HARRISBURG SCHOOL DISTRICT, Harrisburg School Board, Joseph C. Brown, Linda M. Cammack, Kenneth Leister, Judith C. Hill, Wanda R.D. Williams, individually, and as parent and natural guardian of Rauwshan Williams, Ricardo A. Davis, individually and as parent and natural guardian of Jeremiah Stephenson and Tiffany Davis, Clarice Chambers, Joy Ford, individually and as parent and natural guardian of Samantha Wilson, Grace Bryant, Glenise Cobb-Wingfield, individually, and as parent and natural guardian of Johnathan Wingfield and Asia Wingfield, and Citizens Concerned for Children First, by Dwayne Blount and Dale Carter, Trustees Ad Litem v. Charles B. ZOGBY, Secretary of Education, Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Stephen R. Reed, Mayor of Harrisburg, Jane/John Doe I, Jane/John Doe II, Jane/John Doe III, Jane/John Doe IV, Jane/John Doe V, Potential Members of the Board of Control for the Harrisburg School District.
1MAP2002, 2MAP2002, 12MAP2002, 7MAP2002, 14MAP2002
Supreme Court of Pennsylvania
July 22, 2003
828 A.2d 1079
Charles B. ZOGBY, Secretary of Education, Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Stephen R. Reed, Mayor of Harrisburg, Jane/John Doe I, Jane/John Doe II, Jane/John Doe III, Jane/John Doe IV, Jane/John Doe V, Potential Members of the Board of Control for the Harrisburg School District.
Appeals of Charles B. ZOGBY, Secretary of the Pennsylvania Department of Education @1MAP2002; Board of Control of the Harrisburg School District @2MAP2002 and 12MAP2002; Stephen R. Reed, Mayor of Harrisburg @7MAP2002 and 14MAP2002.
Supreme Court of Pennsylvania.
Argued April 8, 2003.
Decided July 22, 2003.
Linda J. Shorey, Julia Marie Glencer, John P. Krill, for Presiding Officers of the General Assembly of the Com. of PA, Appellant Amicus Curiae.
David Fredrick Russey, Charles B. Gibbons, Pittsburgh, Thomas Peter Brogan, Harrisburg, for Stephen R. Reed.
Nathan Harlan Waters, for Potential Members of the Board of Control for the Harrisburg School District.
Royce Leon Morris, Steven Edward Grubb, David M. Steck-el, Ronald M. Katzman, Harrisburg, for Harrisburg School District et al., Appellees.
Before: CAPPY, C.J., and CASTILLE, NIGRO, NEWMAN, SAYLOR, EAKIN and LAMB, JJ.
OPINION
JUSTICE SAYLOR.
This is a direct appeal from an order of the Commonwealth Court invalidating an amendment to Pennsylvania‘s Educational Empowerment Act which would allow the mayors of certain medium-sized cities within the Commonwealth to assume control of failing school districts. The primary issue presented is whether the amendment in question constitutes special legislation in violation of
In May of 2000, the General Assembly enacted the Education Empowerment Act (the “EEA“).1 The act establishes an Education Empowerment List (the “List“) to be maintained by the Department of Education (the “Department“). Pursuant to the terms of the statute, the Department must place any school district having a history of low test performance on the List.2 After the Department thus “lists” a school district, it notifies the district of its status and establishes an “academic advisory team” for the district. The district, for its part, appoints an “empowerment team” to work with the Department‘s academic advisory team in developing a school district improvement plan which sets forth specific “methods and goals” for improving the performance of each underperforming school within the district. The plan is then submitted to the Department for modification and approval. See
If the school district improves sufficiently, such that it reaches the goals in the improvement plan and no longer has a history of low test performance, the Department removes it from the List and returns control to the school board. See
Under the EEA, failing urban school districts that meet certain criteria are subjected to an expedited recovery plan whereby the Secretary waives the inclusion of the school district on the List and immediately certifies it as an empowerment district. In these cases, the mayor of the city in which the district is located, rather than the Secretary, appoints the board of control. This mayor-selected board consists of five members of the community who serve at the mayor‘s pleasure, and exercises essentially the same powers as a board of control appointed by the Secretary. The mayor also appoints a school district empowerment team to develop a district improvement plan, which is ultimately submitted to the Department for modification and approval. A district certified under this special provision is governed by the mayor‘s board of control for at least five years. Thereafter, when it no
The General Assembly codified the following legislative findings in support of this expedited scheme:
(1) In addition to the operation of failing school districts by a state, other jurisdictions across the nation are utilizing other models to reform failing urban school districts in which the chief executive of the city government is empowered to control the governance of the public schools serving the city. For example, Chicago has implemented a reform model operated by the mayor.
(2) In this Commonwealth, the Mayor of the City of Philadelphia, a city of the first class coterminous with a school district of the first class, recently was empowered by amendments to the home rule charter immediately to appoint all members of the Board of Education of the School District of Philadelphia to serve at his pleasure. In no other school district of the Commonwealth is the mayor or chief executive of a municipality empowered to control or affect the governance of school districts. Under the home rule charter amendments, the Mayor of Philadelphia will have significant input into development and implementation of any school district improvement plan adopted under [
24 P.S. § 17-1703-B ] and the school district generally.(3) In order to assess the effectiveness of a mayor-led system of school governance in other large city school districts in this Commonwealth which have a history of extraordinarily low test performance, a pilot program under this section shall be established for certain school districts....
As noted, only a certain, defined class of urban school districts is eligible for the expedited, mayor-led program described above. Under the original version of the EEA, a school district was eligible for such treatment only if it was “a
One week before this Court‘s Hickok I decision was announced, the General Assembly amended Section 1707-B,
For a school district of the second class which has a history of extraordinarily low test performance, which is coterminous with a city of the third class that has opted under the “Optional Third Class City Charter Law” or
53 Pa.C.S. Pt. III Subpt. E to be governed by a mayor-council form of government and which has a population in excess of forty-five thousand (45,000), the secretary shall waive the inclusion of the school district on the education empowerment list under [24 P.S. § 17-1703-B(a) ] and immediately certify
On December 4, 2000, the Harrisburg School District, the Harrisburg School Board, several individuals residing within the Harrisburg School District, and “Citizens Concerned for Children First,” an unincorporated association of such residents (collectively, “Appellees“), filed a petition for review in the nature of a complaint in equity and declaratory judgment in the Commonwealth Court, challenging the constitutionality of Act 91.6 They also requested special relief in the nature of a preliminary injunction. The named respondents were Pennsylvania Secretary of Education Eugene W. Hickock, Mayor Reed of Harrisburg, and five John/Jane Doe‘s, representing the potential members of the board of control for the Harrisburg School District (collectively, “Appellants“).7 Appellees alleged in their complaint that, like the Reed Amendment, Act 91 constitutes special legislation and violates federal equal protection principles, and that it additionally impermissibly changes the form of government of the City of Harrisburg. They admitted that the class created by Act 91 is open to more than one member—and named the Erie School District as another potential member—but asserted that it “was drafted without regard for any rational, meaningful criteria of classification.” They also averred that the shift in power to the board of control in effect: delegates tax-levying power to a special commission in contravention of
After the Commonwealth Court denied preliminary injunctive relief, Appellants filed preliminary objections, which the Commonwealth Court sustained with respect to Counts IV and V, finding that the school board retained tax-levying power and that its members retained their offices although their powers were affected. The court overruled the preliminary objections, however, as to Counts I, II, and III, that is, the counts alleging that the amendment amounts to unconstitutional special legislation, violates the Equal Protection Clause, and improperly changes the form of Harrisburg‘s government. See Harrisburg Sch. Dist. v. Hickok (“Hickok II“), 781 A.2d 221 (Pa.Cmwlth.2001) (en banc). In so ruling, the court found that, with respect to the special legislation claim, no apparent reason existed “at this stage in the proceeding” for the criteria used in creating the class, and that such criteria appeared to be designed to avoid the special legislation prohibition. See id. at 230. In this regard, the court indicated:
The number and oddness of the distinctions that mix and match a class of school with a particular subclass of a third class city that itself is a particular subclass of a home rule municipality that is further narrowed by a population classification that itself is a subclass of population classification used to determine classes of city indicates that the object of the legislation was to winnow down the number of school districts so that it would apply to a very, very, very small number. While that, in and of itself, does not make the legislation violative of Article III, Section 32‘s prohibition against special legislation, the absence of any apparent “rhyme or reason” for the factors used indicates that they were artificial and irrelevant to remedying the situation in
districts with “extraordinarily low [Pennsylvania System of State Assessment] scores.”
Concerning the equal protection challenge, the Commonwealth Court concluded that there was no “rational reason why the citizens of some extraordinarily failing school districts are not [sic] given the opportunity to create their own Improvement Plan and school board members of those school districts are divested of their duties while other school boards of extraordinary [sic] failing school districts are not.” Id. at 231. Finally, with regard to the change in the form of Harrisburg‘s government, the court noted that Harrisburg had adopted a home rule charter with a mayor-council form of government pursuant to
Judge Leadbetter dissented and indicated that she would have sustained Appellants’ preliminary objections as to all counts of the complaint. Initially, she observed that a separate constitutional provision,
Appellees subsequently moved for judgment on the pleadings against the Secretary, raising the three issues on which implementation of Act 91 had been preliminarily enjoined, namely, that the statute violates
On January 3, 2002, the Commonwealth Court granted Appellees’ motion, stating that it had “fully explored each and every one of these arguments in our prior decision regarding the preliminary objections and our answers remain the same.” Harrisburg Sch. Dist. v. Zogby, 789 A.2d 797, 801 (Pa.Cmwlth.2002) (en banc). Thus, based upon its earlier reasoning, the court declared Act 91 unconstitutional and permanently enjoined the Commonwealth from “carrying out or acting in any way pursuant to” Section 1707-B,
Appellants argue that the purpose of Act 91 is to explore ways to “fix broken school districts,” specifically urban ones, and that it extends to school districts in medium-sized cities a tool already available in Philadelphia, the Commonwealth‘s largest city: putting the school district under the control of a board appointed by the mayor. They contend that Act 91 therefore represents a rational response to the problem of failing urban school districts, and state further that it cannot constitute special legislation because the classification it cre-
Amici, the Honorable Robert C. Jubelirer, President pro tempore of the Pennsylvania Senate, and the late Honorable Matthew J. Ryan,12 add that the burden of proof in a facial challenge to the constitutionality of a statute rests upon the challengers, and the Commonwealth Court erroneously shifted such burden to Appellants to prove that the statute was valid. They argue that Appellees failed to meet their burden to
Appellees respond there can be no rational reason to treat some third-class cities differently than others. They contend, moreover, that the disputed classification is in reality aimed only at Harrisburg, and that it therefore constitutes special legislation regardless of any asserted rational basis, and unfairly stigmatizes the Harrisburg School District as being the “worst in Pennsylvania.” Appellees state further that there is no “pilot program” exception to
II.
A statute duly enacted by the General Assembly is presumed valid and will not be declared unconstitutional unless it “clearly, palpably and plainly violates the Constitution.” Purple Orchid, Inc. v. Pennsylvania State Police, 572 Pa. 171, 178, 813 A.2d 801, 805 (2002). The party seeking to overcome the presumption of validity bears a heavy burden of persuasion. See Commonwealth, Dep‘t of Transp. v. McCafferty, 563 Pa. 146, 155, 758 A.2d 1155, 1160 (2000). Our examination and interpretation of the statute, on this facial challenge, is undertaken with due regard to the codified legislative findings set forth above. See Leventhal v. City of Phila., 518 Pa. 233, 246, 542 A.2d 1328, 1335 (1988) (indicating that codified legislative findings are entitled to “great weight” in deciding whether an enactment violates the Constitution). As the present matter involves a question of law, our review is plenary. See Penn-
A. Special Legislation and Equal Protection
In the seven years before the Constitution of 1874 was adopted, the General Assembly enacted 8,755 local or special acts and only 475 general laws. See Robert E. Woodside, PENNSYLVANIA CONSTITUTIONAL LAW 321 (1985).13 Against this backdrop, the citizens of Pennsylvania chose to include within the Constitution of 1874 a proscription on special laws “for a very simple and understandable purpose—to put an end to the flood of privileged legislation for particular localities and for private purposes which was common in 1873.... It was aimed at laws that were in the proper sense local and special.” Haverford Township v. Siegle, 346 Pa. 1, 6, 28 A.2d 786, 789 (1942) (citation omitted). Thus, the underlying purpose of Section 32‘s prohibition on special legislation was not so much to prohibit the General Assembly from undertaking limited, remedial measures as part of a long-term strategy to fulfill its duties connected with the public interest, but to end the practice of favoritism.
Over the years, this prohibition, as well as other state constitutional provisions such as the Uniformity Clause, see
Equal protection principles do not, however, vitiate the Legislature‘s power to classify, which necessarily flows from its general power to enact regulations for the health, safety, and welfare of the community. See Harris v. State Bd. of Optometrical Exam‘rs., 287 Pa. 531, 538, 135 A. 237, 240 (1926). Nor do they prohibit differential treatment of persons having different needs, see Curtis v. Kline, 542 Pa. 249, 255, 666 A.2d 265, 267 (1995), provided the classifications at issue bear a reasonable relationship to a legitimate state purpose. See Tosto v. Pennsylvania Nursing Home Loan Agency, 460 Pa. 1, 14, 331 A.2d 198, 204 (1975); Baltimore & Ohio R.R. Co. v. Commonwealth, Dep‘t of Labor and Indus., 461 Pa. 68, 83, 334 A.2d 636, 643 (1975).14 In this regard, a classification, though discriminatory, will be deemed reasonable if any state of facts reasonably can be conceived to sustain it. See Curtis, 542 Pa. at 255, 666 A.2d at 268. However, a classification will be struck down if it is based upon artificial or irrelevant distinctions used for the purpose of evading the constitutional prohibition. See Hickok I, 563 Pa. at 397, 761 A.2d at 1136 (citing Freezer Storage, Inc. v. Armstrong Cork Co., 476 Pa. 270, 275, 382 A.2d 715, 718 (1978)). In undertaking its analy-sis, a reviewing court is free to hypothesize reasons the
The history of the present dispute, as related above, leaves little doubt that the General Assembly sought initially to prescribe an aggressive course of action to ameliorate the systemically failing school district located in the state capital. Under this procedure, the school district would be immediately certified as an empowerment district and placed under the mayor‘s control rather than having to wait three years and then being taken over by the state. Although this effort may have been salutary in purpose and effect, this Court held in Hickok I that the General Assembly could not, consistent with
Additionally, we agree with Appellants that the Legislature could reasonably have sought to limit the program initially to cities with a mayor-led government in which the mayor is accountable to the same local electorate that makes up the
Furthermore, while other third-class cities may have a mayor, see
Finally, although, as noted by the Commonwealth Court, these restrictions collectively narrow the class of school districts eligible for expedited treatment under Act 91 to a small number, we believe that it was rational for the General Assembly to seek to limit the program‘s initial reach to a small group of districts before prescribing the same procedures more generally throughout the state. Such is consistent with the codified legislative findings, which indicate that the effectiveness of a mayor-led system of school governance should be assessed under the act‘s “pilot program” before being made more generally available.16 Moreover, there is nothing improper about this method of attacking social problems of statewide dimension, as the Legislature is free, for reasons of
Under these circumstances, we do not believe that the class defined by Act 91 is based upon artificial or irrelevant distinctions utilized merely to evade the constitutional prohibition on special legislation; we hold, rather, that it is a classification which is reasonably related to the Commonwealth‘s legitimate interest in, and the General Assembly‘s constitutional duty to ensure, the existence of a “thorough and efficient system of public education.”
The Commonwealth Court struck down Act 91 upon the alternative ground that, in its view, the statute improperly vests powers in the mayor of Harrisburg without approval of the Harrisburg voters. As discussed, the court viewed this as inconsistent with the Charter Law, in that the mayor-council plan of government does not grant the mayor authority to appoint a board of control for the school district. Appellees likewise contend that giving the mayor power to appoint such a board violates
While there is some appeal to the proposition that giving the mayor any duties or responsibilities which are not specifically enumerated in the Charter Law effects a change in the form of government because the voters did not opt for a plan in which the mayor possessed such responsibilities, see Hickok II, 781 A.2d at 234, it should also be recognized that the Charter Law specifically imbues the mayor with general enforcement authority over “all general laws applicable thereto.”
The question, then, distills to whether, as Appellees contend, Act 91 violates
“Form” is defined variously, and most relevantly, as “the organization, placement, or relationship of basic elements,” and “the structure, organization, or essential character of something, as opposed to its matter.” WEBSTER‘S COLLEGIATE DICTIONARY 515 (2d rev‘d & updated Random House ed.2000). In this respect, we agree with Judge Leadbetter that
This reading is also consistent with the provisions of the Charter Law itself. Those applicable to all optional plans tend to focus upon such things as the size of the city council, see
C. Conclusion
Since preliminary objections were sustained as to Counts IV and V, and our analysis is dispositive with respect to Counts I, II, and III, relief is unavailable on the complaint and further proceedings in this matter are unnecessary. See Bensalem Township Sch. Dist. v. Commonwealth, 518 Pa. 581, 586-87, 544 A.2d 1318, 1321 (1988) (explaining that, where relief is unavailable to the party who moves for judgment on the pleadings, entry of judgment for the non-moving party is appropriate).
Accordingly, the order of the Commonwealth Court is reversed, and the matter is remanded for entry of judgment in favor of Appellants.
Justice LAMB files a dissenting opinion.
Because I believe that Act 911 is special legislation passed in violation of
Act 91‘s classification is no less effective in singling out the Harrisburg School District for special treatment than the Reed Amendment. It is, in my view, nothing more than a thinly veiled attempt by the Legislature to promulgate special legislation under the guise of a general law. Were the purpose of this legislation really the remediation of failing urban school districts, such could have been achieved through the passage of general laws. The only possible purpose of Act 91 is the evasion of the constitutional limitation ran afoul of in Harrisburg Sch. Dist. v. Hickok (Hickok I), 563 Pa.391, 761 A.2d 1132 (2000). As such, it must fail.
By its opinion today, the majority has placed its imprimatur on legislation passed in disregard of the constitutional limitation contained in