California Visit by Michael Rebell to Discuss Litigation and the National Adequacy Movement

In February of 2005, the Campaign for Fiscal Equity’s Executive Director and Counsel, Michael Rebell, visited California for productive meetings with two powerful groups involved with national and statewide educational concerns.

Rebell’s first meeting was organized by the California School Boards Association in light of the current political crisis over education funding in the state. The dramatic cuts in education funding that the governor recently announced has led the School Boards Association, in conjunction with the California Teacher’s Association, and a number of other advocacy groups, to consider various options for public engagement and litigation as solutions to the crisis. Rebell was called on to relate his experience litigating and conducting public engagement in New York as well as the knowledge ACCESS has gained regarding litigation and public engagement nationwide, and to reflect upon the potential relevance of that knowledge to California.

The second meeting Rebell attended was organized by faculty members at the University of California at Berkeley’s School of Law. These faculty members are embarking on a project entitled “Rethinking Rodriguez,” which hopes to reconsider San Antonio School District v. Rodriguez in the context of the equity and adequacy lawsuits that have transpired in subsequent decades. Rodriguez was the 1973 school funding equity lawsuit, in which the U.S. Supreme Court held that there was no federal constitutional responsibility to provide adequate and equitable education, sending all subsequent school funding litigations into state courts. The group will bring in a number of academics, primarily from California, to address many of the topics relevant to the National Education Adequacy Movement. Rebell updated the group on New York’s adequacy lawsuit, Campaign for Fiscal Equity v. State, and also outlined the goals and challenges of the national movement. Such collaboration sets a hopeful precedent for continued involvement of academic and legal experts in the National Movement.

Rebell’s trip was part of the ongoing effort by CFE, and its national ACCESS Network, to reach out to advocates and litigators in other states considering adequacy lawsuits and related efforts. This endeavor has most recently taken Rebell to Massachusetts and Georgia, in addition to California.