Jul 14, 2006 7:01 pm US/Eastern
Parents Sue To Lift NYC School Cell Phone Ban
NEW YORK (AP) ―
A group of parents, saying they were concerned for the safety of their children, filed a lawsuit Thursday challenging the city's ban on students having cell phones in public schools.
The eight parents' lead lawyer, Norman Siegel, said the lawsuit was filed against the city's Department of Education, schools Chancellor Joel Klein and Mayor Michael Bloomberg after they "callously refused" to discuss or listen to concerns about the ban.
"The ban needs to be lifted so a vital communication link between parents and student can continue," Siegel said.
The lawsuit does not ask that cell phones be used during classroom hours but before and after school, he said.
Siegel said that the cell phone policy, in effect since 1988, is illegal and unconstitutional because it interferes with parents' rights to oversee their children's safety and that the ban was arbitrary because it was begun without regard to
any specific, demonstrated facts.
City education officials, with Bloomberg's support, have said cell phones are disruptive and distracting, can be used for
cheating on tests and can be used to coordinate gang activity.
But Bronx mother Camella Price, who has two daughters, ages 12 and 14, in public schools, said the cell phone ban was "a safety issue."
Price said her 12-year-old daughter had been followed after school by three teen thugs one day and attacked in front of her home. It was only after the girl called home on her cell phone that she was rescued from her assailants, Price said.
Price and other parents who joined Siegel at the news conference said they were concerned about stalkers, sexual predators, children getting lost, abrupt changes in parents' work schedules and other problems.
Siegel said that because the city has taken its "incredibly rigid line and has refused to negotiate," the parents contacted him. The plaintiffs are eight parents and a group called the Chancellor's Parent Advisory Council.
City law department spokeswoman Kate Ahlers said Thursday she could not comment yet because city attorneys had just received the lawsuit and were reviewing it.
Plaintiff Carmen Colon, a mechanical engineer with three sons, ages 10, 13 and 17, said cell phones "are here to stay" so city school officials need to learn to deal with them.
"To not address the needs of the many because of the irresponsible behavior of a few is a cop-out," the Brooklyn mother said.
She called on city officials to "sit down with us and do the work" to find alternatives to a ban.
Two teens who attended the news conference, Obed Fernandez, 14, and his sister Rebeca Fernandez, 13, said neither of them carried cell phones to school but would gladly do so if allowed.
And their mother, Carmen Morena, agreed students should be allowed to have the phones.
"Any emergency could happen," she said.
The cell phone ban has prompted passionate protests by parents and students.
More than 100, many holding up cell phones and signs such as "Schools are not prisons," rallied at City Hall in May to demand that the Department of Education reverse the ban.
A month earlier, about 150 Brooklyn students walked out of their classes early and rallied for an hour outside their school to protest the ban and slow security procedures. Five people were arrested.
(© 2006 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)
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