School desegregation in Pitt County, North Carolina involved intertwined lawsuits spanning 40 years and, until recently, a period of dormancy.

Prior to 1986, Pitt County contained two separate school districts, Pitt County and Greenville City. In January 1965, in the Teel case, a group of plaintiffs brought a school desegregation lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina. The plaintiffs, African-American minor school children by and through their parents, sued the defendant Pitt County Board of Education to enjoin the operation of a segregated school system. Teel v. Pitt County Board of Education, 272 F.Supp. 703 (Civ. No. 569, E.D.N.C. Aug. 4, 1967). In November 1969, in the Edwards case, a group of plaintiffs brought a separate but similar action to enjoin the defendant Greenville City school board from operating a segregated school district. (No. 69-cv-702, E.D. N.C.) In both lawsuits, the district court entered injunctions against the Boards and worked with the parties on school desegregation plans, largely based on freedom of choice. The district court monitored the progress of both plans until 1972 when it concluded the Board was taking the appropriate steps and thus the court's active involvement in the case was no longer needed. After this decision, the cases remained administratively closed (though always subject to re-opening) for 35 years.

In the meantime, as noted, in 1986, the two districts merged. In 2006-07, the Board adopted a new student assignment plan for Greenville that explicitly considered students' race in school assignment. An association of (white) parents challenged the use of race, filing a complaint with the U.S. Department of Justice's Office of Civil Rights. The Board changed its assignment policy, adding other factors like socioeconomic status. As part of settling the complaint, the parties sought a ruling from the district court as to whether the desegregation orders from Teel and Edwards authorized the Board to consider race. The Board also sought to have the district court approve its new 2006-07 plan. In 2008, the district court reopened the case and re-captioned it Everett v. Pitt County Board of Education. After court-ordered negotiations, the parties reached a settlement on the plan, which was approved in November 2009. The following year, the Board began developing a student assignment plan for 2011-12, working with North Carolina Statue University. A group of parents with children in the district and an association called the Pitt County Coalition for Educating Black Children sought to enjoin the implementation of the plan. Initially denied, the plaintiffs appealed to the Fourth Circuit, which vacated the district court's decision. On remand, the Board moved for unitary status. After a five-day bench trial, the district court granted the motion for unitary status on September 25, 2013. It concluded that even prior to the 1986 merger, both school districts were unitary with respect to student assignment, and after the merger, the consolidated district achieved unitary status in the remaining areas. Everett v. Pitt County Board of Education, 2013 WL 12176624 (E.D.N.C. Sept. 25, 2013). On June 3, 2015, the Fourth Circuit affirmed. Everett v. Pitt County Board of Education, 788 F.3d 132 (4th Cir. June 3, 2015)

Available Opinions
Teel v. Pitt County Board of Education, 272 F.Supp. 703 (E.D.N.C. Aug. 4, 1967)
Everett v. Juvenile Female 1, No. 6:69-CV-702-H, 2011 WL 3606539 (E.D.N.C. Aug. 16, 2011)
Everett v. Pitt County Board of Education, 678 F.3d 281 (4th Cir. May 7, 2012)
Everett v. Pitt County Board of Education, 2013 WL 12176624 (E.D.N.C. Sept. 25, 2013)
Everett v. Pitt County Board of Education, 788 F.3d 132 (4th Cir. June 3, 2015) (upholding district court’s finding of unitary status)

Greg Margolis - 03/03/2017


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