On Monday, April 29, phase one of the Malibu Schools Alignment Project was given the green light by the Malibu Planning Commission.
In a unanimous 5-0 vote, commissioners approved the Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District’s (SMMUSD) request for a coastal development permit, a conditional use permit, and a lot merger to facilitate the merging of Juan Cabrillo Elementary School and Point Dume Marine Science School at the latter’s site in time for the 2019-20 school year.
“My goal is to bring back some of your kids,” SMMUSD Superintendent Dr. Ben Drati said at the Monday meeting. He explained that by combining the schools and increasing its size, more programs and resources would potentially be available to students and faculty.
The commission also adopted an initial study and mitigated negative declaration composed by the school district to identify any potential negative impacts to the area. This report focused on the disturbance of natural habitat and cultural resources, noise and traffic.
To achieve the goal of adding Juan Cabrillo’s 185 students to PDMSS’ 195 student population, the school district planned a number of changes including: adding temporary modular buildings (portables) to increase classrooms from 18 to 26 and allow for a maximum of 450 students, conducting grading, configuring the onsite traffic to address safety and traffic flow, and mitigating any native tree disturbance.
To accommodate all the portables, the school district had initially planned to remove one native Western Sycamore tree and pay in-lieu mitigation fees to the Native Tree Impact Mitigation Fund based on the city’s native tree protection ordinance.
Planning Commission Chair Steve Uhring asked whether downsizing from 10 portables to eight would save the native tree, to which Stan Barankiewicz, legal counsel for the school district, said, “We could save that one Sycamore.”
“Hallelujah,” Uhring replied.
As for noise, Barankiewicz said construction would not be taking place between 7 p.m. – 7 a.m. on weekdays, and between 5 p.m. – 8 a.m. on Saturdays, Sundays, and all city holidays. Despite worries from Commissioner Kraig Hill that a possible staggered schedule to accommodate all the students could increase the usage of the bell and PA system, Drati assured him the usage—and subsequent noise disturbance to neighbors—was “not going to change from what is taking place now.”
After previous talk with the City of Malibu Public Works Department, the district proposed changing the current Fernhill Drive gate to entrance-only for vehicles; a separate exit-only driveway would be created just south of the current driveway to aid flow of traffic. It also described a secondary pick-up/drop-off area on Grayfox Street.
The biggest concern commissioners had—especially Commissioner John Mazza—was the possible vehicle queuing to get into the school lot. “When I read the traffic report, I took it with a grain of salt because the first thing it said was, ‘Well, we’re going to add cars for another 185 [or] 190 students, but it’s going to increase the queue by two cars,” Mazza said. “That’s nuts, OK?”
Brian Marchetti, a senior transportation planner with KOA Corp. assisting the district with traffic mitigation, explained that based on prior observations the queue did not regularly block the streets surrounding PDMSS, and that they had made the projections based on these observations. Though Mazza remained unconvinced, Uhring pushed for a sheriff’s presence as well as continual updates to monitor the situation once the 2019-20 school year goes into session.
Several community members voiced their thoughts and concerns during public comment prior to the district’s presentation.
A parent, Todd Doyle, echoed the statement: “What’s lost a lot is just the impact on the children. The children need this.”
On the flip side, several Point Dume residents brought up traffic and environmental concerns.
“If you guys don’t figure out how to educate the parents, we got a real big problem,” thirty-one year Point Dume resident Steven Grahek said, referring to them as “crazy-eyed, cell phone talking moms and dads” driving their kids to school.
“I hope we have more kids—I just want you to protect them,” he explained.
Multiple commissioners expressed that while they wanted to see the merger happen, there were parts of the project that needed to be addressed in further detail.
As part of their approval of the permits, they set forth conditions, including:
*A qualified archaeologist must be onsite during any construction that causes ground disturbance as part of recognizing cultural resources.
*Every three months during the school year, the school district must present traffic conditions, problems/solutions and bus usage to the planning commission.
*A bus must run from Juan Cabrillo—or another location not in Point Dume—to the PDMSS site in the first year, regardless of ridership. The second and third year of bussing is dependent on the number of bus passes sold—if the number is shown to be below 10, the condition may be terminated by the commission.
Construction is set to begin on May 10, with a completion date of Aug. 16—just in time for the school year.
On a final note, Uhring said, “I can assure you that what we’re going to do is keep our eyes on this one, all right, because … the impact on the residents; we want to make sure that’s as minimal as we can make it and I think the school district will help us do that.”