Kaiser moving day postponed

Marisa O’Neil

Moving day will wait until holiday break for Kaiser Elementary School

teachers in classrooms due for the next phase of Measure A

renovations.

Plans had called for teachers in seven classrooms to move

everything, including Christmas decorations, over the coming weekend

-- one week before the school beak. But after complaints from

teachers and parents, project manager McCarthy Construction changed

the move to the weekend of Dec. 20.

“A lot of people at Kaiser were upset,” said Bonnie Martin,

project manager for McCarthy. “Typically we try to work around the

teachers. We thought they would rather move the weekend of 13th and

not have to come in on their time off. But if that’s their

preference, that’s fine. We can work around it.”

Parent concerns about continuing construction under Measure A, the

$110-million bond passed in 2000, go beyond the move. Niki Parker,

chair for Kaiser’s Measure A Site-Based Committee, said the altering

moving plan was just the latest in a series of problems that has them

so frustrated, members are considering resigning en masse.

“We were the first [group of schools], we were the guinea pigs,”

Parker said. “There are eight members on my committee. We’ve spent

hours working on things to no avail. We feel that we’re not a part of

the process.”

The committee’s main concern, Parker said, is safety of children

on campus. Clocks and the paging system aren’t functioning and it

takes three people to turn on the fire alarms, she said.

“We’re one step away from disaster,” Parker said.

There are three separate alarm systems on campus -- one in the

portable classrooms, the old system and the new system -- but all are

functioning, Martin said.

Everything is “absolutely up to fire code” and should be

integrated by the end of the year, she said.

Communication, or a perceived lack thereof, among the district,

parents and teachers “continues to be a problem,” admitted district

spokesperson Jane Garland.

Parents at Harbor View Elementary School, also undergoing Measure

A work, have expressed frustration that their concerns were not being

heard properly by the district.

The site-based committees were set up to provide accountability,

communication and representation, Parker said, but she feels that

they have little say in what actually happens on their campuses.

“The site committees need to have a better defined role so there

isn’t a disconnect between expectation and reality,” said Mark

Buchanan, chairman of the Measure A Citizens’ Oversight Committee.

“[McCarthy Construction] was taking the ideas and preferences of the

site committees and doing the best they could with the funds

available to do the work on the campus.”