Charter schools grow more popular, lawsuits follow

A Sacramento judge has granted permissive intervention to the Sutter County superintendent of schools in a challenge to a new "nonclassroom" charter school that opened last year. The case is one of several recently filed involving online charter schools, several of which have expanded their enrollments because many traditional public schools remain closed.

The Yuba City School District sued last summer to force the closure of Sutter County Pathways Charter School. The district said the Sutter County Board of Education did not have the authority to approve the school and violated a moratorium on new nonclassroom charters. Yuba City Unified School District v. Sutter County Board of Education, 34-2020-80003502-CU-WM-GDS, (Sac. Super. Ct., filed June 2, 2020).

In its complaint, the district said that under the state Education Code the board of education can only approve charter schools that serve a particular subset of students, such as occupational schools or those for dropouts. Only the district can approve charters serving the general student population, the complaint stated. The district also asserted the board approved the Pathways School without proper meetings for public input and that it engaged in a conflict of interest.

Finally, the complaint filed by attorneys with Dannis Woliver Kelley in Long Beach said the new school violated a two-year moratorium on "nonclassroom" charter schools passed last year as part of AB 1505. Last year, the district requested and received an unopposed motion to change venues in the case from Sutter to Sacramento County.

In December, attorneys for Sutter County Superintendent Tom Reusser moved to intervene as a real party in interest. In a declaration filed last month, Reusser said he is a separate entity from the board, in charge of administering and operating Pathways and another charter school. The district opposed, arguing Reusser's interest in the case was indirect and that his intervention would impermissibly expand the case's scope.

Sacramento Superior Court Judge James P. Arguelles disagreed. In his tentative ruling, he found the "superintendent's interests are sufficiently immediate and direct to support permissive intervention." Arguelles also rejected the district's arguments that Reusser should not be permitted to intervene because their attorneys represented him in another case.

"The superintendent does not assert that the district's counsel represented him in connection with Pathways or the charter," the judge wrote. "Moreover, the superintendent promises that he will not move to disqualify the district's counsel in this case."

"Primarily our concern with his intervention in this case was the potential conflict," said Keith A. Yeomans, representing the district as special counsel with Dannis Woliver Kelley, during a brief virtual hearing Friday morning. "To the extent that the Sutter County superintendent, as well as the board, are willing to state on the record and represent they are not planning to bring the issue of the conflict before these proceedings, then we will submit on the tentative."

Erin M. Hamor, representing the superintendent as a partner with Lozano Smith in Sacramento, affirmed her side would not seek to disqualify opposing counsel.

"If something were to change later on ... I guess you could just bring a motion for reconsideration," Arguelles replied. "If there was a conflict, I probably wouldn't have granted the motion."

The case is one of several pending that could shape the relationship between charters and more traditional schools in the future. Last fall, a coalition of charters, students and parents sued the state targeting a pair of related bill, SB 98 and SB 820, "that specifically defund the educations of public school students newly enrolling in public charter schools that specialize in providing at-home/remote or hybrid learning."

Arguelles granted class status in that case last week. Reyes v. California, 34-2020-80003489-CU-WM-GDS (Sac. Super. Ct., filed Sept. 24, 2020).

Some critics of charter schools have said these institutions are harder to police for fraud and other wrongdoing. In February, two men pleaded guilty to fraud in a scheme in which they bilked the state by enrolling fake students in a charter school in San Diego. People v. McManus, SCD266439 (S.D. Super. Ct., filed May 17, 2019).