In today’s blog I will discuss an interesting case out of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11^th, Circuit, Powell v. School Board of Volusia County, Florida (2023).  The case is available on the 11^th Circuit website. It is of special interest because the school district prevailed at the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida, but was vacated (i.e., overturned) and remanded (i.e., sent back to the lower court) at the circuit court in light of the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in Perez v. Sturgis, 2023.

            In this class action suit, the parents of students with disabilities asserted that the Volusia County School District used exclusions and disciplinary removals as consequences for disability-related behaviors exhibited by their children. Examples of such actions include sending their children home early, instructing the parents to keep their children at home even when they were not suspended, improperly using out-of-school suspension, and initiating removal procedures under a Florida law known as the Baker Act, thus discriminating against their children based on their disability.

The parents filed a $50 million lawsuit against the school district under Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act and Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act in the federal district court for the middle district of Florida. The parents sought injunctive relief (i.e., asking the court to require the school district to stop the use of discipline in this manner), compensatory damages, and punitive relief.

The federal district court dismissed their case because the plaintiffs had failed to exhaust their administrative remedies (e.g., a due process hearing) under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). The district court held that the plaintiffs could not bypass the administrative requirements of the IDEA by framing their allegations under other laws (e.g., Section 504).

A  few months after the district court’s ruling was announced on November 9, 2022, the U.S. Supreme Court issued its ruling in Perez v. Sturgis (2023). In this case, the High Court ruled that parents do not need to exhaust their administrative remedies under the IDEA if the lawsuit seeks damages that the IDEA does not provide. Because courts have routinely held that the IDEA does not include monetary damages, suits looking for monetary damages do not have to exhaust their administrative remedies under the Perez rule.

The parents refiled the claim with the 11^th Circuit Court, which vacated and remanded the case to the district court for a new ruling in light of the Perez decision. This decision means that after the Perez ruling, school districts may have cases that were settled on exhaustion grounds relitigated even though the Perez ruling came after the case was  first settled.

In the Powell case, it is likely that the Volusia school district may find itself litigating a lawsuit thought to be over. For sure, it will be a high bar for parents to convince the court to award monetary damages under Section 504 and the ADA. Nonetheless, this possibility will likely lead to more litigation.