Cranston School District Owes ACLU $173,000

That number hurts… I wonder what will happen to poor Jessica now that the schools are losing money “because of her”? Because so far these guy have been sore losers, and now that “her bad” will impact funding of their schools, it could get really ugly. Yeah, the schools deserve it, but the people writing death threats won’t see it that way.

“The adminstrators in that district cared more about their public display
of religion than the education of the children. They deserve to pay a
penalty for that.”

It’s a pity it will be the taxpayers footing the bill, not those responsible.

“The adminstrators in that district cared more about their public display
of religion than the education of the children. They deserve to pay a 
penalty for that.”
Yes, and the administrators should pay it.

 This is a great idea, Zachary.  I know that collecting money via PayPal for donations is fraught with perils and, as a web professional, I’m embarrassed to admit that I’m not sure what a better solution would be.  I’m going to investigate moving forward on this one and see what comes of it.

 Yup.

What it would appear that is needed actually exists in British law (but probably not in US law):
In the United Kingdom a public servant, for example a local government officer, who has unlawfully spent public funds, or caused loss to a public authority through misconduct may be surcharged to recover public money.  In the case of an illegal corporate decision by an elected body all the councillors may be surcharged.
(It has to go through the Audit Commission first, and it’s only reached that level with a couple of cases, in one of which five councillors were surcharged £36.1 million for selling council-owned houses to people who would “vote the right way” at below market prices. They did recover about £12.3 million of it).

For those of a legal persuasion, the relevant legislation is the Local Government Act 2000, amending the Audit Commission Act 1998

I’m with gksi.  The ACLU’s attorney fees are like punitive damages.  If they’d billed them every cent not only would it deter that conduct from this school district but from others also.

They bought their tickets, they knew what they were getting into. I say, let ’em crash.

Did that include fees and the damages asked for?  I know it was a small amount that was asked for, but the judge could make it whatever he wants.  This could end up costing over $200k.  Maybe the judge will figure into the damages the environment created by the school board and add enough for Jessica to go find a nice non-religious private school.

It is unrealistic to think that the parties responsible will learn anything. The legal fees are being taken out of the city school budget, not the pockets of the committee members who decided to fight the suit. The only consequences that will teach them a thing, would have to come from the voters. In the meantime, I don’t wish to see the students of Cranston losing out in even this marginal way, for the simple fact of their dumb luck at being residents in a district run by ideologues.

Correct me if I’m wrong, but we don’t actually have legislation that specifically says that public schools may not post 10 commandments, prayers or otherwise endorse religion, right? Assuming that is true and judges decide these cases based on the establishment clause and other court cases, it would seem that having legislation that clearly states that
schools may not post prayers, ten commandments or anything else
promoting religion might be worthwhile. Would it be redundant? Yes. Would it prevent school districts
from thinking they could actually win these cases? Maybe. It’s not like they have better things to do (re-affirming “In God We Trust”, Making 2012 the “year of the bible”, etc.)

The people that are directly responsible for letting this go to court should be fired. They wasted a lot of time and money on something they knew they would loose.

Hopefully this will be a serve as a stern warning to other schools.

Aw, poor school district.  Maybe we should send them some flowers from a local florist?  😛

Nah!

It’s sad that desperately needed education might take a dip, but these people knew the risks. The community were well informed, and so were the students. The vast majority of them flagrantly tossed it aside. I’m glad they are facing the consequences. And if they appeal, I’ll be happy to see them facing an even larger bill. When people refuse to be reasonable, this kind of recourse should be the only option. Do they want a good education for their kids or do they want to keep trying to pushing their religion onto all students? They can’t have both.

On the one hand, if the ACLU charged every penny they could, I don’t know that that would be a good thing. By handing in a reasonable charge, the ACLU makes it clear that they are standing for principle, not trying to turn a profit, and considering how much they are hated by so many people that’s probably a wise stance to hold.

On the other hand, I am increasingly skeptical of the idea that it’s a good thing to throw money at public schools. Not because I doubt that there’s a link between funding and performance but because I doubt that most school boards are even capable of spending money wisely on things which will benefit students. Too much funding goes into technology, not enough into more (and better-qualified) teachers. I went to schools which had practically no computers, outdated textbooks, and no Smart Boards or other high-tech gadgetry, and somehow I managed to learn the subject matter being taught. Why, I even dimly recall taking AP tests and earning a bunch of college credit by the end of high school. I suspect that a bunch of ninnies like the Cranston school board would spend this cash on a new computer lab and a retreat for the High School Seniors, or something equally useless, and that the kids will be no better or worse off than they otherwise might be.

(Then again, people as moronic as these have proven to be a perfectly capable of firing a few teachers to fund a new computer lab and a retreat, so who knows? It would be interesting to see what their budgets look like for the next few years, as compared for the previous few, although obviously we can’t do that yet.)

I might have felt sorry for the kids, but the way most of them have reacted has lost any sympathy.

I’m afraid I don’t agree with your reasoning. The administrators who made the decision to fight the suit — and to stick to their guns about the banner when the problem was first brought to their attention — didn’t make a cost-benefit analysis of the kind you describe. They didn’t think, hey, this fight is worth the cost. They thought, hey, we won’t allow ourselves to be pushed around like this. The costs didn’t factor into their thinking — that’s the nature of the unreason that comes with a privileged status. Likewise, other school districts aren’t going to decide to defend SOCAS violations based on the outcome of this case — though their lawyers might advise them to take such facts into consideration.

You’re not wrong when you describe the scenario as “it will cost you nothing but a bit of time.” It isn’t the pols money being put up at risk — it’s the school district’s. As far as the pols are concerned, it’s play money for the board game called Us vs Them. They won’t learn anything from this suit and the judge’s decision against them, one way or another, whether the district pays the ACLU, or if the money comes from elsewhere. The law is not an instrument to teach lessons! It is a means to protect all of us from the abuses of power. The prayer banner was an abuse of power, and the law instructed the school to remove it: the abuse of power has been ameliorated. Now, the law says, pay the other side’s legal bill. This aspect of the law is meant to deter future such abuses, but I believe the ideologues involved in such cases are immune to this deterrent effect. If they were reasonable people, the matter would have been resolved before it came to trial.

In short: the only way to protect Cranston schoolchildren from the poor decisions of the school board, is to remove the school board. These people, by their actions, have shown that they’re not qualified. Forcing the school committee to sign a check to the ACLU won’t teach them anything — remember, they’re not susceptible to reasonable arguments — but it will deprive the students of the educational benefits that money might have purchased for them.

I say we raise the money and pay the bill. Our interest is not in teaching lessons, and is especially not in wasting our time trying to teaching a lesson to people who can’t that way. The occasion for the lawsuit was to protect the school environment from the undue influence of sectarian views; the occasion for paying the bill is to avoid taking money away from education in order to pay for the foolishness of school administrators.

You want to send a message? Find out how to replace the school committee members, as quickly as possible. Write op-eds, support a campaign; don’t spend time arguing with a guy online that these fools ‘have it coming’ and that they should get their just desserts.

Meanwhile, I’m going to keep stumping for a funds drive. I’m not comfortable with the money for this decision coming out of the education fund. Call me naive, but I’d like to do everything possible to mitigate the damage this bunch of jokers can inflict on the students of Cranston.

Yes.   If anyone has money to donate, the ACLU could still use it.  As could AU and FFRF.

I JUST renewed my AU membership, and am really looking forward to getting a copy of “The Lord Is Not On Trial Here Today” as a gift.

Annie, your post has got me thinking. Here’s a solution: how about we raise monies to cover these legal costs, and then offer them to the district… CONTINGENT on the school committee members pledging that they won’t run again for public office. Whatever they learn or don’t learn from this conflict, they won’t again muck up the running of government with their ninnyness, and the students won’t have to pay the price for belonging to a district infected with ninnyism.

What do people think? Do we offer to cover the fees, if the school committee pledges to get out of public service? Perhaps we could offer to cover a portion of the costs, proportional to the number of committee members who so pledge.

It would be good to know what the timeline for payment is; whether the school district has some kind of legal insurance which would cover the costs anyway; and whether the committee members can be removed from their positions for incompetence.

I would REALLY like it if the ACLU, FFRF and other groups that stand up for cases like this would make a habit of going to the school board and town council meetings and issuing a ‘double-dog dare’ to the folks on the board: “If you’re so certain you’re going to win, sign this statement that, if–and when–you do lose, you will indemnify the school district against any damages awarded or lawyer fees paid as a result.”  Call them out in public, and make it absolutely clear that they’re burning taxpayer money on an altar to Jehovah.

So refreshing, an opinion piece on the Cranston situation from The Nebraskan. I read it and though, oh my goodness, someone has a working brain!

http://www.dailynebraskan.com/opinion/root-harassment-based-on-faith-shows-hypocrisy-1.2692964#.TymbmYFlySp

I admire your enthusiasm and concern for the student body Zachary, I really do, but unfortunately, I’m not as optimistic as you that the next crop of school board members would be any better than the current ones.  Some others have wrote that without the financial penalty, it is unlikely that the school board will be deterred from blatantly disregarding the law in the future.  As sad as it is that the students are the ones that will suffer from the board’s decisions, I don’t know a way around it.  Perhaps it will take student athletes wearing last year’s uniforms, or no homecoming pep rally to help parents and the student body realize that the board did not have their best interests at heart when they entered into the lawsuit. 

As a teacher and parent myself, the above isn’t easy for me to say.  I would be willing to donate money for a traveling museum exhibit or some other educational opportunity for the students of Cranston, but sadly, once people knew who was paying for it, my guess is they would boycott. 

I just read all of these comments, so I’m going to let it all ruminate for a bit…  Keep thinking- you seem to have good ideas and a big heart.

The taxpayers are also the voters, and ultimately they are the ones responsible. The school board didn’t appoint itself.

Boy this commenting software really sucks.  But anyways…

If you pay off this school’s debts then there are absolutely no consequences for the school board.  None, zip, not a bit.  In fact, they’ll look at it as some sort of moral victory.  And since I’m not anywhere near that district, I have no vote, nor say on the matter.

In the best case these people will be voted out.  The question is, what will motivate the voters?  Education on this subject is best.  Make it known how obvious the decision in this case was from the get-go.  They had no chance, they chose to fight, they lost, now the school will suffer.  Yes it hurts the kids, but it’s a short term problem.  

I’m sure there are other cases where schools have backed off religious stuff because of the precedents their lawyers told them about.  Now you want to set a new precedent, one where there is no financial penalty to the people/organizations doing illegal things, just hurt feelings.  They’ll see this as another reason to try and try again, they may lose, but it’s the “libs” who’ll pay.  They’ll be having a good laugh at that.  

I agree. But they get to spin it however they want. What we need is people who call out poor reporting and dig up the real data. Then include that in a “letter to the editor” of the local paper.

While chipping in would seem to help the situation, it really doesn’t. The school’s response is quite predictable.

They wasted tax-payer money to fight it and now they will turn around and point fingers at the ACLU attempting, in your case it seems successfully, to paint the ACLU as the bad guys.
It is an expensive lesson but it is important that they take it. Paying for them will teach them nothing.

I believe the school’s lawyers didn’t charge them–making free legal help the most expensive kind.

The ACLU specifically charged something like a tenth of what the school’s legal defenders did in a zoning case they won.

Fees are not like punitive damages. They are to cover actual costs. Punitive damages are excess awards to further punish defendants that refuse to change when standard fees are imposed.

Let’s not jump to the conclusion that “the whole town” is represented by the vile ones. “Where’s the data”, we as rationalists might ask. Look at what Jessica Ahlquist herself said at the end of that NYTimes article — “It’s for their own good.” Let’s follow her cue, and set aside the (natural enough) impulse to be vindictive.

I encourage you to hold fast to your sympathy! There are students who supported the suit and the position it represents; we don’t hear much from them, given the media bias (though, even so, we don’t know if they are many or few). There are students who are spouting bigotry… BUT they are simply acting out the influence of their bigoted home lives, and shouldn’t be given some quarter. Then there are the students who have worked out for themselves that supporters of the banner’s removal are evil; and for these teens who have been infected by hate, we can still spare some sympathy.

I think we know enough at present about the way beliefs and attitudes are formed, not to act out the old vindictive scripts. To hell with the idea that “Love thy enemy as thyself” is a Christian notion — I’m a nonbeliever to the bone, and I say, this is as humanistic and rational a principle as any.

Which is not to say that holding out sympathy for bigots means, somehow, that I respect their bigotry; or that I intend to let bigoted behavior limit my freedoms.

“If you pay off this school’s debts then there are absolutely no
consequences for the school board.”

And yet if the school district pays off the debt, it is BOTH the
committee, and the students, which will have to pay: the committee with
their jobs (perhaps?),  the students with the loss of that bit of
funding.

Let’s try to be creative and come up with something which doesn’t come
at the cost of the students. Even the lousy ones who vented all their
unthinking religionist spleen on their classmate…

“The question is, what
will motivate the voters? Education on this subject is best.”

That’s optimistic (which is not a criticism). I suggested elsewhere in
this thread, that we motivate them with money, as well: we’ll pay the
costs, if the school committee members agree to step down. I wonder what
the community response would be then?

“Now you want to set a new precedent, one where there is no financial
penalty to the people/organizations doing illegal things, just hurt
feelings.”
I’m really surprised at how this point keeps being repeated.

The COMMITTEE is not on the book to pay the fees — the DISTRICT is. And in the zero-sum game, that means, the money is being taken out of the education budget. That’s the kind of damage to the non-responsible parties (the students) that I’d like to see if we can mitigate

“They’ll see this as another reason to try and try again, they
may lose, but it’s the “libs” who’ll pay.  They’ll be having a good
laugh at that.”
I give exactly not one shit what the ninnies are laughing at. It was easy enough for the committee to expose the district to this liability, because it wasn’t their money. So now the students pay.

Well, no. Let’s see  can do better than that.

My blue-sky, best-case scenario would see a new committee, staffed by Cranston residents who aren’t as likely to put their own ignorant identity politics ahead of the students’ best interest; the addition of SOCAS material to the curriculum (great local color!); and the students to know that there are people out there (out here… )who are willing to defend their right to a public school education free from sectarian influence, even to the point of paying the legal fees for their idiot administrators.

It’s a line from ‘Airplane.’

“I don’t think you could argue that these cases changed the minds of
those involved, which was my point about “teaching them a lesson.” “

I couldn’t care less where someone’s mind is at, and know damn well that changing minds takes time. Your solution isn’t accomplishing it either, nor even coming close – if that’s your concern as you say, you need to try a lot harder than that. But I’m very much in favor of establishing firm consequences for acting on beliefs when they’re detrimental to society, and that’s an important step in maintaining the social order that is law’s primary function.

“I think rather that it was the case law attested in these decisions, and
not the financial consequences, which serves the deterrent function.”

Pick one side and stick with it. You just said that there was no deterrent for ideologues.

“Above, thinking more on this, I suggested that we offer to cover the
cost of the district’s bill to the ACLU, *on the condition that* the
school administrators involved in the decision to defend the banner,
either step down from their post, or if that’s impractical, pledge not
to serve in the future in the school system.”

Sorry, that simply sounds like either a bribe or extortion to me, and I doubt it would be seen favorably by the district. Outsiders setting terms of behavior for any community isn’t going to go over well – hell, too many in this country couldn’t even handle France condemning the invasion of Iraq.

You’re also ignoring that the terms for a deal had already been set, by the initial complaint of the ACLU – this ruling came about solely because of the board’s refusal (and failure to recognize their responsibilities as a board.) There really isn’t any point in continuing to offer deals, and the only message that it sends is that no one is really going to follow through.

I’m not faulting you for thinking of the kids, but let’s be real – their education has already been seriously compromised by countless actions from past administrations (and inactions from the current one) – this is a drop in the bucket. Some lessons, unfortunately, are hard ones, but only because no one heeded the easy ones. The voters need to be pissed. I’m just wondering how few will ever recognize that they got their panties in a twist over an incredibly lame, vapid prayer. Seriously, if you thought it was that important, scribble it on a note in your kid’s lunch…

I much prefer Dwayne_Windham’s idea.

Funding a new curriculum is fine, but paying an elected school board to stand down smacks of bribery.

I will not deliver to this person.

Regardless of whether anything comes of this specific idea, here’s what I’ve found out perusing the terms of services for PayPal and Google Checkout. 

Both of them actually pretty much indicate that the collection of money via their services for the purposes of donations by anything other than a 501(c)(3) is against the ToS.  I read one account of a person collecting fees for a local soccer league and had the ability to pay X for a ticket but you could pay X+Y to help subsidize others’ tickets.  They called “Y” a donation and Google had to ask them to change the language on the site or have their account locked. 

If you are a 501(c)(3) both of them charge about 3% + $0.30 as a fee for their services.

The big difference seems to be that PayPal stores your money in their accounts while the Google Checkout system simple passes the money through to an existing bank account.  In that way Google only facilitates the transfer of funds and doesn’t actually store them in anyway. 

So, for 501(c)(3), money collection is pretty straightforward using tools that people are familiar with.  But, without that, things get a little murky.  You could do things like set up a kickstarter page hoping to raise $1 since you can keep the money above that which you target.  However, I didn’t read their ToS too carefully and, thus, they might also preclude donations in some way.

The best thing to do, it seems, is to just open up a “real” checking account with no minimum balance and set up a payment gateway through something like authorize.net so you could collect credit card payments yourself, but that’s beyond what most people can probably do, technically speaking. It’s a shame, but after noodling around online for quite some time yesterday, I really didn’t find a good way to make this happen.

@Zachary_Bos:disqus: Feel free to drop me a line at facebook if you want to chat further about this. 

You are basically arguing against everyone on this page. Maybe you should step back and just agree to disagree. People need to learn from their mistakes.
What better way to teach them than by hitting them in their wallets. That will definitely make them and others think twice when and if something like this comes up again.

AFAIK,  most school boards are elected, so they can’t be fired. Most work at other jobs and are paid only a token salary, so the threat of  “throwing them out in the next election” doesn’t carry a lot of weight, unless they are serving for some  other reasons.
The Cranston’s school boards intransigence over editing the xtian bits out of the prayer implies, to me, that some of them are on the board as xtian “moles”, bent on xtianizing the school.
After the failure to influence federal laws, this is the new fundie tactic – take over local and state government bodies and weasel in as much xtianity as possible. It is why we are seeing so many states pass CreoID laws.  They are packing state governments and school boards.
A few days ago, Hemant posted a video of Jessica talking about the aftermath of the court decision, including a video of a board meeting where people were demanding for an appeal to be filed. 
While I hate to see kids suffer, getting a nice big bill for court costs might be enough to dissuade them from mounting an  appeal. It also is a big lesson to school boards in the rest of the country that they are grabbing a tiger by the tail when they try to put religion in the schools.

They should have demanded the resignation of the entire school board in order to redeem the discount and charged full price otherwise. Prove to the entire city that the board values its power more than the well being of the students.

Do you think that having to pay these fees will actually make a difference in the kid’s education?  I don’t.  

Thanks for the link–that was one of  the best articles I’ve read on this story.