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<DIV>Hooray for Russ. This practice has continued to escalate because
Districts have few alternatives. </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Sue H. </DIV>
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<DIV style="font-color: black"><B>From:</B> <A title=thansen@moscow.com
href="mailto:thansen@moscow.com">Tom Hansen</A> </DIV>
<DIV><B>Sent:</B> Wednesday, October 03, 2012 3:42 PM</DIV>
<DIV><B>To:</B> <A title=vision2020@moscow.com
href="mailto:vision2020@moscow.com">Moscow Vision 2020</A> </DIV>
<DIV><B>Subject:</B> [Vision2020] Idaho Suit Takes On School
Fees</DIV></DIV></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV></DIV>
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<DIV style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto">Courtesy of the Spokesman-Review
at:</DIV>
<DIV style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto"> </DIV>
<DIV style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto">(Registration required)</DIV>
<DIV style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto"><SPAN
style="LINE-HEIGHT: 19px; WHITE-SPACE: nowrap; FONT-SIZE: 15px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: none; -webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(26, 26, 26, 0.296875); -webkit-composition-fill-color: rgba(175, 192, 227, 0.230469); -webkit-composition-frame-color: rgba(77, 128, 180, 0.230469)"><A
href="http://www.spokesman.com/stories/2012/oct/02/idaho-suit-takes-on-school-fees/">http://www.spokesman.com/stories/2012/oct/02/idaho-suit-takes-on-school-fees/</A></SPAN></DIV>
<DIV style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto"> </DIV>
<DIV
style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto">-------------------------------------</DIV>
<DIV style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto"> </DIV>
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<P
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<H1
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size=3><SPAN>Idaho suit takes on school fees</SPAN></FONT></H1>
<H5
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class=subhead><FONT size=3><SPAN>State high court decision in 1970 cited in
challenge</SPAN></FONT></H5>
<P
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style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto">BOISE – A former Idaho school district
superintendent with twin granddaughters in kindergarten is suing the state,
charging that cash-strapped schools are violating the Idaho Constitution by
charging fees for what are supposed to be “free, common schools.”</SPAN></P>
<P
style="BORDER-BOTTOM: 0px; BORDER-LEFT: 0px; PADDING-BOTTOM: 0px; MARGIN: 0px 0px 21px; OUTLINE-STYLE: none; OUTLINE-COLOR: invert; PADDING-LEFT: 0px; OUTLINE-WIDTH: 0px; PADDING-RIGHT: 0px; VERTICAL-ALIGN: baseline; OVERFLOW: visible !important; BORDER-TOP: 0px; BORDER-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-TOP: 0px"><SPAN
style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto">Russ Joki’s granddaughters were each
charged $45 to register for kindergarten this year, and his grandson, a high
school junior, had to pay $85 in fees to enroll at Meridian High. He said a 1970
Idaho Supreme Court decision specifically found educational fees for public
schools unconstitutional. “I don’t think it passes the constitutional test at
all,” Joki said, “and I think someone has to raise that question.”</SPAN></P>
<P
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style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto">His lawsuit was filed Monday afternoon in
4th District Court in Ada County; it seeks class-action status on behalf of all
schoolchildren and parents in the state of Idaho. In addition to Joki,
plaintiffs include his grandson, for whom he is legal guardian; his daughter and
her twin 5-year-olds; and 15 other individuals from around the state, all
grandparents of Idaho public school students.</SPAN></P>
<P
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style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto">Bob Cooper, spokesman for the Idaho
attorney general’s office, said he couldn’t comment because “We’ve not seen the
lawsuit at this point.” The state Department of Education also declined to
comment.</SPAN></P>
<P
style="BORDER-BOTTOM: 0px; BORDER-LEFT: 0px; PADDING-BOTTOM: 0px; MARGIN: 0px 0px 21px; OUTLINE-STYLE: none; OUTLINE-COLOR: invert; PADDING-LEFT: 0px; OUTLINE-WIDTH: 0px; PADDING-RIGHT: 0px; VERTICAL-ALIGN: baseline; OVERFLOW: visible !important; BORDER-TOP: 0px; BORDER-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-TOP: 0px"><SPAN
style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto">The lawsuit comes as Idaho is embroiled
in an election debate over school reform laws that sought to shift funding
priorities within the state’s crimped school budget, after three straight years
of budget cuts.</SPAN></P>
<P
style="BORDER-BOTTOM: 0px; BORDER-LEFT: 0px; PADDING-BOTTOM: 0px; MARGIN: 0px 0px 21px; OUTLINE-STYLE: none; OUTLINE-COLOR: invert; PADDING-LEFT: 0px; OUTLINE-WIDTH: 0px; PADDING-RIGHT: 0px; VERTICAL-ALIGN: baseline; OVERFLOW: visible !important; BORDER-TOP: 0px; BORDER-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-TOP: 0px"><SPAN
style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto">Joki, who served as superintendent of the
Nampa School District from 1980 to 1985, said, “It’s at a time of great public
debate on schools, and great economic stress on families.”</SPAN></P>
<P
style="BORDER-BOTTOM: 0px; BORDER-LEFT: 0px; PADDING-BOTTOM: 0px; MARGIN: 0px 0px 21px; OUTLINE-STYLE: none; OUTLINE-COLOR: invert; PADDING-LEFT: 0px; OUTLINE-WIDTH: 0px; PADDING-RIGHT: 0px; VERTICAL-ALIGN: baseline; OVERFLOW: visible !important; BORDER-TOP: 0px; BORDER-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-TOP: 0px"><SPAN
style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto">In addition to charging fees, Joki’s
lawsuit targets Idaho schools’ practice of distributing lists of school supplies
for parents to purchase, from specific brands of colored pencils and crayons to
reams of paper, boxes of tissue and dry-erase markers. “It’s occurring
statewide,” Joki said. “These supply lists are a substitute for essential
educational materials that the district needs to provide. Instead, the burden
has been placed on parents and patrons.”</SPAN></P>
<P
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style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto">In 1970, the Idaho Supreme Court held in
the case of Paulson v. Minidoka County School District that a $12.50 “textbook
fee” the district was charging each high school student was unconstitutional.
“School books are … indistinguishable from other fixed educational expense items
such as school building maintenance or teachers’ salaries,” the court wrote in
that case. “The appellants may not charge students for such items because the
common schools are to be ‘free’ as our constitution requires.”</SPAN></P>
<P
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style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto">The court, in its unanimous decision,
upheld a $12.50 fee for extracurricular activities, but overturned the school
district’s policy of not providing transcripts for any graduate who hadn’t paid
$25 in fees. A family who refused to pay the fee challenged it in
court.</SPAN></P>
<P
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style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto">Robert Huntley, a former Idaho Supreme
Court justice, is the attorney representing Joki. In the lawsuit, Huntley asked
the court to refund one year’s worth of the fees charged to parents across the
state – estimated at more than $2 million. The refund would have to come either
from school districts or from a supplemental appropriation from the state
Legislature.</SPAN></P>
<P
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style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto">“In contravention of the constitutional
requirement to provide free common schools,” the lawsuit states, “the great
majority of Idaho’s school districts, being grossly underfunded by the state
Legislature, have been engaging in the practice of levying fees upon the
students and their families for various supplies and coursework, elective and
otherwise, in violation of the Idaho Constitution.”</SPAN></P>
<P
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style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto">Joki is a Coeur d’Alene High School
graduate and was a teacher and administrator in the Coeur d’Alene School
District early in his career. After leaving the Nampa School District in 1985,
he served as a school district superintendent in Oregon for 15 years, then
returned to Idaho, where he’s taught graduate-level courses for the University
of Idaho for the past 12 years to aspiring school principals and
superintendents.</SPAN></P>
<P
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style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto">Joki said his 5-year-old granddaughters
were charged fees said to cover field trips, school supplies, milk for snacks
and art supplies. His grandson was charged fees for chemistry, art and sports
medicine classes plus $10 in “junior class dues.”</SPAN></P>
<P
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style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto">“This became kind of a grandparents’
coffee topic,” he said.</SPAN></P>
<P
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style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto">Joki said schools may offer hardship
exemptions to their various fees – though none was mentioned to him when he
brought his grandkids to school registration – but said, “That’s beside the
point. There shouldn’t be the asking in the first place. Hardship shouldn’t be
part of the equation in attending free public schools.”</SPAN></P></DIV>
<DIV
style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto">-------------------------------------<BR><BR>Seeya
at the polls, Moscow, because . . .
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>"Moscow Cares"</DIV>
<DIV><A href="http://www.MoscowCares.com">http://www.MoscowCares.com</A></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>
<DIV>Tom Hansen</DIV>
<DIV>Moscow, Idaho</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>"We're a town of about 23,000 with 10,000 college students. The
college students are not very active in local elections (thank
goodness!)."</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>- Dale Courtney (March 28, 2007)</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV></DIV></DIV>
<P>
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