I don’t think, with the millions of tourists who flood Malibu every year, that any of us can be called an xenophobe as Webster Principal Phil Cott accused me of being because I objected to his padding our classrooms with out-of-district kids. I’m sure that he is correct that these are “lovely children from wonderful families.” However, let the wonderful families pay for their own lovely children and don’t put their lovely tab on my property tax bill.
Malibu is one of the wealthiest Zip codes in the country and I’m sure we can pay for our own schools without dependency on state funding or Santa Monica unified. We can write our own rules and invest in our own best and brightest without big bucks brother looking over our shoulder. Cott then refers to the residents of Calabasas, Agoura, Topanga and Pacific Palisades, as the kids he presumably wants to recruit, with such niceties as “wretched refuse.” The good principal certainly has a way with words.
Jack Singleton