Dear Safe Schools Coalition members and friends,
Governor overturns bias rules:Plan required school workers to have 'diverse backgrounds' [Des Moines, Iowa]
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By JONATHAN ROOS and JENNIFER DUKES LEE
Register Staff Writer
06/01/2001
Gov. Tom Vilsack ordered the Iowa Department of Education Thursday to withdraw proposed school accreditation rules that include protections for gay and lesbian students and workers.
Vilsack's spokesman, Joe Shannahan, said some of the education rules don't comply with state law and must be rewritten.
Republican lawmakers had threatened to block the new rules, which were published Wednesday and immediately became a hot topic on radio talk shows.
Representatives of Iowa's private schools also had raised questions about how their schools would be affected, because many of them already had chosen to be accredited by the state. All public schools must meet state requirements.
Vilsack said in a statement issued late Thursday afternoon that members of his staff didn't become aware of the proposed rules changes until Thursday. He was apparently caught off guard as well, saying in an interview a few hours earlier that he hadn't heard about the rules.
Kathi Woods, a spokeswoman for the education department, said officials spent months working on the rules and had received comments from educators and others.
The seven pages of rules, dealing with the diversity and inclusiveness of schools as well as discrimination and harassment, were to be reviewed next week by a legislative committee.
Conservative legislators who had sparred with Vilsack, a Democrat, over previous efforts to establish protections for gays and lesbians criticized the proposed school rules for inserting sexual orientation into some of the accreditation standards. They were especially critical of a rule requiring school districts to take steps to hire and retain employees "of diverse backgrounds."
"This social activism, San Francisco policy runs right in the face of Iowa values," said Sen. Steve King, a Kiron Republican.
Rep. Danny Carroll, a Grinnell Republican who serves on the Administrative Rules Review Committee, said the rules appeared to impose "an unreasonable burden" on schools by requiring them "to have their staff reflect certain protected minorities."
"It's troubling if a department seems to take on a very controversial issue when the Legislature has chosen not to," said Carroll.
Woods said the employment requirement was intended to apply only to public schools, not private schools. She noted there is a rules exemption that leaves religious institutions free to impose qualifications "related to a bona fide religious purpose."
Sara Deeny, a lobbyist for the Iowa Catholic Conference, said attorneys and administrators were unsure of the rules' impact. "There's a big question mark about the extent to which it would include" Catholic schools, Denny said.
The Des Moines School District already has a nondiscrimination policy that includes sexual orientation, said spokesman Klark Jessen. "The controversy would be for districts that don't have it," he said.
Department officials defended the rules, based on a combination of state and federal laws. "The purpose is to help ensure that schools and school districts take steps to build bridges between diverse groups and provide a supportive environment for all children, regardless of their background," Woods said.
"As the makeup of our state changes we need to make sure we are providing an equitable education for all students in our state," said Gene Vincent of Carroll, vice president of the state Board of Education, which acted on the rules this month.
Senate Majority Leader Stewart Iverson, a Dows Republican, said he told education department Director Ted Stilwill earlier this week, "It appears to me you'll be stirring up a hornet's nest" by moving ahead with the rules. Stilwill could not be reached for comment.
Iverson and other Republican lawmakers succeeded last year in getting a judge to nullify an earlier executive order by Vilsack forbidding state job discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity. Polk County District Judge Glenn Pille ruled in December that Vilsack's order intruded on the Legislature's lawmaking authority.
The governor issued a new, more general executive order in March.
Vilsack cited Pille's decision in calling Thursday for the withdrawal of the set of proposed school accreditation rules. "This office respects the court's ruling and is directing that the proposed rule be withdrawn and rewritten to comply with the law," Vilsack said.
What was proposed
Here are a few of the school accreditation rules proposed by the Iowa Department of Education:
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