Reply to Option H is permanent and the old Wootton HS campus will be closed for good?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Lawyer here and an actual litigator who has moved for TROs & PIs on behalf of plaintiffs and defended against injunctive requests for defendants. Also a Wootton parent who doesn’t think the sky will fall if our kids go to Crown permanently or as a holding school.

Before I’m accused of being a troll, let me start out by saying that when my kids were babies I moved to MoCo and exclusively looked for a home in the Wootton school district because of its reputation and ranking. The education my kids have received thus far has been phenomenal, particularly the multiple pathways to take advanced classes on a pace faster than kids in other counties and states. Their teachers have been across the board dedicated and inspiring.

No snark intended, but I honestly do not understand the pervasive fear that simply moving our kids to a new building but being taught by these same incredible teachers with the same advanced classes will somehow make otherwise elite-college bound kids stuck going to No Name U. Our ranking isn’t going to suddenly drop just because a few hundred Crown kids are added. Admissions officers will know about the change.

Back to my legal point. I had to chime in because I deeply care about my community and I don’t want anyone to be misled by lawyers who see rich, angry & hysterical parents and a $$$$$ income stream. Please look at prior challenges to boundary changes. No one wins these cases. Even if the goal is simply to file a nuisance suit thinking this will cause years of delays and pressure, that only works when there is a ripe claim that can survive a motion to dismiss. If MCPS caved every time someone filed a frivolous lawsuit, we’d have no school system.

Injunctions 101: you can’t get injunctive relief unless you demonstrate you’re likely to succeed on the merits. And there is zero merit to the argument that this process is “illegal.”

Even if they announced today that they are going to ask the county council to support option H, and even if the county council met today and voted to approve that decision, MCPS still has plenty of time to then prepare its plans for the change and what happens to Wootton. Then they hold hearings.

Despite the musings in this thread, there are zero regulations or requirements that would require MCPS to hold school closure hearings before they’ve even decided whether to pursue option H. Because of course there isn’t. It’s a basic chicken/egg concept.

If a lawsuit is filed right after option H is announced, no judge is going to grant a TRO preventing MCPS from embarking on the process to move Wootton to Crown. It’s not ripe. It’ll be easily denied. The complaint will then be dismissed and typically there is no discovery until after motions to dismiss.

Why waste your money on lawyers who will happily have “field days” with it when you can instead be active & constructive participants in the public process and hearings about how best to make this transition? I find it odd that the parents most concerned about property values would want to ratchet up litigation and attacks on MCPS rather than being constructive participants in solutions as to how to best use the budget to perform necessary renovations and how to redraw boundaries so as to adjust to changing enrollment. 
[/quote]

You’re assuming Option H is in the best interest of Wootton families. The rest of your legal post (lawyer & litigator here) is biased from this perspective.  Those opposed to Option H have a different story to tell (and they’re not just Wootton families concerned about property values). In the end, MCPS doesn’t want this in court during an election year. A lawsuit would force MCPS to keep Wootton open for several more years as it performs the very community engagement you espouse in your post. Option H popped out of nowhere in December, and a recommendation decision will be made in March. Less than 4 months of time for such a drastic move is in no world reasonable. [/quote]

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