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JudgeD'Apolito to make distress commission decision early next week
By Denise Dick
YOUNGSTOWN
A decision is expected early next week on the city school board president’s appointment to the academic distress commission.
“I’ll make my ruling in writing by early next week,” Judge Lou A. D’Apolito of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court said Thursday.
The judge heard arguments from attorneys for the Youngstown City Schools teachers union, school board President Brenda Kimble and the Ohio Attorney General’s Office.
The new city school district academic distress commission, established by legislation called the Youngstown Plan, will appoint a state-paid chief executive officer to manage and operate the school district.
Under the plan, the commission is to have five members: three, including the chairman or chairwoman, appointed by the state superintendent; one by the mayor; and one – a teacher – by the school board president.
Kimble appointed Carol Staten, a retired principal who recently was tapped to be principal of Discovery Transitions to Careers at Volney.
The Youngstown Education Association disagreed, saying the appointee should be an active classroom teacher, and filed a lawsuit to challenge it.
In the meantime, the commission cannot meet until the issue is resolved.
A magistrate agreed with the teachers union and directed Kimble to appoint an active teacher.
Attorneys for both Kimble and the Ohio Attorney General’s Office disagreed.
Atty. Ted Roberts, representing Kimble, and Michael Fisher, an assistant attorney general, contend that the YEA doesn’t have standing to bring the suit.
To have standing, the union would have to show it would be irreparably harmed, Roberts said.
The judge asked who would have standing. Roberts said the commission, but that panel hasn’t challenged Staten’s appointment.
“How mechanically would that be done?” Judge D’Apolito asked.
Would the full commission have to challenge it, some members or something else? he queried.
“When does it actually become a commission capable to do anything?” the judge added.
Roberts said that right now, none of the five members has been seated, so the commission is inactive.
Roberts also maintains that Staten is a teacher. She’s a licensed teacher in Ohio, she works for the city schools, she interacts daily with both students and staff and addresses curriculum. He disputes the magistrate’s opinion that a teacher is “someone whose occupation is teaching others, especially children.”
Judge D’Apolito said the magistrate, Daniel Dascenzo, used the simplest meaning of teacher in making his decision.
“I don’t see how that could be wrong,” the judge said.
He said Staten’s duties sound more like those of an administrator than a classroom teacher.
Fisher said the YEA doesn’t have standing to bring the case because there are district teachers who pay fair-share dues rather than union dues. Although they’re not voting members, they are still covered by the contract.
The union would be harmed only if the commission would take action that was irreversible, so the four members whose appointment isn’t in dispute should be able to meet to begin their work, Fisher argued.
Students of the district “are losing another school year if we don’t move soon,” Fisher said.
Judge D’Apolito said there isn’t a commission before all members are appointed.
Atty. Charles Oldfield, who represents the YEA, said the union has standing to bring the case. There are about 500 teachers, and only about 10 are fair-share payers. If Kimble appoints a teacher, it likely will be a YEA member.
The commission shouldn’t be able to meet, Oldfield argued, because the union could be harmed. Once a CEO is appointed, that person will determine class sizes and hire and fire administrators among other duties. Those actions would be irreversible, he said.
“That’s not going to be undone,” Oldfield said.