The New York State Association of

Small City School Districts, Inc.

1280 New Scotland Road
Slingerlands, NY 12159
518-475-9500
518-475-7677 (fax)
@SmallCitySchool

NEWS RELEASE
For Immediate Release October 5, 2016
For More Information:
Robert Biggerstaff, Esq.
The Biggerstaff Law Firm, LLP
1280 New Scotland Road
Slingerlands, NY 12159
reb@biggerstaff-firm.com
518-475-9500
518-209-5300 (cell)

Sharon Krengel
Education law Center
60 Park Place, Suite 300
Newark, NJ 07102
skrengel@edlawcenter.org
973-624-1815, ext. 24

PARENTS AND CHILDREN IN SMALL CITY SCHOOLS FILE APPEAL OF

DECISION IN MAISTO EDUCATION ADEQUACY CASE
Plaintiffs in the Small City Schools case, Maisto et al v State of New York, filed an
appeal today of the September 19, 2016, decision of Acting State Supreme Court Justice
Kimberly OConnor, which dismissed their complaint over seventeen months after a
lengthy trial held in the Spring of 2015. Maisto is a constitutional challenge by parents
from eight Small City School Districts to the States failure to provide their children a
constitutional sound basic education.
A successful ruling in Maisto would require the State to ensure adequate resources and
funding are available in these eight districts, a decision which may well impact similar
districts throughout the state. The Maisto districts are Jamestown, Kingston, Mount
Vernon, Newburgh, Niagara Falls, Port Jervis, Poughkeepsie and Utica, serving
approximately 55,000 students and 330,000 residents.

If the Maisto decision is allowed to stand, thirty years of court precedent will be reversed.
Beginning with the Levittown case and through the landmark CFE rulings, New York
courts have repeatedly found that under the education article of the state constitution all
children are entitled to the opportunity of a sound basic education and such children have
recourse to the courts if they are denied a constitutional education. The Maisto decision
effectively strips the education article of its essential protections for elementary and
secondary New York public school children.
The Maisto case is the first constitutional challenge to the States failure to provide a
sound basic education to come to trial since the CFE case in 2001, which involved
the New York City public school system.
The issues to be raised in the Maisto appeal filed today, especially the States
dramatic underfunding of New Yorks poorest school districts serving the states
neediest children are of the utmost importance and are also the subject of concerted
advocacy efforts across the state, which include a walk now underway by parents
and students from New York City to Albany on the 10th anniversary of the Court of
Appeals CFE III ruling.
The appeal is to the Appellate Division, Third Department, situated in Albany.
Lead appellate counsel for the Plaintiffs are David Kunz, Esq., and George Szary,
Esq., of DeGraff, Foy and Kunz, LLP in Albany, and Gregory Little, Esq., a partner
at the White & Case law firm in New York City.
The legal team also includes William Reynolds, Esq.., of Nixon Peabody, LLP;
David Sciarra, Esq., and Wendy Lecker, Esq., of the Education Law Center; Robert
E. Biggerstaff, Esq., and Laura K. Biggerstaff, Esq., of The Biggerstaff Law Firm,
LLP; and Richard Casagrande, Esq., and Megan Mercy, Esq., of NYSUT.
http://scsd.neric.org
#SmallCitySchool
www.edlawcenter.org

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