By Rob Moritz
Arkansas News Bureau

LITTLE ROCK — Attorney General Dustin McDaniel on Tuesday urged the three Pulaski County school districts to consider his proposal to end the state’s $60 million annual payments in the long-running desegregation case because they might not like the outcome if the issue goes to court.

McDaniel told state legislators his offer would wean the districts off state funding for desegregation programs over a seven-year period, while a federal judge could stop payments immediately.

He said he is working on the assumption that the issue will be decided in court.

“If one is going to have an amicable resolution of testy litigation, I think that it is wise to offer more in the settlement than you absolutely think you will be held to in trial,” McDaniel told the Public School Desegregation Lawsuit Resolution Task Force.

“If we have to push this the hard way, a short wind down (in funding), less money, a hard resolution at trial, and if we wind up having to (take over the districts), we just do, that may very well be the position that we take,” he said. “That’s not the position we’re taking now, because I find the carrot to be a better approach to take than the stick will be later.”

A status hearing in the Pulaski County school desegregation case is set for Sept. 30.

Under the attorney general’s proposal, the state would maintain desegregation funding at the current level for the first year of the seven-year plan. During years two, three and four the payments would be reduced by $4 million a year.
State funding would be reduced another $4.25 million in each of the final years.

Little Rock School District attorney Chris Heller told reporters after the meeting he plans to present the proposal to the school board Thursday.

“Everybody is talking about how they want to end the payments without any discussion about what the reason is for these payments in the first place,” Heller said.

In 1989, the state agreed to a settlement in a lawsuit that claimed the state did too little to desegregate Little Rock area schools.

The settlement called for annual state payments to the districts to help fund programs designed to foster desegregation of schools, such as allowing students to transfer to districts where their race is in the minority or from assigned districts to magnet schools offering enhanced courses.

After 20 years, the state payout is approaching $900 million.

Heller said Tuesday the Little Rock district must decide whether it can continue to meet federal desegregation requirements without the funding. Another question the board must answer, he said, is what would the loss of funding mean for students and schools.

“What will be that racial composition of the schools, what will be the socioeconomic composition of the schools?” he said.
Lawmakers attending the meeting urged McDaniel to move quickly.

“I thought your settlement offer was … fair,” said Sen. Robert Thompson, D-Paragould. “I think if the school districts accept it, it would be, at least from this senator’s perspective, an acceptable outcome for the state.”

The proposal would provide finality while allowing the three school districts some way to adjust their budgets to an incremental loss of desegregation funding over several years, he said.

In April, a federal appeals court declared the Little Rock School District desegregated. The North Little Rock and Pulaski County districts remain under federal monitoring.

At a legislative meeting in July, state lawmakers expressed frustration over what they perceived as a lack of progress in ending the state’s financial involvement in the case.

McDaniel told the committee progress is being made and he assured the panel his goal is to ultimately end state payments to the districts.