Dive Brief:
- Arizona's state board of education has asked a county judge to toss out a lawsuit that would give the state's schools superintendent the power to fire board staffers.
- The lawyer for Diane Douglas, the superintendent, countered that the judge should instead issue an order clarifying that Douglas supervises and can fire employees of the board.
- Patricia Starr, the Superior Court Judge for Maricopa County, where the suit was filed, said she will rule later but did not specify when.
Dive Insight:
State school boards in several states are currently mired in conflict, especially over intended reform efforts. In Colorado, a state board member resigned, citing the board's dysfunction and at least five top Department of Education staffers are also departing. But it seems Arizona's lawsuit has a particularly personal tone. According to KPHO, the lawsuit comes out of a February conflict, when Douglas fired the board’s top staffers and refused to allow them back in their offices. Arizona’s governor, Doug Ducey, intervened and stopped the firing. The school board then voted to move board staffers' offices outside of the Department of Education building.
"What the superintendent wants to do is have the court micromanage the decisions of the board and say that certain decisions the superintendent disagrees with (are) outside the board's authority and only within her authority to do,” the school board’s attorney, Colin Campbell, told Judge Starr.