Plan to sell a school site meets with angry protests

Andrew Wainer

HUNTINGTON BEACH -- Community protest against the possible sale of school

sites in the city ranged from the practical to the bizarre at a public

hearing on the issue last week.

A Huntington Beach City School District committee considering how to use

three school sites was accused of everything from using faulty enrollment

data to selling out to Wall Street. Many of the roughly 100 community

members who attended the meeting were angry about the committee’s

recommendation to sell Burke school on Levee Drive, one of its three

unused sites.

The district has considered selling one of its unused sites to generate

money to get matching state funds for facility repairs.

The district is eligible for almost $19 million in state modernization

funds to repair the district’s schools, said Jerry Buchanan, the

district’s assistant superintendent for business.

District officials said they need about $4 million to qualify for the

state funds.

But getting the money from the sale of a site will be hard to sell to

residents.

“The district did not use accurate data for its statistical analysis of

enrollment figures,” resident Walter Shulte told the 11-member facilities

committee. “You did not take into account the changing ethnic balance of

our neighborhoods.”

Shulte claimed ethnic groups that tend to have higher birth rates are

moving into the neighborhoods around some of the closed school sites.

Future enrollment was one of the main concerns voiced by residents. They

said if the district sells a site, students could be crowded into other

campuses as enrollment increases.

Others mourned the possible loss of neighborhood schools.

“The reason we moved to Huntington Beach was so our children could go to

school in our community,” resident Donald Thomas said.

And Thomas wasn’t alone.

“I commuted 90 miles to Los Angeles so we could live in a community where

our kids could walk to school,” said Jess Rodriguez, a former Los Angeles

Police Department officer.

While some community members feared neighborhood children would be bused

across town if the schools were closed, exposing them to danger, others

cited the impact on property values if the schools, considered open

space, were turned into homes.

“These schools keep the value up on homes,” Realtor Joann Holly said. “If

we lose that open space, the value will go down.”

Many of the residents’ concerns involved issues such as busing, home

value and the importance of neighborhood schools, but other protests

carried conspiratorial overtones.

“I heard a rumor that low-income housing will be built over a school site

in order to accommodate Wal-Mart employees,” resident Richard Luzingern

said. “If this happens, I will spend all my time fighting it.”

Concerned resident Jong Slosson recalled when then-Gov. Ronald Reagan

dedicated the Burke site.

He chided the committee for even considering selling the site.

“You people are like Wall Street,” he said.

The upset crowd erupted in applause when officials from a French American

private school told the committee they would like to lease the Burke

site.

“We are getting kicked out of our current site in Fountain Valley,”

school official Anne Godfrey said. “We would be open to a short- or

long-term lease.”

Residents have advocated leasing the site, instead of selling it.

Almost all of the public comments expressed a distrust of the district’s

management of the closed school sites.

“The school district does not own these sites,” resident Mark Waithuber

said to wild applause. “The community owns them, and I don’t think we

should be giving the school board a freehand in selling them.”

But on the last presentation of the night, a lone figure presented a

different point of view.

“This district has a huge infrastructure problem,” Steven Lustig said.

“No one wants to sell a site, but we need to think of the welfare of all

the kids in the district.”

Lustig said he has attended most of the committee’s meetings and he told

others in the audience what he had learned from them.

“I can assure you that there is no financial malfeasance on the part of

the board,” Lustig said.

The committee’s final recommendation will be presented to the board of

trustees later this month.

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