BREAKING: CA Supreme Court Will NOT Review Vergara Ruling
The case of Beatriz Vergara et al. vs. the State of California et al. has been working its way though the courts for over four years now, since May 14, 2012.
The journey is over. Petition denied:
The petition for review is denied. Chin, Liu and Cuéllar, JJ., are of the opinion the petition should be granted. STATEMENT by Cantil-Sakauye, C. J. The court, recently having resumed issuing, from time to time, statements by one or more justices dissenting from the denial of a petition for review, has adopted a policy that such statements, when they pertain to an appellate court opinion that has been published in the Official Reports, will also be published, appended to the original appellate court opinion in the Official Reports. With these policies now in place, separate statements will afford members of the court an opportunity to express their views regarding the denial of a petition for review, but of course any separate statement represents the views solely of the authoring justice or any justice signing the statement. In addition, it remains the case that an order denying review does not reflect the views of the justices voting to deny review concerning the merits of the decision below. Rather, an order denying review represents only a determination that, for whatever reason, a grant of review is not appropriate at the time of the order. (See People v. Davis (1905) 147 Cal. 346, 349-350; see also, e.g., People v. Triggs (1973) 8 Cal.3d 884, 890-891.) Similarly, that a justice has not prepared, responded to, or joined a separate statement should not be read as reflecting the views of that justice concerning any separate statement that has been filed by any other justice. Werdegar, Chin, Corrigan, Liu, Cuéllar and Kruger, JJ., concur.BREAKING: CA Supreme Court Will NOT Review Vergara Ruling | deutsch29:
DISSENTING STATEMENT by Liu, J. This case concerns the constitutionality of California’s statutes on teacher tenure, retention, and dismissal. The plaintiffs are nine schoolchildren – Beatriz Vergara, Elizabeth Vergara, Clara Grace Campbell, Brandon Debose, Jr., Kate Elliott, Herschel Liss, Julia Macias, Daniella Martinez, and Raylene Monterroza – who attend California public schools. They allege that these statutes lead to the hiring and retention of what they call “grossly ineffective teachers” (i.e., teachers in the bottom 5 percent of competence) and that being assigned to a grossly ineffective teacher causes significant educational harm. Plaintiffs further allege that they have suffered or are at risk of suffering these harms and that the harms fall disproportionately on minority and low-income students. After hearing eight weeks of evidence, the trial court ruled that the challenged statutes violate the equal protection clause of the California Constitution (Cal. Const., art. I, § 7, subd. (a)), noting that the evidence of detrimental effects that grossly ineffective teachers have on their students “is compelling” and “shocks the conscience.” The Court of Appeal reversed, holding that plaintiffs failed to establish a viable equal protection claim. (Vergara v. State of California (2016) 246 Cal.App.4th 619 (Vergara).) Plaintiffs now seek this court’s review. One of our criteria for review is whether we are being asked “to settle an important question of law.” (Cal. Rules of Court, rule 8.500(b)(1).) Under any ordinary understanding of that criterion, our review is warranted in this case. As the trial court observed: “All sides to this litigation agree that competent teachers are a critical, if not the most important, component of success of a child’s in-school educational experience. All sides also agree
State Supreme Court declines to take up Vergara case, which targeted teacher job protections | 89.3 KPCC - http://www.scpr.org/news/2016/08/22/63829/state-supreme-court-declines-to-take-up-vergara-ca/