NJ school districts blocked from enacting transgender notification policies, for now

A New Jersey judge on Friday halted three school boards from notifying parents if their children display signs of changing gender expression or identity — notifications that the state said would discriminate against transgender students.

Superior Court Judge David F. Bauman issued a preliminary injunction pausing policies recently adopted by school boards for Marlboro, Middletown, and Manalapan-Englishtown Regional school districts.

The ruling marks an incremental win for New Jersey Attorney General Matt Platkin in a months-long legal battle with a handful of local school boards. The school boards have argued the parental notification policy is in line with other school policies that require parents be alerted of anything affecting a student’s mental health — a category that would also include substance abuse, depression or violence.

The state of New Jersey countered that notifying parents of sexual orientation against a student’s wishes is a violation of the student’s civil rights.

“In no way should the court’s preliminary findings of disparate impact serve to minimize or discount the right of parents to make decisions concerning the care, custody, and control of their children,” Bauman wrote. “However, it is also settled that the right of parental oversight is not immutable; that it should and must yield where the State can demonstrate a compelling governmental interest."

In a statement Friday, Platkin called the decision “a major victory for civil rights — especially for the civil rights of our State’s LGBTQIA+ students.”

“As the Superior Court correctly recognized, the State is ‘not targeting parental rights.’ Indeed, the State has never sought and never will seek a ‘ban’ on parental notification,” Platkin said. “All our lawsuits seek to do is to reinstate the same policies these districts found acceptable with little protest for years.”

Bauman blocked the districts from enforcing the gender policies until the conclusion of separate administrative proceedings with the New Jersey Division on Civil Rights, which he said would make the final call on the merits of each party’s claims.

The policies each slightly diverged in detail but broadly sought to notify parents of students who requested some form of school accommodation for a change in their gender identity or expression — from their preferred name or pronouns, to which bathrooms they use.

The amended policies attempted to create exceptions for students who may be subject to unsafe or harmful situations at home as a result of the notifications. But Bauman said “ambiguities” on their specifics “provide insufficient assurance that these exceptions will be applied consistently.”

Marc H. Zitomer, an attorney representing the Marlboro school board, said they were weighing an appeal as the administrative proceedings “could take years.”

“In the meantime, the school district is now severely constrained in its ability to notify parents about important issues involving their minor children, which is quite concerning on many levels,” he said in a statement.

Superintendents and board presidents for Middletown and Manalapan-Englishtown did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

The state sued the three districts and their respective school boards in June after filing a similar lawsuit against the Hanover Township Board of Education a month earlier. Bauman emphasized that his injunction was not the final word on the merits of arguments from either side.

“It is this court’s hope and expectation, however, that the administrative action will proceed expeditiously,” Bauman said, urging all parties to “to negotiate, in good faith, a consensus policy of parental disclosure that best strikes a legally appropriate and practical balance.”