ORAL ARGUMENTS FINALLY SCHEDULED ON R' ARON LANG'S LAWSUIT FOR FAIRER FUNDING FOR LAKEWOOD

R' Aron (Arthur) Lang has tirelessly devoted countless hours for over a decade advocating for fairer school funding for Lakewood.

Mr. Lang's long time 2 arguments are; 1) Lakewood's students are not receiving a constitutionally sound education (known as a Thorough and Efficient education, or T&E), and; 2) the fault of this lies squarely in the fact that New Jersey's School Funding Formula (SFRA) is unconstitutional as applied to Lakewood's unique demographic situation (which has many nonpublic students who need transportation but whom are not counted towards funding).

Succeeding on both of these arguments is key to be able to force State officials to finally provide fairer funding to Lakewood.

R' Aron has already succeeded in the Appellate Division on his first argument. The court has just finally scheduled oral arguments to be held on his second argument.

After many years of fighting in the Office of Administrative Law, a judge agreed with Lang as to his first point, but not with his second point. Instead, the Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) directed the Education Commissioner to review Lakewood’s School District and recommend how they can cut spending.

Following this ruling, the then-Commissioner issued a Final Agency Decision completely reversing the ALJ's ruling, claiming instead that Lakewood did provide T&E and therefore it was not necessary to review Mr. Lang main argument as to the constitutionality of the funding formula.

As the news was broken here on FAA News, on March 6, 2023, the Appellate Division reversed this decision, finding that the Commissioner erroneously disregarded the record before the ALJ that Lakewood does not provide T&E.

Having reached this determination, the 3-judge panel remanded the matter back to the Commissioner to do a "thorough review of the most substantive argument - that the funding structure of the SFRA was unconstitutional as applied to Lakewood's unique demographic situation."

I.e. The Appellate Division agreed with Lang's first argument and sent the matter back to the Commissioner for a decision as to Lang's second argument.

The result: On April 1, 2024, the new acting commissioner issued a Final Agency Decision completely denying Mr. Lang's arguments. Instead, our funding issues lie mainly with the fact that we are "undertaxed," and that the Board of Education is "mismanaged," the commissioner decided.

In response, as previously reported here on FAA News, just 17 days after the issuance of this final agency decision, Mr. Lang filed a new appeal to the Appellate Division seeking to overturn the Commissioner's Final Agency Decision.

After filing 2 motions to accelerate the case, and more recently a Motion in aid of litigant's rights, the Appellate Division has just finally scheduled oral arguments to be held on Tuesday, April 8, 2025 - just days before Pesach.

One of the judges from the 2023 win will be on the panel.

"April 8 is the big day. Lakewood floats for 100 years or sinks this year," R' Aron emphasized.

It's important to highlight that Mr. Lang is continuing his heroic efforts on behalf of Lakewood despite that he has already left the District for a new job out of town, further underscoring his dedication to Lakewood’s taxpayers.

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