By Elizabeth Wulfhorst
MIDDLETOWN – The Middletown Board of Education (BOE) may not enact its amended transgender policy, a judge ruled, until the case pending against it is resolved.
Superior Court Judge David F. Bauman decided Friday, Aug. 18 that none of the three school districts being sued by New Jersey Attorney General Matthew Platkin and Sundeep Iyer, director of the New Jersey Division on Civil Rights, for changes to their transgender policies, may enforce them when school resumes next month.
In addition to Middletown, Manalapan-Englishtown and Marlboro also voted this summer to amend their transgender policies for the 2023-24 school year to include required parental notification if a student’s gender identity expression changes. All three districts were subsequently sued by the state. The cases are being heard separately but Bauman returned the same decision for all three.
Middletown’s previous transgender policy, adopted by the BOE May 1, 2019, stipulated a student-centered approach to gender identity, stating specifically that “parental consent is not required” for school personnel to accept a student’s expressed gender.
It also noted that “there is no affirmative duty for any school district personnel to notify a student’s parent or guardian of the student’s gender identity or expression.”
“We strongly disagree with the Court’s ruling and believe there are several grounds for appeal,” said BOE attorney Bruce Padula in a statement sent to The Two River Times Wednesday morning from the board’s president, Frank Capone.
Platkin has asserted his issue with the amended policies is one of civil rights, stressing the proposed changes “violate the rights of our most vulnerable residents by discriminating against them on the basis of gender identity or expression,” something expressly denied under New Jersey’s Law Against Discrimination (NJ LAD). Bauman noted in his ruling that Middletown’s amended policy “singles out” transgender students in violation of NJ LAD.
But four years after adopting Policy 5756, the BOE is now arguing it denies parents their rights.
The Middletown Board of Education said under its amended policy, parents would be notified only if a student requests a public change to their gender identity. A student’s conversation with counselors would be kept private.
“Notifying parents about issues affecting their children is not discrimination,” Capone said, while Padula added, “It is simply not discrimination to tell parents if their child decides to change the gender in their student records.”
“The law supports our position,” he said.
In a statement Tuesday by Assembly members Marilyn Piperno and Kim Eulner (R-11), both declared the ruling “a deeply troubling encroachment by the state into parent-child relationships” and accused the Democratic Party in New Jersey of demonstrating “a pattern of blatant and troubling disregard for parents’ rights.”
While lauding the judge’s decision shortly after the ruling, Plaktin insisted the state “has always respected the rights of parents and agrees that parents should be involved in important decisions regarding their children.”
Platkin also said the state “has never sought and never will seek a ‘ban’ on parental notification. All our lawsuits seek to do is to reinstate the same policies these districts found acceptable with little protest for years. Put simply, we can both keep parents informed about their children’s development and protect the civil rights of our most vulnerable students.”
Capone called the idea that the attorney general is not seeking a ban on parental notification a “false statement.”
A ban “is precisely what he did here” with the lawsuit, Capone said.
Middletown’s Amended Policy 5756 accepts that a student’s conversations with school personnel, including counselors, should remain confidential, but notes that parents will be notified if a student seeks a “public” change to their gender identity by requesting a different name or pronoun, to use a different bathroom or locker room or to play on a different gendered sports team, “provided there is no documented evidence that doing so would subject the student to physical or emotional harm or abuse.”
“Parental involvement in a student’s education is paramount,” said Capone in the release, with Jacqueline Tobacco, BOE vice president, adding that “vulnerable students” need support from both “parents and mental health counselors.” She said the current parental ban is “eroding trust between parents and our district.”
During arguments before Bauman Aug. 15, the state confirmed the goal is not a “blanket injunction against all parental notifications” for transgender students, but rather an accommodation for the student if they request that their parent or guardian not be notified.
In the board’s release, Tobacco called Platkin’s statement “a premature victory lap” since the case still needs to wend its way through the courts to a final decision. Bauman’s decision only stops Middletown from implementing the amended policy while the case is pending. It will likely head to the Administrative Law Court for a hearing late this year or in early 2024 where a judge could rule in the BOE’s favor.
This article originally appeared in the August 24 – 30, 2023 print edition of The Two River Times.
