Mamás alleges that DPS has mismanaged funds for decades and uses race and class-based segregation in its schools.

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The Legal Claims

Fiduciaries are people who have a responsibility to third-parties to handle their money and property responsibly, and to act in those third-parties’ best interest. DPS (the District and the Board of Education), its accountant, and charter schools owe the public a fiduciary duty both with respect to handling public money and property as well as financial transparency.

Mamás alleges that DPS and certain charter school corporations have been irresponsible with public (taxpayer) money by:

  • engaging in the leasing and building corporation schemes described in the Complaint;

  • running an inequitable school district (including severe race- and class-based segregation);

  • taking on mountains of debt (some that voters know about, some that they do not);

  • losing public moneys on high-risk financial investments; and

  • rapidly opening and closing schools in order to destabilize the public school system and shunt business to private corporations.

Mamás also alleges that DPS’ accounting firm, Forvis Mazars LLP, has:

  • concealed material information related to the Denver School Facilities Leasing Corporation (including its financial statements and where money paid into it goes, and the fact that DSFLC—not DPS—owns the school buildings that are mortgaged to the hilt through complex “certificate of participation” deals); and

  • falsely represented DPS’ student enrollment numbers.

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Breach of fiduciary duty.

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Colorado’s “civil theft” statute allows any victim of theft to bring a civil lawsuit against anyone who holds the stolen property, whether they obtained the property in good faith or not. Mamás alleges that the Denver School Facilities Leasing Corporation and certain charter school building corporations—all of which are private, non-governmental corporations—obtained title to public school buildings unlawfully, which amounts to theft. Specifically, they participated in sham transactions designed to evade the Colorado Constitution’s prohibition on public debt that have all resulted in permanent, private ownership of buildings that taxpayers have paid and are paying for. Mamás also alleges that DPS and the charter schools who transfer public moneys to their building corporations are conspirators to this theft of public buildings and moneys. Mamás alleges that the public is the victim of this theft, and seeks to have public buildings and money returned to the public.

Conversion happens when someone intentionally and substantially interferes with someone’s right to own property without the owner’s consent. It does not require the same “intent to permanently deprive” as criminal theft (and the civil theft statute that goes with the criminal charge). As with its civil theft claim, Mamás seeks to hold the Denver School Facilities Leasing Corporation and charter school building corporations accountable for converting public funds into private hands, and DPS and the charter schools for being conspirators to that conversion. Again, Mamás simply wants all the public property that has been wrongfully transferred to private interests put back into the public trust.

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Civil theft of public moneys and property, conversion, and conspiracy to commit civil theft/conversion.

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“Unjust enrichment” means that someone got some economic benefit at someone else’s expense, and it would be unfair for the unjustly enriched person to keep the benefit without compensating the victim.

Mamás alleges that the Denver School Facilities Leasing Corporation and charter school building corporations have “enriched” themselves by taking ownership of public school buildings (without having to pay for them), tax-free, and then getting paid with public moneys in order to “lease” them back to the district/charter school, then using those public moneys to generate revenue off of high-risk investments that DPS guarantees the losses on. Again, Mamás seeks to have public resources returned to the public itself.

Unjust enrichment.

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School districts are required by the Colorado Constitution to ask voters for permission to incur debt, and they are only allowed to do it via “bonds” (loans made by financial investors, basically). When a school district asks voters to approve debt, it is required to be transparent about what it is going to use the loaned money for (and voters expect the same).

In 2024, DPS asked Denver voters to approve nearly a billion dollars in debt principal, with a “repayment amount” (interest + principal) of $1.9 billion. The ballot measure promised that DPS would use the money for a whole bunch of totally different things (which is not allowed) that voters really want, like air conditioning in old school buildings, smaller class sizes, and increased access to early childhood education. These are the same things DPS has been promising to use bond money to pay for—and that voters have approved billions of dollars of debt to pay for—for more than a decade. DPS did not disclose (nor has it in past elections) two important facts: 1) the true state of DPS’ current debt condition; and 2) that DPS has and will use bond money to pay back other, non-voter approved debt that it has incurred over the course of the past many decades.

Finally, Mamás alleges that DPS Superintendent Alex Marrero created a false pretense to ask the Board of Education to extend his deadline to announce school closures until after the election, and that the Board of Education did extend the deadline on the basis of that false pretense, in order to induce voters to approve the bond measure (which includes funding to make capital improvements to school buildings that the District is closing) without knowing that DPS would be closing schools for the 2025-26 school year.

Fraud in the Inducement of the 2024 bond measure.

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Replevin is an old English common law writ that basically means “give me back my property.” In its replevin claim, Mamás alleges that DPS did not have the legal right to transfer title of public school buildings to the Denver School Facilities Leasing Corporation, and it seeks return of those buildings to DPS, to hold on behalf of the public.

Replevin.

The entire purpose of the Denver School Facilities Leasing Corporation and charter school building corporation schemes is to evade and avoid the Colorado Constitution’s unambiguous prohibition on public debt, including the mortgaging of public buildings. Mamás alleges that these schemes have created public debt in violation of the Colorado Constitution and seeks to void the contracts requiring repayment of this debt (or foreclosure of public buildings in the event that DPS defaults on the debt).

Unconstitutional public debt.

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Deceptive trade practices.

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Colorado law prohibits unfair and deceptive trade practices directed towards consumers of goods or services. In its Complaint, Mamás details how DPS has shifted its governance model to create a private market for public school, specifically through the “School Choice” system. This system is designed to create competition among and between public and charter schools, and for that reason it is supposed to be fair and transparent. Mamás alleges that it isn’t, and that DPS is either misrepresenting or concealing key facts about the schools available in the school choice “market” in violation of Colorado statutes that prohibit deceptive trade practices.

No one is allowed to manipulate markets to favor one company over another. Mamás asserts that when DPS intentionally transformed Denver’s public school system into a “market”-based system that requires public schools and charter schools to compete with each other in order to attract students (and therefore funding from the District to serve those students), it took on the responsibilities of protecting and promoting fair competition. Instead, DPS has manipulated the market by doing things like:

  • Controlling the supply of different types of schools (charter versus innovation versus public);

  • Resource-starving certain schools while allowing other schools to amass huge reserves, maintain marketing budgets, and provide incentives (sometimes financial) to families to induce them to “choose” the school; and

  • Gerrymandering school boundaries.

Mamás alleges that these anti-competitive practices violate the Colorado Antitrust Act of 2023.

Anti-competitive conduct in violation of the Colorado State Antitrust Act of 2023.

The Colorado Constitution requires public education in Colorado to be “thorough and uniform.” Mamás alleges that running a deeply race- and class-segregated school system violates this constitutional provision.

Failure to provide a thorough and uniform system of public education.

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The Colorado Constitution also prohibits public moneys from going to aid private schools. Though there is a Colorado statute that calls charter schools “public schools,” legally they are private corporations, and they are treated as such. Mamás alleges that DPS has unlawfully transferred significant sums of public moneys to both charter schools and their building corporations for the past thirty or so years, in violation of this constitutional provision.

Providing aid to private schools in violation of the Colorado Constitution.

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Finally, the Colorado Constitution requires local school boards to maintain “control” over instruction in public schools. Mamás alleges that by allowing DPS to operate as a “portfolio” of schools, which necessarily and expressly involves releasing control over instruction in public schools, including to private corporations, the Board of Education has violated this constitutional provision.

Unconstitutional relinquishment of control over instruction.