Attorneys for the Webb City R-7 School District say there is no reason to rush LaStaysha Myers' First Amendment lawsuit against school officials.
In their response to Ms. Myers' motion to speed up the process so it can be decided before the beginning of the 2005-2006 school year, filed today in U. S. District Court for the Western District of Missouri, school officials claim Ms. Myers is not suffering "irreparable harm" by not being allowed to wear gay pride t-shirts. Ms. Myers was one of a dozen students who were sent home because they wore shirts supporting gay student Brad Mathewson. Ms. Myers is heterosexual.
The response says Ms. Myers is "free to wear any t-shirt she pleases during the upcoming months because the regular school year is not in session."
And though she will not be allowed to wear any clothes that are "reasonably forecasted to disrupt the district's educational environment," the response said, "(she) is also free to wear any t-shirt she desires both before and after school during every day of the school year."
And if there are not any disruptions, the response said, she is "free to wear any t-shirt, including the t-shirts at issue, that comply with board policy."
In the initial motion, Ms. Myers' lawyers, William Fleischaker of Joplin, and Kenneth Choe of the American Civil Liberties Union, asked that all written discovery be completed by June 3. The response says that is far too soon.
The motion also requested that all depositions be completed by July 1. "This is only 39 days from the filing of the instant motion," the response said. "Due to the high profile of this case, and the potential number of depositions that may be required, such a request is unreasonable."
Plus, the lead lawyer is far too busy, with depositions in other cases, hearings, a special education due process hearing "and a previously scheduled personal matter outside the country for 10 days during the month of June," the response said.
Ms. Myers wanted the trial to take place in August so a decision would be made before school starts. That, too, is much faster than district officials want to proceed, according to the response. "Additionally, in order to try this case, the district administrators anticipate that they will need to call numerous district faculty members as witnesses. During the summer months, such staff members are not under contract, and have prior commitments."
This would seem to indicate that school officials would prefer to wait and pull these teachers out of their classrooms to testify thus forcing the taxpayers to foot the bill for substitute teachers and depriving the students of their regular classroom teachers.
The school district's approach appears to have changed somewhat since Brad Mathewson initially filed a lawsuit late last year. That lawsuit was dismissed when Mathewson dropped out of school. When Ms. Myers filed the lawsuit, it was suddenly mentioned for the first time that school officials had "allowed" Mathewson to wear his gay pride t-shirts until they began causing a disruption. A close examination of the filings in the Mathewson lawsuit do not reveal any instance in which school officials said they permitted Mathewson or anyone else to wear such t-shirts.
School officials also created an uproar when they said in an earlier court filing that students would be allowed to wear clothes with these kinds of messages on them when school begins again in August. At the same time, they are claiming that they are not changing their policy and reserve the right to have the students change the shirts if they are termed disruptive.