Just 12 days after school officials announced a preliminary agreement to settle Lake Oconee Academy’s two-year-long lawsuit against the Greene County Board of Education, both boards have approved a draft agreement. It happened Monday night during a called meeting of the two boards.
During the marathon three-hour closed negotiating session, each board was in a separate room. School Superintendent Chris Houston shuttled between the two in an effort to close the deal, according to Lake Oconee News reporter Maureen Stratton, who waited outside.
The result, she says, was a list of deal points, signed by both sides. It is being converted by attorneys into a legally binding document that must officially be approved by both boards.
“I’m glad that we’re all moving in the direction to get this thing resolved,” LOA Board Chair Michael Tompkins said Tuesday. “I probably feel the same way LOA does,” BOE Chair Mike Lynch told the Lake Oconee News. “We won some, we lost some.”
The LOA lawsuit, filed in September 2020, focuses on the number of students that LOA can enroll and how many of those students are funded by the Board of Education.
The key disagreement is whether or not LOA’s Charter Application, which sets gradually increasing limits for enrollment each year, is part of the official 2016-24 Charter. BOE says yes. LOA says no.
The speedy growth of the PreK-12 school has outpaced the enrollment limits in the Charter Application. Previous Boards of Education were willing to compensate LOA for the additional students until August 2020, when the BOE put the brakes on that and agreed to only fund LOA for the number of students listed in the Charter Application.
The Charter limits LOA’s enrollment to 1,051 until it ends in 2024. LOA is educating about 1,081 students this year. The Charter Application sets enrollment at 1,032 for the current year, and that’s how many the BOE is funding.
Monday’s draft agreement addresses both issues.
The Greene County School System will pay LOA for 1,051 students this year and next year. Also, GCSS will pay $1,366,629 to LOA.
Part of LOA’s lawsuit argued for money it said was withheld by the school system during the last two years. Lynch insists that’s not the reason for the payment.
“We paid a number to get the thing done,” Lynch insists. “We didn’t pay anything specific because we didn’t think there was anything specific to pay.”
LOA has agreed to use attrition to gradually lower its current 1,081 enrollment down to 1,051 for the remainder of the charter’s term. But, children of full-time teachers, school professionals or other school employees will be exempted from the calculation.
Until LOA enrollment dips below 1,051, no students on the LOA lottery waitlist will be accepted.
“There are 134 kids in LOA that are children of teachers and staff,” Tompkins said. “So, we are well under 1,051.”
“While both sides made considerable concessions,” said School Superintendent Chris Houston in a press release, “tonight’s meeting set forth a process whereby these important elements can be accomplished without any student having to be dis-enrolled from any school that they presently attend.”
A settlement would mean that LOA would drop its lawsuit and withdraw a request to the Georgia Department of Education to officially exceed the Charter’s 1,051 enrollment limit, according to the draft agreement.
Also, the school district will withdraw last month’s official complaint to the State School Board that accused LOA of violating the charter by enrolling 1,081 students.
Final approval is not guaranteed until the legal document is signed by both boards.
“It still isn’t done,” said Lynch. “You’ve got to have the documents, but I can’t imagine anyone backing out now.”
“The negotiations are not yet complete,” said LOA CEO Otho Tucker in a separate press release issued Tuesday. “There is much work yet to do. Both the School Board and the Board of Governors are positive and hopeful that this draft settlement framework will result in an end to the lawsuit.”
What remains to be seen is if a settlement will heal the wounds from two years of heated disagreement as both boards must begin negotiations next year on a new LOA charter.
“I hope so, that’s all I can say,” Lynch added. “If the litigation was still going on, it would make it almost impossible to be cordial. With the litigation gone, the chances are much better.”