Findings of Fact and Recommendations

    | SOUTHERN DISTRICT oF MISSISSIPP] | 
FILED 

AUG3 1970 
CTT Y OMS, Ciiric 

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS (J ame 
FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT / man 

    
  

| UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, | ; PLAINTIFF 

VERSUS NOS. 28030 and 28042 | 4 

| HINDS COUNTY SCHOOL BOARD, ET AL, DEFENDANTS 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, PLAINTIFF 

VERSUS NO. 1372(E) | 

NOXUBEE COUNTY SCHOOL DISTRICT, ET AL, DEFENDANTS   FINDINGS OF FACT AND RECOMMENDATIONS 
  

In the above styled consolidated cases, Nos. 28030 and 

28042, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, by order dated November | 

7, 1969, directed the Noxubee County School District, Noxubee 

County, Mississippi, in Cause No. 1372 on the docket of this Court, 

to adopt the school integration plan offered by the Office of 

Education of the Department of Health, Education and Welfare. On   November 25, 1969, the N.A.A.C.P. Legal Defense and Educational   Fund, Inc., was allowed to participate as amicus curiae. By order=| 

| of December 30, 1969, the Appellate Court amended the HEW student   
assignment plan for the balance of the school year 1969-1970, and 

directed that the matter of future student assignments be present- | 

ed to this Court according to the procedure provided for in the 

Appellate Court's order of November 7, 1969. 

On June 5, 1970, William Bradley and others, having been 

so authorized by order of the Appellate Court dated March 20, 1970, 

intervened and filed on behalf of themselves a plan designated     
"Alternative School Desegregation Plan." On July 13, 1970, the 

| school board filed its plan endorsed by a bi-racial committee, 

      
 



  

    
    

adopting in all respects the plan as modified by the Appellate 

Court, and providing that it continue for the coming school year. 

On July 20, 1970, the aforesaid intervenors filed numerous objec- 

tions to the modified plan as adopted by the school board. On 

July 22, 1970, the United States of America, plaintiff, responded 

to the board's plan, objecting thereto on the grounds that, as 

implemented during the second semester of 1969-70, it had failed 

to disestablish the dual, racially discriminatory school system 

and that under it each school would retain its racial identity. 

The response further stated that the school district had requested 

technical assistance and recommendations from the Educational 

Resource Center at Mississippi State University and that a program 

officer from this center would be available at the hearing to 

offer suggestions for the establishment of a unitary system. 

In order to afford time for this study to be made, this 

Court re-set its hearing to July 27, 1970, on which date the 

defendant board offered and filed an amended student assignment 

plan, incorporating therein the suggestions and recommendations 

offered by a three-member team from the Education Resource Center 

of Mississippi State Univemity. Upon the filing of this plan, the 

earlier plan of the school board became moot, and neither 

plaintiff nor intervenors pressed their objections thereto. 

Prior to the HEW plan, the Noxubee County school district 

operated six schools, one white and one nearby negro school being 

located in each of three geographical areas, the negro schools 

housing a total of 3573 students and the white schools housing 

872 students. Of these schools two in the center of the cqunty, 

Noxubee County High and B. F. Liddell, each accommodated crates 

1-12, the remaining schools serving grades 1-8. The HEW plan 

proposed fo assign all students in the district in grades 9-12 to 

the Noxubee High School, centrally located, close the Shuqualak 

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and Brooksville Schools, formerly white, and assign grades 1-8 to 

B. F. Liddell, centrally located, grades 1-8 to Wilson in the 

northern part of the county, which would absorb the Brooksville 

students, and grades 1-8 to Reed in the. southern part, which would 

absorb the Shuqualak students. This plan was obviously unworkable 

as it assigned a total of 1171 students in grades 9-12 to Verdbos 

High School which has facilities for only 280 students at the high 

school level. | 2400 

The Appellate Court, in its modifications, undertook £8 

establish four school attendance centers by combining each former= 

ly negro schobl with its white counterpart, the assignment of each 

student being determined by the courses he took, plus an arbiteary 

assignment of a fixed number of negro students to formerly white 

schools. 

Although not a part of the evidence at this hearing, the 

Court takes judicial notice of the fact that the negro students 

of this school district, in toto, refused to accept their assign- 

ments under the modified plan and boycotted the schools for the 

remainder of the 1969 term. 

Intervenors' plan recommended that Noxubee County High and | 

Elementary Schools be established as a central high school serving 

all district students in grades 10-12; that the B.F. Lidell 

Elementary and’ High school serves grades 1-9 in the Macon area; 

that Brooksville, grades 1-4, be paired with Wilson, grades 5-8, 

serving all students in that area; and that Shuqualak, grades 1-4, 

be paired with Reed, grades 5-8, serving all students in that 

area. In view of the subsequently offered amended plan by the 

school board, intervenors merely presented their plan, making 

no serious contention that it was preferable to the board plan. 

The defendant school board presented its amended plan 

through the testimony of Mr. Thomas Leroy Richie, a staff     “3 

 



  

    

    

                

specialist in the Education Resource Center of the Department of 

Education of Mississippi State University, who testified on 

behalf of the government as well as the board. At the invitation 
of the school board, he first visited Noxubee County ih the latter 

part of June 1970. He and two other members of his staff vetiene 

ed on July 25 and inspected each facility, noting the number of 

classrooms, size of playgrounds, and state of repair. He declared 

familiarity with the amended plan of the school board and stated     that it incorporates basically his recommendations. He noted that 

the county is geographically divided into three zones. In the 

northern zone, of the two schools, Brooksville and Wilson, he 

stated that Wilson, the formerly negro school, is the better 

facility, and for grades 1-8, is adequate, and in the southern     zone, it is academically and practically inadvisable to keep 

Shuqualak in operation with an enrollment of only 118 students,: 

inasmuch as Reed has adequate facilities for all 1-8 grade 

ftudents in that area, With regard to the central gone, his 

recommendations as to grade assignments were premised on academic 

considerations. As the Noxubee County High School has insufficient 

science, laboratory and other space for specialized courses for 

more than 280 students, he approved the board's proposed assign- 

ment of all 12th grade students, county-wide, to this school, and 

the assignment of county-wide grades 9-11 to the B. F. Liddell 

High school, a much larger and better equipped facility. He 

particularly agreed with the school board's expressed intention 

of renovating the Noxubee County High School facility to eventual- 

ly become a centralized high school for grades 9-12. 

Also incorporated in the school board's amended plan, 

is its intention to construct at or near the Noxubee County High 

School a vocational complex which will serve the entire district.     
 



  

The amended student assignment plan, as recommended by 

the team of consultants and as adopted by the board proposes as 

follows: 

  

  

  

ANTICIPATED ENROLL- 
SCHOOL GRADES MENT 

W N T 

I. NORTHERN ZONE: 

Brooksville - (closed) 
Wilson 1-8 110 824 934 

II. CENTRAL ZONE: 

Noxubee Co. High 12 76 198 274 
Macon Elem. (Noxubee Elem.) 6-8 124 423 547 
B.F. Liddell High 9-11 188 652 840 

B.F. Liddell Elem. 1-5 227 643 870 

III. SOUTHERN ZONE: 
Reed 1-8 | 100 454 554 
Shuqualak (closed) 

  

Also, any student residing within the northern zone Or 

the southern zone will have the privilege of transferring to the 

central zone as space may permit. | 

Upon examination of the board's amended plan, counsel, 

for intervenors, announced his clients had no objection thereto but 

would withhold a formal endorsement in view of lack of time to 

present the plan before a full meeting of their supporters. The 

| government, as plantiff, registered a technical objection to the 

right reserved to students in the southern and northern zones to 

transfer to the central zone, but conceded that the amended plan is 

by far the most practicable before this Court. In addition to being 

the most practical in the sense of best utilizing the available 

facilities and capacities of the schools in this system, there is   
(no constitutional deficiency in the plan as each school, as shown   | by the projected attendances, will have a uniform racial mixture, 

| comparable to the county-wide ratio. 

| This Court recognizes and appreciates the cooperation 

of all parties hereto,;, with particular reference to the school 

board, in the fruition of a unitary school plan, and recommends 
, Yh 

| that the amended plan presented by this school board be approved. 

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As to the school board's request for permission to 

close certain schools in the event of the failure of ‘85 percent 

of either the black or white students to attend, this Gout 

finds such request premature, and recommends that it be rejected. 

Recommended and signed in duplicate, the Clerk of this 

Court being directed to file one signed duplicate in his office 

and forward the other signed duplicate to the Clerk of the U.S. 

Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, and mail one copy to each 

party of record. 

  

      UNITED STATES DI UDGE 

DATED: 1g pa