A decades-long battle came to an end this week, with a federal court ruling that the Lowndes County School District is in compliance with desegregation orders and is no longer under the U.S. Department of Justice’s control.
Although school segregation was declared unconstitutional in 1954, many districts continued the practice until 1970, when a court order forced them to integrate and placed the DOJ in charge of making sure the mandate was met.
To qualify for “unitary status,” the county school system had to prove it provides an equitable education for all of its 5,000 students, particularly in four key areas — student assignments, faculty and staff assignments, transportation and facilities.
In 2002 and 2003, private plaintiffs, including board member Jacqueline Gray’s husband, Will Gray, sued the district, saying conditions at the predominantly-black West Lowndes High School were not equal to conditions at Caledonia and New Hope high schools, which have a majority of white students.
In January 2006, the district was ordered to make improvements to West Lowndes schools, including building sports facilities, teaching Advanced Placement classes, upgrading classrooms and ending race-conscious policies in extracurricular activities.
An August 2008 petition for unitary status failed. In 2009, the district agreed to repair the baseball field and entryway at West Lowndes High School, support an Advanced Placement curriculum at the middle and high schools and adopt a non-discrimination policy to address community concerns.
While under the DOJ’s jurisdiction, the district was required to get approval before building, upgrading or renovating facilities.
Rep. Gary Chism (R-Columbus) was a member of the school board in the 1990s, and he said he was surprised at the number of reports the district was required to file with the DOJ.
Something as simple as allowing students to move into a new wing to alleviate crowding became a paper nightmare, costing time and money.
“This is a tremendous relief, a tremendous taxpayer savings to not have attorneys involved in trying to submit all these reports to the court or the Justice Department anymore,” Chism said Wednesday afternoon. “It’s been a long time coming.”
The district presented its case during a fairness hearing July 31 at the U.S. Federal Courthouse in Oxford. U.S. District Judge Michael P. Mills presided.
As of July, 47 Mississippi school districts — including Lowndes County — were under the DOJ’s control. Nationwide, 196 districts still had open desegregation cases. The Columbus Municipal School District was granted unitary status in 2007.
Carmen K. Sisson is the former news editor at The Dispatch.
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