For the second consecutive month, Malibu Park residents came to City Hall to complain to the school board that they were being left out of the 45,000-square-foot redesign process for Malibu High School, which is located in their neighborhood. Several members of the Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District Board of Education sympathized with the residents they heard from at last Thursday’s meeting, and asked district staff to be more open about what is going on.
The residents were angry because they had only recently found out that a PTA meeting was scheduled for the next day to discuss the redesign project. They said they should have been invited.
“I feel like we’re being divided into two communities,” said one resident, who further stated, “By doing it this way and not talking to us, you’re saying [to the parents], “here’s what we want to do, but here is this other group that doesn’t like it, and we’re going to hear some static from them.'”
Jan Maez, the district’s chief financial officer, said the residents should not be concerned they are being shut out because the upcoming meeting was scheduled by school principal Mark Kelly for the PTA. She said there would be three community meetings on the issues, although dates for the meetings have not been set. The first meeting, she said, might take place next month. This explanation did not sit well with board member Oscar de la Torre.
“It sounds like if we work on a parallel track of having in-school meetings to talk about the plan and then out-of-school meetings to talk with the residents, we’re setting up a divisive process,” said de la Torre, who said the community meetings on the redesign should serve as forums cohosted by the district and the homeowners association.
Several other board members said the district has been doing a poor job communicating with Malibu Park residents. Maria Leon-Vazquez noted the board had just heard from many of the same residents last month when the board met in Malibu.
“It’s kind of disconcerting to have them come back to us and say there is a meeting on Friday and not everybody was asked to come to this meeting after there has been active participation in the community about being involved in these meetings,” Leon-Vazquez said.
The redesign plan for Malibu High was released in September. Homeowners have complained mostly about three features: the design of the buildings, permanent lighting of the athletic facility and that the project does not properly address, in their opinion, the traffic issues on Morning View Drive. The environmental impact report for the project is being written at this time. Maez said at the board meeting that the three public sessions would help with the writing of the document and lead to possible modifications of the proposed project.
“There is a misunderstanding that the kinds of plans we’re seeing at this time are absolute and final,” Maez said. “We’re far from that process. The whole purpose of an EIR process is to get input and let that input mold the final plans that come forward. We’re very much at the beginning of that process.”
But the Malibu Park residents said they have been voicing their concern about issues involving the school for many years, and their statements have fallen on deaf ears.
“The traffic problem on Morning View is a chronic one that the Malibu Park Homeowners Association and individual residents have protested for more than a decade with unfortunately zero impact,” said former association President Marshall Thompson. “It’s only a matter of time until a serious accident or a fatality happens on Morning View due to the chaotic traffic that is there now.”
Fellow resident Robert Miller added, “The school has done nothing. They take meetings. They meet with us. They say they’re going to do something. Nothing gets done.”
Information on the redesign proposal can be found on the district’s Web site at www.smmusd.org. Comments on the proposal can be submitted to the district until Nov. 26 in preparation for the drafting of an environmental impact report. Instructions on how to submit comments appear on the Web site. The district has promised three “public outreach” meetings. The dates of those meetings have not been established.