Residency The Issue In Court Battle Between Mom, Decatur Schools

The and a woman are battling in court over the residency status of four children attending city schools.

Lisa Rudolph says her three children and a foster child deserve a free education from Decatur schools because they live in the city limits, with a home in Talley Street Condos.

The school system says her legal residence is actually Lithonia, because that's where she owns a house and claims a homestead exemption.

The schools want her to pay $42,680 in back tuition for the 2009-10 and 2010-11 school years.

Meanwhile, the four kids are still attending Decatur schools, said Rudolph's lawyer, Cynthia Wright Harrison. She obtained a restraining order last May that stopped the system from banning them from the schools.

"It's a lot of money for anybody, especially when you think your children are entitled" to attend Decatur schools, she said.

The school system lawyer, Debra Golymbieski, and the schools administration declined comment.

The school system says non-resident kids who don't pay tuition are a big problem for the system, draining resources and finances. Some out-of-district children pay $611-per-month tuition to attend. Administrators said last August that Decatur accepted 176 tuition students for the 2011-12 year.

Last March, Decatur Schools Superintendent Phyllis Edwards sent Rudolph a letter saying that an investigation determined she was not a Decatur resident because she owned a house in Lithonia, which the system looked upon as the family's primary residence.

Edwards offered to let the children finish the school year if she paid $2,444 tuition for May. Harrison obtained the restraining order that allowed the kids to remain in school while the issue was argued.

The school system is trying to get the restraining order dismissed, having filed papers to that effect last month.

In the application for the restraining order last spring, Rudolph said she has owned the home in Lithonia since 2002. She she bought the Talley Street condo in August 2009 after the death of her husband but hasn't been able to sell the Lithonia house because of the depressed real estate market.

She also said she spent weekends and one or two weekdays at the Lithonia house in an effort to make the house look occupied and to keep it from being vandalized.

Harrison said Friday that the Lithonia house is now rented. She didn't know if the school system will seek back tuition for the 2011-12 school year.

"I hope we can reach a resolution and everybody go away happy," she said.