L. Merion: Insurance will cover redistricting suit

Lower Merion school officials said last night that the district's insurance policy would cover "a significant portion" of the cost of a contentious and expensive 2009 lawsuit about redistricting.

The federal lawsuit, filed last May by the families of 10 African American children in South Ardmore, has cost the district about $538,000, district business manager Scott Shafer said. The district has several policies that cover lawsuits and general liability. Those policies cost the district about $660,000 a year, Shafer said after the school board meeting.

According to the redistricting plan, passed in January 2009, some students who live in South Ardmore are now bused three miles to Harriton High School in Rosemont although they are close enough to walk to Lower Merion High School in Ardmore. That number will increase starting next year.

The lawsuit alleges that the plan is racially biased. School officials say the shift is needed because of a decision to build two new high schools, which would have equal enrollments. Now Lower Merion High has a greater enrollment.

A new Harriton building has already opened. The new Lower Merion school is scheduled to open next school year.

In another high-profile matter, an attorney for Blake Robbins' family asked yesterday for an extension of almost a month, until April 28, to respond to a motion filed last week by a group of high school parents seeking a say in Robbins' so-called Web cam spying lawsuit. The Robbins motion in federal court said the family hoped that an investigation by the district would be complete by late April and that the question of whether the parents should be permitted to intervene would become clearer.

The Robbins family alleged in a federal lawsuit last month that the district used Web cams in district-issued laptop computers to conduct surveillance on students in their homes.

The parents, members of LMSDparents.org, say they want to know how many times and for what reasons the district used the Web cams to take pictures of students. But they oppose having the matter become a class-action lawsuit and an extended legal battle that would cost the district money and time.