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The Berkeley Unified School District (BUSD) emerged victorious in the American Civil Rights Foundation vs. Berkeley Unified School District lawsuit when Judge Winifred Y. Smith of the Alameda County Superior Court ruled in favor of the school district Monday. 

Sacramento-based Pacific Legal Foundation (PLF) sued Berkeley Unified School District on behalf of the American Civil Rights Foundation in October, charging it with violating California’s Proposition 209 by racially discriminating among students during placements at elementary schools and in programs at Berkeley High. 

“The judge ruled that the student assignment system that we apply in our elementary schools is legal and that our integration system is fair and legal,” said school superintendent Michele Lawrence tto the Planet Tuesday. 

“I think her ruling is consistent with the earlier ruling which had also been in our favor. I hope that Pacific Legal Foundation will now leave Berkeley alone.” 

Berkeley Unified was sued in 2003 by PLF on behalf of a parent who charged the district with race-based assignment of students in a different and earlier Berkeley program.  

The case was dismissed by Judge James Richman who said that voluntary desegregation plans or ‘race-conscious’ school assignment systems were not specifically prohibited by Prop. 209. 

The assignment system in BUSD lets parents register their first, second and third school choices, and then a computer lottery gives the final placement. The lottery takes into account factors such as race, ethnicity, student background and parental income and education. 

PLF attorney Paul J. Beard said in a statement in October that concerns were the elementary student assignment plan for Berkeley Elementary Schools, the admissions policy for Berkeley High School’s small schools and academic programs, and the admissions policy for Berkeley High School’s AP Pathways Project.  

The lawsuit alleged that BUSD “uses race as a factor to determine where students are assigned to public schools and to determine whether they gain access to special educational programs.” 

“These plans and policies use student’s skin color to help determine how individual students will be treated,” said Beard in the statement. “That’s unfair and transmits a harmful message to our kids that skin color matters—and, under Proposition 209, it also happens to be illegal.” 

Proposition 209, a provision of the California Constitution, was enacted by California voters in 1996 and “prohibits discrimination or preferences based on race or sex in public education, employment, and contracting.” 

“BUSD won two of the three claims,” Beard said in a telephone interview Thursday. “We won the third claim which concerns the admissions policy for the AP Pathways Project. We will go forward with that in the Alameda County Superior Court. Once the trial court adjudicates that we can appeal on the claims we lost. We are confident we will get a victory on the appeals.” 

PLF’s complaint on the Pathways Project alleges that “only students who are African-American, Latino or from a low-income household are selected to the Academic Pathways Project, and students who are not from one of these categories are ineligible.” 

It states that the above allegations are in violation of “Section 31’s ban on discrimination or preference on account of race.” 

The attack on BUSD by PLF last year had come on the 10th Anniversary of Prop. 209.  

Speaking to the Planet in an interview in October, Lawrence said that PLF had used the Berkeley schools to make a “public splash” during the anniversary. 

“BUSD stands firmly by its elementary student assignment plan for Berkeley elementary schools,” she said. 

The school district was trying hard to pass Measure A, a school parcel tax, at that point. 

At the school board meeting Wednesday Board members congratulated each other on the victory. 

“I am pleased that the judge—who went to Berkeley High—ruled in our favor,” said director Nancy Riddle. Board Vice President John Selawsky thanked the law firm of Keker & Van Nest for their pro bono work. which he described as  

“stellar.”