Southlake Carroll declares impasse in talks with feds over civil rights complaints

The Southlake Carroll school district has declared it is at an impasse with the Department of Education over findings the district violated students’ civil rights.

School board president Cameron Bryan announced the impasse during a specially-called workshop Monday. He said said the Education Department is not acting in good faith in providing facts and evidence that outlines how the district violated students’ civil rights in four complaints of discrimination involving race and sexual orientation.

Bryan said the school district asked for the evidence on three separate occasions.

“We have clearly made the Carroll ISD position known to the OCR and provided our evidence and complete analysis of such evidence. It’s only fair for them to do the same for us,” Bryan said.

Bryan said that if the OCR doesn’t provide the district with the necessary information to negotiate an agreement, then officials will wait for the letter of “impending enforcement” to have the information to move forward with fair and transparent negotiations.

Bryan posted the letter to the OCR and the school board’s statement on his Facebook page.

The letter stated that a recent federal court ruling “enjoins” the Education Department from taking action against the Carroll school district. The letter referred to a recent ruling from U.S. district judge Reed O’Connor involving the Carroll school district’s lawsuit against the Biden administration over expanded Title IX protections.

The letter stated that the district reviewed the Education Department’s database and looked at 10 “random cases and findings.” The district found that in at least six of the cases, the OCR found insufficient evidence, made no finding or made negative findings.

The letter stated that the school districts agreed to voluntary resolutions, and the OCR made the districts abide by them.

“From Carroll ISD’s perspective, the District is being forced to negotiate in the dark without the benefit of OCR’s findings, which are necessary to make decisions and work towards a resolution,” according to the letter.

When asked about the letter from the Carroll school district, an Education Department spokesperson said the cases are not being investigated under the 2024 Title IX regulations. The Office of Civil Rights is following procedures in its case manual, according to the spokesman.

The school board issued a separate statement describing the four complaints and how they were resolved. The complaints, from late 2020 and early 2021, described antisemitic slurs, homophobic and racial slurs. The statement said students were disciplined and the district took measures, including reviewing videos of incidents and meeting with a rabbi and the education director of the Anti-Defamation League.

But Angela Jones, who filed two complaints on behalf of her son, accused the district of lying and combining two of her complaints in to one.

She complained after her son was called a racial slur.

“The letter doesn’t change anything. It’s just a distraction. The district is clearly trying to avoid its role,” she told the Star-Telegram on Tuesday.

Jones added that she made multiple complaints, and the district doesn’t have a system to track them.

“The district is showing us who they really are. This is not the district I moved here for.”