Letter: Ad was shameless and inaccurate

As La Cañada resident and career land-use attorney, I have seen my share of antiproject hyperbole, but none so crass as the recent full-page hit piece ad against the Flintridge Sacred Heart Academy Master Plan purchased in the Valley Sun by the so-called “Protect La Cañada Flintridge” group.

As if equating the image of a male bartender and a lineup of cocktail glasses with a prestigious all-girls parochial school wasn’t tasteless enough, the purported facts that our residents should be up in arms about were hardly compelling.

Why would anyone have a problem with FSHA wanting to provide a top flight education to 40 more young women from our community by increasing enrollment 10%? That would put FSHA’s enrollment at….oh, less than each our city’s three elementary schools: La Cañada, Palm Crest and Paradise Canyon. And the attempt to link FSHA to car accidents in the area is also baseless according to the letter from the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department posted on the group’s own website. The Sheriff’s Department clearly stated in the letter that “none of [of the reported accidents] are confirmed to have involved a FSHA student or visitor.”

In my opinion, the group that mounted this shameful attack should stop wasting its money on slick ads, and should instead consider making a contribution to FSHA’s capital campaign to help fund one of the proposed Master Plan improvements — a subterranean parking structure. Now that’s something that would make the neighborhood a better and safer place.

Donald M. Davis, Esq.
La Cañada Flintridge