U-46 candidates advocate lawsuit settlement without outside control

A majority of Elgin Area School District U-46 board candidates said this week that they hope for settlement without court-monitored control in the costly racial bias suit pending against the district.

At a Tuesday League of Women Voters candidate's forum, moderator Barbara Mulliken asked five candidates running for three, 4-year seats about their ideas for ending the suit that stemmed from the district's decision to redraw boundaries in 2004. The sixth candidate, Ed Stade, did not participate in the forum.

The class-action suit, first filed by a group of Elgin families in February 2005, charges that the new boundaries violated the constitutional rights of black and Hispanic students by placing them in crowded, older schools; busing them farther and more often than white students; and providing them inferior educational opportunities.

To date, it has cost the district more than $6.7 million in legal fees.

"Obviously, the end to the lawsuit will be the result of some type of settlement," said Joyce Fountain, a member of the school board since 1993. "The board has continued to pursue settlement. The challenge has always been what will the terms be."

U-46, she said, "has seen what has happened to surrounding districts who have settled lawsuits and had their hands shackled."

Of the desegregation lawsuits affecting Illinois school districts in recent years, the most notable is Rockford's 15-year legal morass, which during the 1990s drove hundreds of families into private schools, sharply divided the city and cost taxpayers $250 million.

Donna Smith, a board member since 2001, agreed with Fountain, also noting "there's a lot of behind-the-scenes information that can't be talked about."

Dale Spencer, who joined the board in 2005, said "We may look as a board to be stubborn. But you have to understand we are stewards of the community ... We are not going to be controlled by an outside entity. We need to be realistic."

Challengers Gary Percy and Kevin Echevarria, both of Elgin, conceded that incumbents are privy to more inside information about the topic.

Percy said he believes the key to a fair settlement is two-way communication. "I think both sides have the best interests of the kids at heart, but unfortunately, they're probably talking past the kids and each other."

Representatives from the Elgin families suing and the U-46 board of education, Superintendent Jose Torres and legal counsel Pat Broncato sat down for an initial four-hour settlement talk Dec. 15.

No agreement has yet been reached; nor has Magistrate Judge Michael T. Mason set a date for another conference.

Judge Robert W. Gettleman, who oversees the case, said in January that if the parties fail to come to an agreement this spring, he plans to order them at a July 7 hearing to begin preparing for trial.

"The only people making money off to this are the lawyers on both sides," Echevarria said. "We need to look for resolution, but we can't have outside control. ... I would say we need to watch ourselves so this doesn't happen again."

Tuesday's forum was the last for candidates before the April 7 election.