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Utah law that allows municipalities to form their own school districts may violate the Equal Protection Clause of the U.S. Constitution, according to an attorney for the Jordan School District.

"I have determined that by allowing voters of the new school district alone to vote to create a new school district and to terminate the tenure of board members in the existing school district, [the law] likely violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution of the United States," attorney Blake Ostler wrote to the Jordan Board of Education.

A 2006 law allows cities to unite to form a new district if voters in those cities approve the split. East-side cities including Sandy, Cottonwood Heights, Draper, Midvale, Alta and a portion of Salt Lake County are considering asking their citizens to vote to break away from Jordan School District as early as this fall.

Under the law, residents remaining on the Jordan district's west side would not be allowed to vote on the split.

The Jordan board sought legal advice about the proposed split after receiving a letter this spring from mayors representing Herriman, West Jordan, South Jordan, Riverton and Bluffdale.

They questioned the constitutionality of only allowing some voters to decide on the potential district division. "This seems unfair and possibly unconstitutional to disenfranchise the other voters in the district," the March 15 mayors' letter states.

The lawyer's response was sent to cities this week with a letter from the board indicating a vote on a district split may need to be delayed.

According to the legal analysis: "The election will affect prior voting decisions made by the entire existing Jordan School District residents and will have the effect of creating not one, but two new school districts - one of which the voters located within the remaining school district boundaries never have a chance to vote upon."

Sen. Carlene Walker, R-Cottonwood Heights, who sponsored changes to the school district division law, said she was unconcerned. The law is based on incorporation, a system that has been in place for decades.

"The whole process is the same as when you incorporate a city, the same as we did when we incorporated Cottonwood Heights," she said.

Sen. Carlene Walker, R-Cottonwood Heights, who sponsored law enabling the formation of new districts, said she was unconcerned by the legal opinion. The law is based on incorporation, a system that has been in place for decades.

"The whole process is the same as when you incorporate a city, the same as we did when we incorporated Cottonwood Heights," she said.

The board will wait to see what kind of response the letter and legal analysis receive, board President J. Dale Christensen said.

"We want to see how important an issue it is for them," he said.

Though Riverton Mayor Bill Applegarth had not yet received Jordan's correspondence as of Thursday afternoon, upon hearing the lawyer's conclusion he said it "confirms the feeling or suspicions I had."

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* JULIA LYON can be contacted at jlyon@sltrib.com or 801-257-8748.