Sheff v. O’Neill Agreement Reached

Plaintiffs in Sheff v. O’Neill have announced that the parties have reached an interim agreement in the historic, 14-year-old litigation. The agreement was reached in settlement of plaintiffs’ December 2000 motion charging the state with making insufficient progress to address the constitutional deficiencies set out in the 1996 decision by the Connecticut Supreme Court. The 1996 decision had declared that the system of public education in Hartford and the Hartford region deprived school children of their right to a substantially equal education as guaranteed by the Connecticut Constitution.

Elizabeth Horton Sheff, whose 24-year-old son Milo was one of the original plaintiffs in the case at age 10, said: "After struggling for 14 years to achieve equal educational opportunity, we think that this agreement has the potential to be a significant first step toward that goal."

The agreement calls for the tripling of the number of Hartford African-American and Latino students in desegregated educational settings within four years through the implementation of a start-up plan. Specific elements of the plan include:

• Creating a timetable under which two new interdistrict magnet schools will be added in Hartford each year over the next four years.

• Providing resources for the Project Choice program in order to double the number of students in the program to 1,600 students.

• Engaging the state Department of Education and Hartford Public Schools in an ambitious planning program to create desegregated educational opportunities.

• Evaluating the results of the state’s efforts during the first four years to determine what additional actions should be taken in future years.

• Establishing a definition of what constitutes a desegregated school.

Philip Tegeler, CCLU’s Legal Director, said "in order to succeed in this plan, the state will need to work with Hartford to create new magnet schools of the same high caliber we have seen at the Learning Corridor. Now is the time to start to bring these programs to scale."

Dennis Parker of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. said: "All of the parties have made compromises in order to reach an agreement which holds the promise of reducing racial and ethnic isolation in the Hartford area schools. At a time when there is a disturbing trend of resegregation of American schools, we are pleased that the State of Connecticut has expressed a willingness to take steps to provide a quality, desegregated education for all of its students in the Hartford metropolitan area."

Wesley Horton, a private lawyer representing the plaintiffs, noted: "The parties have been engaged in extensive negotiations for the past seven months. Neither side got everything they wanted, but the result is fair to everyone in Connecticut, and is a major step forward in addressing the very difficult problem of de facto segregation in the Hartford area public schools."

For more info call Elizabeth Horton Sheff or the Sheff attorneys today at 860-247-9823, ext 211.