The last integrationist?

The town of Arlington, population 2,569, is 74.2 percent white, 23 percent black, according to 2000 census figures. And in fact a quick drive through the area leaves the impression that it's not an all-white enclave. But Fields, by focusing on the proposed school, is really trying to put the spotlight on the problems in the city that Rout acknowledged.

"Now there's not the 'segregated system,'" Fields admits, "but there is." He points to low-performing all-black schools in Memphis city and says, "You have to give the kids an opportunity to escape that."

One way to improve conditions for Memphis schoolchildren, Fields says, is to change what he calls the "crazy formula" used to fund local schools. For instance, while the county is forced to share education funding with the city, any funds the county raises for school construction must be spent on construction in Memphis as well -- even if none is needed. Today Memphis schools urgently need money for operations and instruction, Fields says, but they can't spend money raised by the county -- which is constantly building new schools to accommodate its growth -- on what they need.

In a system known as "single-source funding," both city and county schools take money from the same revenue pot, but can spend it on what they need. Fields and many Memphis schools advocates back the arrangement.

"We've been having a long negotiation to try to get education onto a single-source funding," says Ernest Kelly, the attorney for the Memphis city school system, "where the county would pay all for the local funding for education." He says there's support from the Chamber of Commerce as well as various parties in both governments and both school systems for single-source funding of the two school districts. But there's also resistance from nearly all sides.

City residents are taxed twice -- for the city and for the county. As Fields sees it, county residents simply "aren't paying their fair share." Any plan to combine the districts would probably involve lowering taxes in the city and raising them in the county. That doesn't go over too well with county residents, who also don't want to be dragged into the same system as the city schools, which are perceived as underachieving. ("I think it's a bum rap," Kelly says, "because I think what we're suffering is primarily just statistics on poverty rather than poor teaching.")

On the other hand, as County Mayor Rout points out, the city government would likely balk at a single-source funding arrangement unless it could be reimbursed for millions of dollars in discretionary funds it's poured into city schools. The city school system could also simply surrender its charter, Rout says, which would force the county school system to absorb it, "but I don't know that the city school people would want to give up their positions."

"We've had a lot of negotiations where as long as people aren't talking about taxes and coming up with more money, that's fine. You know, we're all together in theory," Kelly says. "But when they start talking about taxing their constituents ..."

On top of the problem of who gets what funding is the fact that any way you slice it, there isn't enough of it. "The basic problem in Tennessee is that education is not funded to where it should be," Fields says.

The same week that Fields sent his letter to Winchester, the Democrat-controlled General Assembly overrode Republican Gov. Don Sundquist's veto of a budget that doesn't raise taxes, relies on tobacco settlement money to cover shortfalls and calls for $110 million in cuts statewide. The veto was claimed as a major victory by tax reformers, but it resulted in the state's bond rating being lowered and the opening of the school year being delayed in two rural school districts. It looks like widespread slashing of school programs and personnel is underway around the state.

"What the Legislature has done to gut the schools -- the secretary of state says, 'Tennessee is headed for the dark ages,'" says Lucas, the civil rights lawyer.

All those larger forces, Fields admits, are worsening the picture for city schools, and their problems won't be solved by blocking the construction of a single county school. A tireless advocate of thoroughgoing school reform, he gets animated talking about successful magnet schools and other innovations that have worked elsewhere, and he's convinced that Memphis-based companies like Federal Express and AutoZone have foundations eager to help with education dollars if the right deal can be struck.

"Test scores are so low in the inner city that we've got to have some sort of broader vision," he says. "So it's not tilting at windmills. All of these ideas are out there. They're being implemented in one fashion or another."

When I ask Lee Winchester if he ever thought, way back in 1963, that Robinson vs. Shelby County would still be an open case in 2001, he chuckles and says, "No, but we've had a pretty good success story of desegregation throughout that whole period of time. It hasn't been often, but each time that it's gone up [to court in a dispute], we've prevailed."

"I'm willing to listen to anything," Fields says when asked if anything short of total victory in the funding battle would result in him approving the school, "but I've worked with them for over four years now, with the County Commission, City Council, both boards of education, and they haven't come up with a solution yet."

Blocking the school in Arlington, Fields says, is the best way he knows to get new funding ideas discussed.

"I think it'll probably make everybody come to the table and work at the business of solving the problem," he says. "Usually these things settle -- but I never go into a case thinking I'm going to settle."

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