Opinion: Judge gives integration a chance

Hillsborough County's longstanding school desegregation case, which a federal appeals court brought to an end this month, was a paradox of success and indifference. Generations of black and white students have grown up with the normalcy of attending the same schools. But the warring parties for 43 years, the school district and the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, never showed the same accommodation -- on busing, racial ratios or student achievement -- that could have resolved the litigation long ago and left the community in better shape.

Ironically, it was the ruling by U.S. District Judge Elizabeth A. Kovachevich in October 1998 -- which the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals recently overturned, thereby closing the case -- that prompted the district to craft an integration plan that holds tremendous promise for black students. The district will spend nearly $100-million to build and repair schools in minority neighborhoods, spend millions more to boost scholastic achievement and provide tutoring and day-care programs to give students the attention they need.

The appellate ruling was moot in a practical sense. Though Kovachevich was faulted for pushing the district beyond what it needed to do, her order nonetheless spurred a broad plan to integrate the schools more fully. That achievement won't go away. Superintendent Earl Lennard said publicly and repeatedly, as the plan took shape during the last two years, that the spending would proceed even if the courts closed the desegregation case. Members of the School Board backed Lennard on his word. By taking a strong role, as the whole issue of black achievement withered two years ago, Kovachevich helped resolve the case on terms that were reasonable and faithful to the original Brown decision.

The only regret is that the appeals court left little room for the judiciary to monitor and guide the school district in the interim. Hillsborough's controlled-choice plan, which gives students some school options, won't take effect until 2004, the same year the bulk of spending for inner-city schools will occur. Oversight by the court would help the transition, given the complexity of choice and the effect student transfers will have on the racial composition of individual schools. The court's presence could provide the community some reassurance as more schools, inevitably, become identifiably black or white, a shift that's already begun. If that legal option is foreclosed, and the Legal Defense Fund forgoes loses an appeal, the district should continue to monitor racial ratios for the purpose of measuring equity in student assignments and education spending.

Clearly, though, two realities have emerged. The first is that the appellate ruling removes the leverage the black community had with the district. The court order brought enormous change, but the broader problem -- the district's intransigence -- was evident only two years ago. It is far too early to predict whether the good faith Kovachevich found lacking will manifest itself in the voluntary plan. The court also provided legal cover for the very tools, such as magnet programs, that drive voluntary integration. The whole plan could collapse. The risks ahead show why Kovachevich's role was significant. The judge bought time, a critical commodity given the federal courts' retreat on desegregation cases nationwide. In so doing, Kovachevich sealed her legacy not as a jurist who erred, but as the judge whose principled handling of the case gave integration its best, lasting chance.

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