Polanco v. Porter

Background

Onaney Polanco sued under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), which requires schools receiving federal funds to provide eligible students with a free appropriate public education. Polanco sued as A.D.’s parent and natural guardian and individually. A.D. was eight years old during the 2019–2020 school year, was nonverbal and non-ambulatory, and had been diagnosed with Pelizaeus-Merzbacher disease.

Polanco had unilaterally enrolled A.D. at the International Institute for the Brain (iBrain) for the 2018–2019 and 2019–2020 school years. For 2019–2020, Polanco filed an administrative complaint alleging that the New York City Department of Education had failed to provide A.D. with the required education. In May 2021, an impartial hearing officer ruled on the merits that the Department had provided A.D. with the required education.

Polanco served a request for review by a state review officer on June 25, 2021. The applicable deadline was 40 days after the impartial hearing officer’s May 9, 2021 decision, making the request seven days late. The state review officer dismissed the appeal as untimely. Polanco then filed this federal action seeking review of that dismissal.

Exhaustion of Administrative Remedies

The IDEA generally requires a party to complete the available administrative procedures before filing a lawsuit in federal court. The court held that Polanco failed to exhaust those procedures because she did not timely serve her appeal on the Department.

Polanco argued that the late filing should be excused for good cause. She cited her late receipt of the impartial hearing officer’s decision and, in the federal briefing, described the delay as a clerical error by counsel. The court held that late receipt did not justify the delay and that counsel’s control over calendaring the deadline meant that a clerical error did not constitute good cause. The court also noted that the state review officer was permitted not to consider an additional explanation about counsel’s illness because that explanation had not been properly presented in the request for review.

The court concluded that the state review officer’s decision was not arbitrary and capricious, meaning it was not an unreasonable decision lacking a proper basis. It therefore held that Polanco had not exhausted administrative remedies and that the court lacked subject-matter jurisdiction to review the appeal.

Pendency Funding

Polanco alternatively asked the court to order retroactive funding for A.D.’s 2019–2020 placement at iBrain under the IDEA’s “stay-put” or pendency provision. That provision generally requires a school district to continue funding the child’s then-current educational placement while administrative and judicial proceedings are pending.

The court declined to consider that request in this case. It found that Polanco had already filed a separate related action seeking a pendency determination for the same school year and that the arguments substantially overlapped. The court stated that the pendency issues were more appropriately addressed in that related action, in the interest of judicial economy.

Disposition

The court DENIED Plaintiff’s motion for summary judgment and GRANTED Defendant’s cross-motion for summary judgment. The Clerk was directed to terminate the two motions and close the case. The court did not decide the underlying question whether the Department’s educational program for A.D. provided a free appropriate public education, and it did not decide the pendency-funding issue in this action.