One of the most surprising things I learned from reading the resources available at the National Trust for Historic Preservation website is how common District 150’s missteps are from a national perspective.  Reading the NTHP publication “Why Johnny Can’t Walk to School” (PDF file), published in 2002, is like reading our morning paper lately.

The whole report is fascinating and a highly-recommended read, but I just want to point out a few highlights from the section titled “How Shortsighted Policies Undermine Historic Neighborhood Schools”:

• “Many state education departments either mandate or recommend a minimum number of acres for schools. […] Sites as large as those recommended today are hard to find in older cities and towns, where older schools typically occupy only two to eight acres, are surrounded by densely developed neighborhoods, and have no room to expand. […]  In Massachusetts, older communities have had to give up precious parkland and farmland so schools could meet acreage standards.”
• “In some cases, state acreage standards are actually more flexible than they are represented to be. However, some school districts treat recommendations as if they were regulations, particularly when they want an excuse to tear down and build new. When citizens working to save older neighborhood schools try to distinguish between what’s required and what’s merely recommended, they sometimes run into a brick wall, buck-passing between state and local officials, or both.” Peoria is suffering from this: Ken Hinton went on WMBD radio and left the impression the state mandated 15 acres for a new school, when in fact Illinois has no minimum acreage requirement. And even at the meeting Monday night, school officials were applying the erroneous 15-acre standard to the current Glen Oak School site, protesting they’d have to demolish 60 houses to get that much space at the corner of Wisconsin and Frye and conlcuding, “the district simply doesn’t have the money to build there.” Yet the 15-acre standard is completely arbitrary and impractical for an inner-city school.
• When comparing the costs of renovation vs. new construction, “certain new construction costs — items such as land acquisition, water and sewer line extensions, transportation and road work, for example — may not be factored into the comparison. […] The rules also trivialize other values, such as a community’s desire to maintain a school as a neighborhood anchor or to have a school to which children can walk.”
• The costs of busing children longer distances as a result of building schools in remote locations are sometimes ignored, even though these costs can be substantial.
• “Because of insufficient operating funds, many school districts […] have to defer needed building maintenance.  In other cases, school boards have been criticized for allowing older schools to deteriorate, knowing it will then be easier to garner voter approval for new buildings.”
• And finally, this is my favorite: “Although many school boards are models of inclusiveness and openness, other boards act in secrecy and make citizens feel shut of the planning process.”

Regarding that last point, the Journal Star correctly pointed out in a recent editorial that the board’s actions weren’t technically secret.  They did disclose that Glen Oak Park and Morton Square Park were potential sites back in October 2005, even saying explicitly that the Glen Oak Park site was “preferred.” However, the final decision-making process was not what one would call “inclusive.”

According to the master facilities planning document, the committee held forums September 5-16, 2005, before the document disclosing specific sites was released.  After the document was released, no further input from neighbors, parents, the city, or other concern citizens was solicited until this past Monday night’s meeting.  But I think everyone’s pleased they provided Monday’s forum, belated as it was — let’s just hope it results in some positive changes from the school board.

There’s been a lot on the news about the format of the District 150 public forum last night at Woodruff High School.  There was no real dialogue — the board gave their presentation and the residents gave their presentations.  The board chose not to respond to questions or comments from the audience, but instead post responses on their website at a later date, after they’ve had a chance to discuss them.

I don’t think that’s a bad thing.  The natural tendency would be for the school board members to be defensive in the face of questions and comments from the audience, and want to explain themselves.  Had they responded directly in the forum last night, a lot of time would have been spent with the school board talking, and talking, and talking.  The format they chose allowed the maximum amount of time for East Bluff residents and other concerned citizens to voice their concerns and for the board to do the best thing they could do:  listen.

Of more concern to me was the fact that not all the school board members were there.  According to the Journal Star, the board members who attended were Alicia Butler, Sean Matheson, Steve Morris, David Gorenz and Mary Spangler.  That means Garrie Allen and Martha Ross didn’t show up.  Why not?  Where were they?  Did they have a good excuse to miss such an important meeting?  Or did they not feel listening to residents was important?