Judge Turns Down Bullis Request For New Campus

A judge on Monday denied Bullis Charter School's motion to compel the Los Altos School District a campus, saying that the legal consideration of its objections to the space offered for the 2012-13 school year can not rely on a higher court's order decision in its favor for an earlier case.

Santa Clara County Superior Court Judge Patricia Lucas denied the petition by the charter school to compel the school district give up one of its campuses, among several requests, in the act of compelling the district to comply with Prop. 39.

"BCS will continue to forge new legal territory in California, as there is little to no precedent for a case in which a school district proactively disobeys the law to thwart the growth of an in-demand, high-quality public charter school that is serving the community with a high-quality public education," said BCS chair Ken Moore Monday afternoon, in an e-mailed statement to Patch.  

Lucas said the threshhold question the court considered was the "nature of the procedural vehicle of enforcement, the standard of review, and the relief available."

While the Sixth District state Court of Appeal had ruled that the Los Altos School District had failed to comply with Prop. 39 provisions in its 2009-10 offer, Judge Lucas said that what BCS was requesting "clearly goes beyond the scope of the Writ, for example compelling the District to negotiate a certain way or providing facilities the Court of Appeal never addressed."

Judge Lucas wrote that Bullis' motion had no precedent in previous cases, and that the school was seeking a new review of the case from the Superior Court.

"Petitioner may file for a supplemental petition for writ of mandate, framing the issues as to which the Petitioner may seek relief," Lucas wrote.

The decision is unlikely to change much. BCS already filed that new writ of mandate in early September asking the court to find the district out of compliance and to give it a school campus, among other things. 

The judge also granted the application of three groups to act as friend of the court, including the Huttlinger Alliance For Education, the California School Administrators Association and the California School Boards Association's Education Legal Alliance. She struck some declarations that had been filed by BCS after Aug. 15.