Governor Mike Huckabee said yesterday that he does not want to call a special session until studies on the schools' financial needs are completed.
The court ruled in 2002 that the school districts were underfunded and that the money spent was distributed unevenly. Legislators approved measures in 2003 and 2004 that the justices initially had said appeared fine.
However, after per-pupil funding remained at 2004-05 levels for the current school year, 49 of Arkansas' 254 school districts asked the justices to reopen the case. Per-pupil funding is set to increase in the 2006-07 school year by $97 -- less than 2 percent.
Two former justices appointed by the court to review the reforms faulted the Legislature for the funding freeze, for not conducting a study to determine schools' budget needs, and for allocating only $120 million toward a 10-year, $1.9 billion overhaul of school buildings and equipment.
''Because we hold that the public school funding system continues to be inadequate, we further hold that our public schools are operating under a constitutional infirmity, which must be corrected immediately," Justice Robert L. Brown wrote.
The court wants the remaining problems in the 450,000-student system fixed by Dec. 1, 2006.
House Speaker Bill Stovall, a Democrat, accused the court of ''judicial activism," saying determining appropriate funding levels for education is a legislative job.
