Let me first give you the basics from the Baton Rouge newspaper:

http://www.2theadvocate.com/news/47271792.html

Tangipahoa school desegregation hearing set

By DAVID J. MITCHELL
Advocate Florida parishes bureau
Published: Jun 9, 2009 - Page: 4B

NEW ORLEANS — A federal judge has ordered a one-day hearing June 30 to hear arguments and testimony on the Tangipahoa Parish School Board’s nearly $200 million proposal to end a 44-year-old desegregation lawsuit.

Pressing plaintiffs’ attorneys to reach a point where a decision could be made on the proposal, U.S. District Judge Ivan L.R. Lemelle agreed to give both sides time to prepare and depose witnesses for the 9 a.m. hearing.

Lemelle also allowed the plaintiffs to hire desegregation expert Leonard Stevens, of Sarasota, Fla., to review the School Board plan but gave him a short timeframe. Stevens must provide his review of the 268-page revised proposal and the outlines of any alternative by June 20, Lemelle ordered.

The ruling came after two hours of arguments in open court and about 40 minutes with attorneys in chambers — after a 30-minute recess.

School attorneys, who had witnesses ready to testify Monday, had argued for an expedited hearing in pleadings and claimed the plaintiffs’ expert request was a delay tactic.

School officials are trying to get the sales and property taxes backing the plan on the ballot Oct. 17 and need a ruling by July 15. The School Board has until June 25 to respond to Stevens’ review.

In discussions with lead plaintiffs’ attorney Nelson Taylor before the ruling, Lemelle said he had no problem with the desegregation expert but wanted things done now and not later as in the past with the case.

“A lot of things were said, ‘OK, let’s do it later,’” Lemelle told Taylor, who has represented the plaintiffs since the early 1970s and argued Monday he was not ready to present evidence.

“We just want a fair chance,” Taylor responded a bit later.

The School Board proposal calls for $187.4 million in school construction and nearly $12 million annually in operational costs for themed magnet schools that would be a key tool in desegregating schools and improving education quality, school officials have said.

The proposal would require a new 1-cent parishwide sales tax; up to 29.5 mills in new property taxes; and rededication of an existing 1-cent parishwide sales tax renewed in 2007.

In court papers, Taylor has called the School Board’s proposal “a massive building plan” that does not do enough to desegregate.

Lemelle opened discussion of the plan Monday by questioning lead school desegregation attorney Charles Patin Jr. about the proposal’s voluntary nature since courts rejected voluntary desegregation plans in the ’60s.

Lemelle also asked how the School Board arrived at desegregating 17 of 39 schools in the system under the plan, or about 44 percent, versus “20 or 21” schools.

Patin noted first that the plan is not entirely voluntary, making attendance zone changes to further desegregation and allowing special school transfers.

Patin also said that school officials considered neighborhoods in which schools were located and tried to keep children from passing schools in their neighborhoods on the way to their assigned schools.

He said the board did not want to do anything that led to flight by white families and middle- and upper-class black families.

Lemelle noted the court can order the expenditures backing the plan even if the electorate fails to back the taxes. “That’s the last resort, but I hold that card,” he said.

To open the hearing Monday, Lemelle agreed to allow Baton Rouge lawyer Gideon Carter III to withdraw from representing the plaintiffs over what Lemelle called “irreconcilable differences” with Taylor on “matters perhaps dealing with strategy.”



----------------------------
Lemelle, Ivan L. R.
Born 1950 in Opelousas, LA

Federal Judicial Service:
Judge, U. S. District Court, Eastern District of Louisiana
Nominated by William J. Clinton on February 12, 1997, to a seat vacated by Veronica D. Wicker; Confirmed by the Senate on April 3, 1998, and received commission on April 7, 1998.

U.S. Magistrate, U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana, 1984-1998

Education:
Xavier University, Louisiana, B.S., 1971

Loyola University New Orleans School of Law, J.D., 1974

Professional Career:
Law clerk, Hon. Robert Collins, Orleans Parish Criminal District Court, LA, 1972-1974
Assistant district attorney, Parish of New Orleans, LA, 1974-1977
Private practice, New Orleans, LA, 1977-1981
Assistant city attorney, New Orleans, LA, 1977-1978
Assistant state attorney general, Louisiana Department of Justice, 1980-1984

Race or Ethnicity: African American

Gender: Male
----------------------------------

29 mills of new propery tax would mean another $4,700-$5,000 annually for me.
My children were sent to the Catholic School in town and graduated 10 years ago.
I sent them for the uniform dress code (which the public schools later adopted),
the strict discipline (allowing corporal punishment is part of the entry contract),
religious instruction (even though I am protestant, I am Christian), facilities,
music, foreign language, art and advanced level courses. There are scholarships
provided students meeting the grade and citizenship requirements and about
10% of the school is minority (the parish is about 30%).

In this economy there is no way the additional property tax will pass, IMHO.
And, if the judge (who grew up in the same town I did, and is one year younger
than I am) orders the parish school board to spend $200 Million on the plan...
the destruction of the parish system will be complete...or at least every family that
can will send their children to private or parochial schools...and the public system
will be abandoned by most of our population...probably killing any chance for renewals
of the current property and sales taxs. It just doesn't make sense to me...kind of
like destroying a village to save it (Vietnam rhetoric). Xin Loi.

Well...when all else fails go to the pros.

I spent a few minutes with the tax assessor's
folks in our government building this a.m. and
learned that my additional property tax for the
school systems $200 Million construction/busing
plan would be $470 not $4,700.

I forgot assessments are 10% of value after the
$75,000 homestead exemption is deducted. I
also learned that the new millage would replace
the 14 mils we pay now with the 29 mil tax, and not
put an additional 29 mils on.

So, while I really don't care for an additional $470 a
year in property taxes, I could live with it and not
get gutted with 10 times that.

The problem remains however...the two cities in
our parish would have to swap students...as one
is a majority minority and the other is a majority
majority. The competition between the two cities
has always been intense...and I'm not sure either
high school's kids would want to change...and I think
lower level school parents (of means) might take flight.

Thank God my kids are college grads and on their own.

The school board meets tonight to select a five-person panel
to oversee bonding requirements...should the deseg plan
get federal judge approval...so an October election can
be called for the new tax to support the plan. I still
doubt the new tax would pass, but I don't live in fear of it any more.

Since my current school millage is 14 mils my school taxes
would simply double. The funny thing is the poorest districts
in the parish school system would have the greatest increases.

Two districts where there is now no school millage would have to find
$221.25 a year for their new tax; two other districts would see
$183 to $198 increases and the lowest would be $71.

(All these annual figures - above paragraph - based on a $150,000 house.
So, if you have one worth $300,000, simply double the figures.)

Another strange thing: the two districts that passed millages to build new schools
in the past few years could possibly have their kids bused from the new schools in
their districts to more run down ones in districts that rejected construction taxes.
But, after a couple of years...I suppose...the tax would construct newer schools
in those districts...and facilities would even out. Those getting the fickle finger
of fate would be the juniors and seniors in H.S., I suppose.

Ain't social engineering grand.

http://www.hammondstar.com/articles/2009/0...cation/9317.txt

Busing plan proposed: Combined schools are 'easy solution'

By Sylvia Schon

Sunday, July 19, 2009 2:07 PM CDT

NEW ORLEANS -- Combined schools and massive busing are highlights of another desegregation plan
proposed in federal court last week by opponents of the plan tendered by the Tangipahoa Parish School Board.

Former board member Donnie Williams took the witness stand Friday to answer questions about the proposal
he drew up in conjunction with local NAACP President Pat Morris and her associate, Lisa Fredericks.

The plan is titled "Easy Solution - Parrino Plan."

It proposes to divide the parish into north, central and south zones with combined schools in each.

Morris, Fredericks and Williams could not be reached for comment on Saturday.

The plan is not based in reality, according to Alton Lewis, school board attorney who cross-examined Williams on Friday.

"They have done nothing to identify where the students are that are going to have to be bused to these
central high schools and junior highs. They have no concept of how many teachers it would take to achieve
their class-size goals. The site on which they want to put the central high school is 16th section land above
Loranger. There is no water, no sewer and only one road that goes there," Lewis said. "And, they have no
idea of what will be needed to obtain the funds they need to do this program."

Years earlier school board members rejected that site for a new school because the only road leading there
was not safe for school busses, Lewis said.

The plan is similar in concept to the first desegregation plan put into action years ago that combined black and white
schools, which resulted in the desegregation case going back to court because of predominantly black and
predominantly white schools for most of the parish now.

Under the judge's questioning about why Williams thinks this plan would work when the previous one didn't,
Williams said that he didn't think there would be black or white flight this time, according to Lewis.

Under the "Easy Solution" plan, the north zone would close Kentwood High and send high school and junior
high students to Sumner and rename it "North Tangi High." Roseland, O.W. Dillon, Chesborough and Spring
Creek elementary schools would be combined at Chesborough and Spring Creek.

The central zone would combine high schools in Amite, Loranger and Independence to a new school in Loranger
called "Central Tangi High." Junior high students in Amite, Loranger, and Independence would attend school at the
existing Loranger High. Nesom Jr. High students would be included in the latter.

The south zone would combine Hammond and Ponchatoula junior and high schools and Champ Cooper Jr. High.
Hammond High would serve as the high school, called "South Tangi High." Ponchatoula High would become a junior
high with 8th and 9th grade students and Martha Vineyard would house 7th grade students.

No information was available about plans for central or south parish elementary schools.

Lewis said the proposal lacks a great deal of information.

"You're busing all the high and junior high students from Amite, Independence and Nesom to Loranger
and then busing all the Kentwood students to Sumner. You're going to bus kids all over the place in
Hammond and Ponchatoula. But they have no information on what that would cost," Lewis said.

School board member Sandra Bailey-Simmons, who has objected to the plan proposed by the school
board because of its impact on Loranger, said Saturday that she could not comment because she has
not seen the plan proposed by Williams and was not in court on Friday to hear Williams' testimony.

Eric Dangerfield, also a school board members who objects to the school board's proposed plan,
could not be reached for comment on Saturday.

------------------

Another misunderstanding of the social engineers is school pride.
For instance combining Amite and Independence would rip out
a competition that often occurrs with the quarter-semi-or-finals
in state football playoffs.

Hammond and Ponchatoula are also very competative, with Hammond
bigger and usually controling (like an LSU-Tulane rivalry and it is real).

Kentwood, a major small-school football powerhouse, multiple state champs in the
past decade, and a foundation of African-American pride - would be disolved.

Anyway, everybody figures they know what's best...and a judge will decide.

Don't know about all this IH. But I do notice you make an effort to correct yourself when you find out what the truth is. But then I never expected or received less from one such as you.

My interest in our schools is ideological and practical...my kids are long graduated.

But, having worked in and around juvenile justice for decades, I know how
important identity of schools, classes, teams and faculty can be for attendance.
Dropping out is most often a gateway to entry into the legal system, while high
self esteem and success is the promising road to professional satisfaction,
family stability, and community stability.

Social science is as much an art, a feeling, an emotion at it's base and while I'm
a fiscal bean-counter on the macro level, each young person is so individual at the
same time...I think more of them than systems and affiliated groups speaking "for them".

It's part of the definition of Blue Dogs...we are Democrats to the heart...and independent (stubborn) headed.

I wish they'd survey the students and teachers, rather than have attorneys and politicians
decide their lives without their inner-most feelings considered. While I love individuals,
and families (extended as well as biological) the organizations they homogenize into... often leave me stupified.

I'm all for diversity, but not without fairness first. It's not fair to make kids get on a bus and travel to another school so society can be happy that it has done something it hasn't really done.

A good book on this subject is called:

Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?: And Other Conversations about Race
by Beverly Daniel Tatum

Synopsis
Walk into any racially mixed high school and you will see black youth seated together in the cafeteria. Of course, it's not just the black kids sitting together-the white, Latino, Asian Pacific, and, in some regions, American Indian youth are clustered in their own groups, too. The same phenomenon can be observed in college dining halls, faculty lounges, and corporate cafeterias. What is going on here? Is this self-segregation a problem we should try to fix, or a coping strategy we should support? How can we get past our reluctance to talk about racial issues to even discuss it? And what about all the other questions we and our children have about race? Beverly Daniel Tatum, a renowned authority on the psychology of racism, asserts that we do not know how to talk about our racial differences: Whites are afraid of using the wrong words and being perceived as "racist" while parents of color are afraid of exposing their children to painful racial realities too soon. Using real-life examples and the latest research, Tatum presents strong evidence that straight talk about our racial identities-whatever they may be-is essential if we are serious about facilitating communication across racial and ethnic divides. We have waited far too long to begin our conversations about race. This remarkable book, infused with great wisdom and humanity, has already helped hundreds of thousands of readers figure out where to start.


But, here is my controversial solution. There should not be differential in school zones. The state should give the schools the collected funds based on student body size and on actuarial data regarding the cost of upkeep for a school of that age per square foot. This would help to eliminate any kind of flight and the schools would be the same except the money gets bussed and not the children.

Well it has cost the school system $756,378.45 to date...the civil rights law suit.
And, that's just school system attorneys etc. by the time it's over the system
will probably have to pay a similar amount in plaintiff's fees to total - $1.5 million...
meanwhile administrators are fighting new gang issues - and the Catholic H.S.
is adding a wing. The public system expects to have to hire only black administrators and
teachers until a 40% minority level is met (which I don't understand as the parish
is 30% African-American)...civil rights in education circa 2009.