Flanked by Deputy City Attorneys Sara Eisenberg (left), Yvonne Mere and Tom Lakritz, Dennis Herrera celebrates a major legal victory
By Tim Redmond
When the Accrediting Commission for Community and Junior Colleges first moved to shut down City College, I talked to Rafael Mandelman, a member of the College Board, about what would happen next. We both agreed: This kangaroo court needed to go before a real court, where a judge could look at the facts and make a determination of whether the ACCJC was even close to in order.
And today, thanks to City Attorney Dennis Herrera (and no thanks to Mayor Ed Lee) Judge Curtis Karnow issued an injunction ordering the accrediting panel to cease any action that could shut down the school until all the facts come out in a full trial.
It was a huge victory for the college, for Herrera, and for the city, and the judge (who is known as a tough but fair jurist) was very clear: Shuttering City College would be “catastrophic. Without accreditation the college would almost certainly close and about 80,000 students would either lose their educational opportunities or hope to transfer elsewhere, and for many of them, the transfer option is not realistic.” (more after the jump)
