Cuccinelli weighs in on Patrick Henry School
Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli has blocked an attempted end run by Del. Joe Morrissey around the Richmond Public Schools charter school agreement with Patrick Henry School of Science and Arts.
Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli has blocked an attempted end run by Del. Joe Morrissey around the Richmond Public Schools charter school agreement with Patrick Henry School of Science and Arts.
Last month, Morrissey (D- Henrico) sought Cuccinelli’s opinion on that contract and its requirement that Patrick Henry founders bring their 80-year-old former public school building into full compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act before the school’s planned opening this July.
In a brief, three-page opinion released March 4, Cuccinelli rejects Morrissey’s attempts to lawyer Patrick Henry’s way out of having to pay for or complete the agreed-to renovations of the old Patrick Henry Elementary School on Semmes Avenue near Forest Hill Park.
“It is my opinion that the provision of the charter agreement between the School Board of the City of Richmond and the Patrick Henry School of Science about which you inquire does not conflict with [Virginia law],” Cuccinelli writes, indicating that nothing in current Charter School laws prevents Richmond Schools from requiring Patrick Henry to meet federal standards for access to people with disabilities.
Richmond Public Schools is subject to a legally binding settlement agreement requiring that it bring its own facilities into full compliance with that federal law. The suit, settled in 2006, was filed because only a handful of Richmond’s nearly 50 school buildings met basic accessibility requirements.
After nearly four years of a snail-paced approach to those repairs, the district remains only in the first year of the agreed-to five-year schedule of repairs.
In seeking Cuccinelli’s opinion, Morrissey suggested that Richmond’s own procrastination should provide some leniency to Patrick Henry, but Cuccinelli rejected this argument, as well as Morrissey’s suggestion that Richmond was illegally applying a “financial disincentive” to Patrick Henry’s founding.
State law says “[f]unding and service agreements between local school boards and public charter schools shall not provide a financial incentive or constitute a financial disincentive to the establishment of a public charter school…”, but Cuccinelli writes that such a stipulation applies only to operating costs and not to start-up.
Cuccinelli also rejected a suggestion that industry-standard lease agreements rarely require tenants to do substantial repairs to an owner’s property to meet ADA requirements.
Cuccinelli agreed with the latter suggestion, but indicated that the signed agreement Patrick Henry has with Richmond, while not typical of such agreements, remains legally binding.
For the time being, Morrissey’s question and Cuccinelli’s answer remain, to some degree, moot. Richmond has granted Patrick Henry a charter contract, but the district has yet to sign a lease agreement allowing the charter school’s founders to take full possession of the building or to affect any of the renovations stipulated in the charter contract.
-
Recommend this
on Facebook -
Report an error
-
Subscribe to our
Weekly Digest
Notice: Comments that are not conducive to an interesting and thoughtful conversation may be removed at the editor’s discretion.
This is actually great news! As much as I would have preferred for Patrick Henry to catch a break in this situation, I am grateful that Cuccinelli did NOT come to their assistance.
Given the anti-gay, anti-victims of domestic abuse, anti-people-with-disabilities venom dripping from their lips, Patrick Henry needs to be careful of the company they keep. McDonnell. Cuccinelli. Morrissey. Jewell ….. may all think they are ” big dogs,” but in reality, they are a bunch of dirty dogs, IMHO.
Falcon@4:17,
Your comments are usually so well-written. Might I suggest that there must be a mistake in your second paragraph? To wit:
“Given the anti-gay, anti-victims of domestic abuse, anti-people-with-disabilities venom dripping from their lips, Patrick Henry needs to be careful of the company they keep. McDonnell. Cuccinelli. Morrissey. Jewell ….. may all think they are ” big dogs,” but in reality, they are a bunch of dirty dogs, IMHO.”
Surely, you do not mean to suggest that the good people at Patrick Henry people have any “anti”-venom dripping from THEIR lips, but rather that McDonnell, Cuccinelli, Morrissey and Jewell are the ones espousing the comments and agendas that are so hurtful to the most vulnerable people you mention?
If that is, indeed, what you are saying, then I am in total agreement with you.
McDumbass and Succinelli are giving Patrich Henry a bad name, let the kids know these two Hate-Mongering Christians are modern day NAZIS.
I don’t see how Cuccinelli in this case has anything against disabled people. In fact it seems that Patrick Henry is the school that is slighting them.
While I don’t agree with some other decisions Cuccinelli has/is making, I see nothing wrong with having Patrick Henry meet the ADA’s standards before opening.
Good catch, Ouch! Thanks.
Cuccinelli could do nothing else but support long-established state and federal laws on this question. Fortunately, these law do exist, and as AG he is bound to uphold them. He could file an Amicus Brief on behalf of the plaintiffs who have been waiting for far too long to get RPS to honor the terms of the Settlement Agreement. Particularly since RPS is in violation of both STATE and federal law.
Maybe, McDonnell will be able to help raise the money to help Patrick Henry become ADA compliant. Hopefully, the AG will take the time to familiarize himself with the case and do something to assist the plaintiffs in this matter in their case to get the recalcitrant Richmond School Board to make the rest of the city schools comply in the same manner that they expect Patrick Henry to do.
So, here we are Richmond. What’s more important?
A new Coliseum? Continuing to subsidize Center Stage?
Or following federal law and making sure operational Richmond Public Schools get ADA access?
Let’s be clear here. Patrick Henry has every intention of completing necessary ADA retrofits to the building. However, what they need to do so, is A) a lease, for full access and control to the school building; B) to raise funds do to the work, which is what most of the fundraising campaign is all about; and C) time to do the retrofits, which will be done over the next two years, both before and during the time the school is open.
What most Richmonder’s are not aware of is that A) RPS is stalling on the lease, which is part of the contract; B) some potentially large donors are hesitent to make a donation without the lease.
So again, RPS (both School Board, and administration) are doing what they can to stop the school from opening. What Cuccinelli should be looking at is that very thing. Are they honoring all aspects of the contract.
If RPS and SB honor the contract, sign a lease (without a bunch of hindering strings), and Patrick Henry can raise the necessary funds, they will probably be ADA compliant before half the schools in rest of the RPS system.
Are you serious Mr. Day? The lease ( a public document) says “All” obligations must be met, and then the Lease shall be given to PHSSA. Not before, NO stalling on RPS side.
Ms.4Real,
Are YOU serious?! The School Board and the RPS administration have been obstructionist and recalcitrant since the “git-damn-go.”
To read how hypocritical it is for them to now be using one group of parents (the ADA plaintiffs) against another group of parents (the Patrick Henry people) is a cruel joke and a waste of taxpayer dollars.
Check out this article by former School Board member Carol Wolf. She pretty much nails it!
Click here: Time to Bring on the Bigger Dogs | Articles/Archives | Style Weekly Richmond’s alternative for news, arts, culture
Sorry … the link in my previous post didn’t work. Try this one!
http://www.styleweekly.com/ME2/Audiences/dirmod.asp?sid=&nm=&type=Publishing&mod=Publications%3A%3AArticle&mid=8F3A7027421841978F18BE895F87F791&tier=4&id=1EA87FB760114FC296B560829E65FEB9&AudID=24508F02FEF54113AAE7F37C8AF3D905
Your comment Kate, makes no sense…the student will count in the cities numbers…why would the schools not want a increase of 150+ new students!
Just crazy talk…I would love to have a “contract” with you. I could make changes anytime I want to and blame you because of it. This is a 3 year process…no secrets. I read the contract during last year while waiting hopefully for the school to open. I hope the Founding Families of PHSSA did also. Carol Wolf please!! She was on the board when all this stuff began! What did she do! Nothing!
VaSpirit,
I do not understand your continued personal attacks of Carol Wolf. You seem obsessed with her and with throwing negative remarks at her at every opportunity. Such obsessive negativity cannot be good for anyone’s well-being. Seriously.
For the record, Wolf (rightly) abstained from voting on the issue after representatives from the NAACP and The Crusade for Voters suggested that there was an appearance of a conflict-of-interest and asked that both Wolf and Chairman George Braxton recuse themselves from voting. The question of the conflict arose because a lawyer at LeClair Ryan Law Firm (where Wolf’s husband is a partner and Braxton is employed) had provided pro bono legal services to the Patrick Henry group.
Braxton flat-out refused to honor the requests made of him and voted in favor of PHSSA throughout his tenure. Wolf took a more thoughtful approach and sought the legal advice of four attorneys (at NO COST to the board, mind you), including Commonwealth’s Atty. Michael Herring.
It was only after she was satisfied that there was no legal conflict-of-interest that she voted on the matter. For the details of why she voted in favor of Patrick Henry, you will have to ask her directly. I am sure you know how to contact her.
I do know that she did not walk out of the meeting and refuse to vote, as I suspect that you and two other board members did. Because Evette Wilson and Chandra Smith, both of whom are still on the board, and Joan Mimms left the room, there were only five board members present. Apparently, Kim Bridges was out of town and not present. Of the five that remained, all that mattered was that a “majority” of three vote in favor of Patrick Henry. It did not matter which way Wolf or Keith West voted, although both voted in favor of Patrick Henry.
What happened when the three walked out of the room has been described elsewhere as “political grandstanding at its worst and an abdication of your oaths of office to represent your constituents.” If you disapprove of an action, the proper recourse is to vote “No” — not run from the room pouting like an emotional adolescent who hasn’t gotten your way.
Again, for the record, you have made statements suggesting that PHSSA doesn’t have a transportation plan. It does and a link to it is available at the end of Chris Dovi’s most recent article.
You have also misrepresented factual information from the contract. Dovi and RVA have also included a link to a copy of the contract as well.
I would appreciate it if you would refrain from ad hominem attacks and spreading misinformation about Wolf. She is one of the hardest working public servants this community has ever had.
But, this is not about her. It is about how we handle difficult issues as a community and how we respect even those we disagree with, no matter how profoundly we disagree. Please try to stick with the facts.