A lawsuit claiming that the city misused millions of dollars in state money earmarked to reduce class sizes was dismissed Thursday by an appeals court.
The suit, brought by the United Federation of Teachers, other unions and community groups, questioned how more than $760 million in state funds allocated to the city had been spent. The money resulted from a measure passed by the State Legislature in 2007 after a court ruled that New York City schoolchildren were being deprived of their constitutional right to a sound, basic education, in part because of excessively crowded classes.
The city challenged the lawsuit, citing a line in the legislation that “the sole and exclusive remedy for a violation” of the law should be by petition to the state education commissioner, not to a court. A lower court disagreed, but the Appellate Division of the State Supreme Court accepted the city’s argument.
“We are pleased with the court’s ruling, as we have continually said that we firmly believed this case was without merit,” the schools chancellor, Dennis M. Walcott, said in a statement.
Given that the appeals court ruling was unanimous, an appeal by the union and the other plaintiffs is unlikely, one person with knowledge about the matter said. Instead, advocates will now try to directly pressure the state’s education commissioner, John B. King Jr., to hold the city accountable for rising class sizes over the last several years.
“The class size issue is not one that is going to go away,” said Michael Mulgrew, the president of the teachers’ union.
Due to budget cuts, the full amount of money for class-size reduction never materialized. And a former state commissioner, David M. Steiner, excused the city from class size reduction targets in all but 75 schools.