Idaho's top school official sues lawmakers, education board

BOISE, Idaho (AP) — Lawmakers violated the state constitution, Idaho's top school official said in a lawsuit, by approving two laws that are an attack on her office by reducing her ability to direct critical public school operations.

Superintendent of Public Instruction Sherri Ybarra filed the lawsuit with the Idaho Supreme Court on Friday against the Legislature and the State Board of Education.

Ybarra is a statewide-elected official whose authority comes from the state’s constitution. She said lawmakers don’t have the authority to trim her office’s responsibilities and give them to the State Board of Education.

The lawsuit said the Legislature is trying to weaken Ybarra’s office by passing appropriations bills taking away money and employees without having to ask voters to approve a constitutional amendment required for such a change.

“The true purpose of this legislation was to significantly hamper and impair the Superintendent’s function as an alternative to the legislative adoption of a measure to amend the Idaho Constitution to eliminate the constitutional office of the Superintendent,” the lawsuit states.

“These bills prevent me from fully discharging my constitutional duties,” Ybarra said in a statement.

At issue are two laws that removed 18 employees and $2.7 million from her direct control and placed them under the State Board of Education. The appropriations bills were approved earlier this year by the House of Representative and Senate. Both Republican House Speaker Scott Bedke and Republican Senate President Pro Tem Brent Hill are named in the lawsuit.

“I feel that the Legislature was well within its prerogative," Bedke said. “I'm disappointed that the superintendent feels she has to waste taxpayer money.”

Debbie Critchfield, president of the State Board of Education, is also named in the lawsuit because the board declined a deal that would have allowed Ybarra to retain authority over the employees and the $2.7 million.

Republican Gov. Brad Little signed both bills into law in late March.

Ybarra, also a Republican, is asking for an expedited court procedure before the laws take effect on July 1.

The lawsuit said the situation requires “remedies of an urgent nature on an issue of great public importance affecting the delivery and quality of public school education in Idaho.”

Idaho spends about $2 billion — about half of the state's budget — to educate about 300,000 students in grades K-12.

Ybarra said the control that's being removed from her oversight includes a technology system called the Idaho System for Educational Excellence. She said that tracks everything from enrollments to grades to test scores that support budgeting, decisions about where money goes and accountability.

Removing that from her management, she said, means the operations of all other employees and functions of her office are likely to be damaged or impaired.