brief in opposition to motion to dismiss - Colorado Attorney General

necessary to provide an adequate education for all students must be diverted to meet thesespecial needs.Article IX, section 15 of the Colorado Constitution directs the general assembly to“provide for the organization of school districts of convenient size,” governed by locally electedboards of education and empowers the directors of the local boards of education with the“control of instruction in the public schools of their respective districts.” Control of instructionby locally elected school boards is an integral component of a thorough and uniform system ofpublic education. 6The Colorado public school finance system’s failure to provide sufficientfinancial resources to the school districts of the state to permit local boards of education toprovide services, materials, and facilities necessary to meet the qualitative mandate of theEducation Clause is unconstitutional under article IX, sections 2 and 15 of the ColoradoConstitution.Education reform legislation and the Consolidated State Plan have imposed instructionaland other substantive mandates upon school districts without analyzing funding needs orproviding the means to fund the accomplishment of those mandates. This legislationsubstantially expanded the role of the State in areas of instruction, program, and educationalpolicy historically controlled by school districts; significantly increased the testing andadministrative tasks of school districts; and has imposed substantial increases in the costs ofproviding a constitutionally adequate, quality education without providing school districts withsufficient funding or the means to obtain sufficient funding to meet those costs.School districts are controlled and strictly limited by the public school finance laws in the6 See Owens v. Colorado Congress of Parents, Teachers and Student, 92 P.3d 933, 938-9 (Colo.2004).6