Suit alleges Hawaiʻi fails homeless kids

The state has failed so badly at helping homeless children get to and from public schools that federal courts should intervene in the situation, according to a class-action lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union and two other parties.

Attorney General Mark Bennett said he has already begun meeting with state personnel “to see if the complaint has legal and factual merit.”

The state “certainly takes the education of homeless children and all children very seriously,” Bennett said. “We have an obligation to educate homeless children in the same manner in which we educate non-homeless children.

“Even aside from the legal merits of the complaint,” he said, “we will look to see if there are areas in which we can improve our educational services to these children.”

State Department of Education spokesman Greg Knudsen declined to comment on the lawsuit or its contents, referring questions to Bennett.

Lois Perrin, legal director of the Hawaiʻi ACLU, said, “The state’s complete disregard of its duty to assist this extremely vulnerable population is indefensible.”

The suit, filed by the ACLU, the Lawyers for Equal Justice and the law firm Alston Hunt Floyd & Ing, alleges that the state has failed to carry out a section of federal law called the McKinney-Vento Act, which requires state and local school districts to help homeless children receive educational services.

The state Department of Education receives more than $200,000 annually in federal funds specifically earmarked to help transport homeless children to and from schools.

But the program has been so badly managed that the overall effect “is that homeless children are turned away at the schoolhouse door, experience significant delays in enrolling in public school, are forced to unnecessarily change schools and/or are denied access to transportation or other services necessary to receive a public school education,” the plaintiffs charged.