By David Fleet
Editor
Goodrich-On Monday night the Goodrich School Board voted 6-0 to join other public school districts in a nationwide lawsuit against electronic cigarette giant Juul Labs Inc., alleging vaping is harming students.
“There is no financial or legal risk to the districts for participating,” said Wayne Wright, district superintendent. “They are just asking us to join the consortium if there is a financial recovery we would get some of that. If it’s dismissed it would cost us nothing.”
The school district is represented by East Lansing-based Thrun Law Firm to initiate the litigation to hold Juul accountable. Thurn is not co-counsel in the litigation, rather is limited to referring clients to Frantz Law Group, a California law firm.
The lawsuit alleges that the defendants fraudulently and intentionally marketed their products to children.
“We in the district are seeing an up-tic in vaping,” said Wright. “Many kids are involved in vaping.”
The damages are separated into past and future. For past damages, schools in the litigation will be seeking reimbursement for costs associated with purchasing and installing vape detectors.

In addition, they will be seeking any lost state aid associated with vaping suspensions and expulsions.
As for future damages, the focus will be on obtaining compensation for schools to appropriately handle the vaping epidemic going forward without having to take money out of the general fund.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, since 2014, e-cigarettes have been the most commonly used tobacco product among U.S. youths. In 2020, an estimated 3.6 million, 13.1 percent U.S. middle and high school students reported using e-cigarettes within the past 30 days (current use); more than 80 percent of current users reported flavored e-cigarette use.