News Update

Some 140 employees of an Oklahoma school district that suffered a $1.2 million budget shortfall must sue to receive back pay, a court has ruled. A series of budgeting mistakes left the Bartlesville district unexpectedly in the red for the 1994-95 school year. (See Education Week, Aug. 2, 1995.)

A state judge last month divided into two groups those whom the district owes money, according to a district spokesman. If the school board had appropriated money to pay an employee or vendor by last Feb. 17, those people will be paid out of a special levy on district taxpayers. Others owed money must sue the district to get paid--or appeal the court decision.

The February date is an estimate of when the district...