[UPDATE Jan 29 1 am – THE OFFER IS BETTER THAN ANTICIPATED. The LASD opening Low Ball Offer was a little better than anticipated by us. The board voted tonight Jan. 28 to prepare a draft of a 2013-2014 Preliminary Prop 39 facilities offer to place BCS K-5 at Egan and its 6-8 students at Blach. That means only 1 additional portable at Egan and at Blach 3 additional classrooms and 2 specialized spaces all at an estimated cost of $306,000 dollars. Based on LASD’s estimate of BCS enrollment of 573 students, that puts 443 students at Egan and 129 at Blach. LASD said it will ask the principals of both schools to start this February to work out detailed sharing of the gym and field facilities. There were no real specifics, but the board sounded like the sharing details would be better than than this year’s 25 minutes of lab time per week!] [hr] [hr]
Published Midnight Jan. 29 – After the Jan. 28 LASD Meeting
Public Study Session Coming Feb. 25 Maybe
The LASD board agreed to propose an agendized study session between the two boards on Feb. 25. Public comment is not taken at a study session, but the public can observe. The LASD board said they would like to have it earlier, but Randy Kenyon would be unavailable because he was giving a deposition in the BCS litigation. The board said if BCS would temporarily “suspend” the litigation process, they could do the study session earlier – like the week of Feb. 11. At the study session BCS could ask questions about the preliminary offer. LASD said it would possibly consider an alternative configuration: K-4 at Egan and 5-8 at Blach. That one would place 369 students at Egan and 203 student at Blach. This would be close to the BCS idea of a minimum enrollment school.
LASD Board Repartee
Board member Pablo Luther asked other board members about the how the Study Session might be conducted. Doug Smith: “We’d like it to be free wheeling where we can explore a bunch of interesting ideas, but the reality is that anything we say, can and will be used against us in a court of law. It you say something there, it’s going to turn up in a court transcript.” Pablo Luther replied, “But it goes both ways. They would feel similarly too.” Mark Goines, ” That’s a fair point.”
Looking Credible to the Public Eye
LASD Board President Doug Smith said, “It’s important to put an offer out there at this time that looks something like…if somebody said to you Pablo [Luther, another LASD board member] go run a school in this configuration… you’d say, yeah I know how to go do that.” In other words LASD doesn’t want to look ridiculous again this year by offering a totally dysfunctional school at Blach. It’s looking for some minimum credibility.
Same Old Blach Land Allocation – But a 2 year view perhaps
Yet LASD has not meaningfully changed the unusable Blach land allocation. Mark Goines did suggest that the small rectangle the portables are sited on could be extended a little towards the baseball diamond. There was discussion of thinking ahead for two years. What would be lowest cost given that BCS would grow next yearr?
Getting it on the Public Record…
Tamara Logan seemed to be lobbying for adding blacktop, tether ball, and play structures at one point. No other board member followed her along that line of thought. Later she set up a question for Randy Kenyon. “What would BCS’s Ken Moore’s proposed Blach configuration cost?” The answer $1.5 Million.
Doug Smith asked about the lease with the Stepping Stones preschool at Blach. Ken Moore’s proposal would move the pre-school to the other side of the Blach gym. Kenyon said the lease was very new and was for that exact site. To move them would require a new agreement.
BCS Parents Participate Again
About a dozen very polite BCS parents showed up to ask the board to create a functional site at Blach. They also asked the LASD board to negotiate with the BCS board “without the stipulation that litigation be dropped.” The standoff seems similar to when Tamara Logan was skewering the Los Altos City Council for refusing to meet with the LASD board, for the “trivial” reason that LASD refused to write a letter giving up exercise of eminent domain on the City. In the current situation, LASD board is now requesting “suspending” litigation, not ceasing it. That seems like a big difference to Lalahpolitico. Hit the pause button for a month? And let’s remember the Board has agreed to try to schedule a Feb. 25 Study Session with both boards, open to public observation.
LASD is still pursuing the Raynor School Sunnyvale site
In March the district will need to pull together the paper work to participate in the RFQ process whereby the Sunnyvale School District will sell Raynor. There is a least one other bidder. LALAHPOLITCO: Why are they pursuing this non-starter? Oh, I get it. A little sabre-rattling and intimidation.
[hr] [hr]Lalahpolitico is glad her original forecast of the LASD Preliminary Offer was wrong and eats crow. This might be a better than usual start to a Prop 39 annual process. Cautiously optimistic?
ORIGINAL – Published morning of Jan. 28
The annual Prop 39 Facilities Offer theatre will continue this evening. Here’s a bit of recent maneuvering. After many thousands of hours were spent by parents and a few citizens to attend LASD’s parent and citizen “community input” sessions this winter, the LASD board recently ruled out all other possible options for BCS except the split campus at Egan-Blach. It said it would evaluate three different grade configurations for a split campus preliminary offer due February 1.
Meanwhile last week BCS said it was OK with a split campus across Blach and Egan, provided that Blach got enough specialized spaces and minimum enrollment to operate like a “real school.” Had LASD been too generous somehow? At tonight’s LASD meeting, we can see that LASD has added a 4th option to the list of 3 configurations it had said it was evaluating. It’s stingier than the other 3.
Had LASD been too generous somehow? At tonight’s LASD meeting, we can see that LASD has added a 4th option. It’s stingier than the other 3.
LASD has countered BCS’s forecast of 615 students enrolled at BCS in 2013-2014 with 572 instead. This is 42 fewer kids…about 2 portables less than BCS says it can fill from demand.
Lalahpolitico predicts that option 4 — the stingy one called the “status quo” by LASD — will be the one selected by the Board. Why do we think so? It’s the only one with maps provided in tonight’s presentation.
Obviously there is a wide gap between what LASD is putting in it’s preliminary offer and what BCS says constitutes a “real school.” Last year BCS did not occupy its Prop 39 facility at Blach for many reasons — including the social and emotional isolation of operating as a 30 kid school.
[info]You can download all the relevant files for tonight’s 7pm LASD Board meeting here. (502kb)[/info]That gap means there will a couple months of negotiations that may close the gap. What’s new this year is that BCS has called for the negotiations to start now and to be conducted till April 1 as open to public for observation. The ongoing LASD Superintendent’s Task Force on Enrollment Growth is being operated as open to the public for observation. The two Prop 39 committees of BCS and LASD are not required by the Brown Act to be open to the public. But we think it is a really good idea to conduct the negotiations in the open. We can see who is nasty or nice, mean-spirited or compassionate.
What’s new this year is that BCS has called for the negotiations to start now and to be conducted till April 1 as open to the public for observation.
By March 1 BCS is required to make it’s formal response to the Preliminary Offer. And LASD makes its final offer April 1. BCS has called for joint public talks between both parties all throughout the process to work out the details in a more productive manner. That means from now till April 1. In the past, working out details has been put off till summer and even later, and have changed just days before the start of school.
Maybe LASD can show the public it actually knows how to plan something simple – like on time delivery of a reasonable Prop 39 facility for BCS. Taxpayers might again trust LASD with tax dollars to build a 10th site for the North of El Camino area.
New surprise 4th option – the LASD Low Ball offer to BCS
Not formally requested by the LASD Board, Staff decided to analyze this 4th lowball option too
With just 56 BCSers at Blach, Option 4 not functional
With just 56 students in 7 & 8 and just 1 specialized space, it’s not a functional school
LASD’s Low Ball offer – the Blach part map, useless land
On Blach the proposed 2013-2014 land allocation remains virtually unchanged and all but useless. Yellow is the proposed specialized portables to add. Also some timed access to tennis courts may be added. Access to the track occurred in 14 minute slices this year and likely would continue in that manner.
LASD’s Low Ball offer – the Egan part map, 4 new classrooms
The yellow shows where on Egan, LASD proposes to add 4 classrooms for k-6. The 2 by the courts look inconvenient.
LALAHPOLITICO: The low ball Status Quo offer is likely
I think the LASD board will vote for the low ball “status quo” option as the Prop 39 Preliminary Offer for 2013-2014. I hope the public negotiations between both parties this spring will move the April 1 final offer towards something kinder and gentler.
You can download all the relevant files for tonight’s 7pm meeting here. (502kb)
