Lucia Mar Unified School District v. Honig

Opinion

MOSK, J.

Section 59300 of the Education Code requires a school district to contribute part of the cost of educating pupils from the district at state schools for the severely handicapped. We must determine if that section imposes on a district a state-mandated “new program or higher level of service” for which the state must provide reimbursement under section 6 of article XIIIB of the California Constitution. The constitutional provision, adopted by initiative in 1979, declares, with exceptions not relevant here, that “[w]henever the Legislature . . . mandates a new program or higher…