City-School Relations Strained : Site for New Campus Is Latest Irritant in Santa Ana

Santa Ana’s new dispute over where to build a new high school is the latest friction between the city and the school board in recent years.

Since February, 1984, several issues have caused tensions between the city and the board, including disputes over housing code enforcement, proposed builders’ fees, growth versus no-growth positions and even the city’s master plan.

At one point, the city sent an emissary to a school board meeting. The city official, however, conceded at that meeting that the City Council had acted on a sensitive issue without contacting the school board. Board members thereupon icily told the city’s emissary that the good-will overtures showed “a lack of credibility.”

No Cooperation

“The City Council has never of its own volition given us cooperation,” said Santa Ana Unified School District Trustee James Richards. “They’ve met with us when we have forced their cooperation, which is not cooperation.”

Richards, however, said he wouldn’t categorize the relationship between the city and the school board as “adversarial.” “I would just say we co-exist. They have priorities that differ from ours. They think of numbers, and we think of neighborhoods.”

City officials deny such criticism. “We’ve been working very cooperatively all year with the school board,” Santa Ana City Manager Robert Bobb said Friday. “We’ve offered city help to find another (high school) site for them. We’re as concerned about the education of Santa Ana students as they are.”

And City Council members have said the economy of Santa Ana is, itself, a key to improving schools. A community with a strong economic base, the council members have said, is necessary to support the unusual growth of the Santa Ana schools.

Verbal Clashes

But the city and school board nonetheless have had verbal clashes, despite mutual assurances of good will and cooperation.

A flap between the two erupted in February, 1984, when school board members charged that inadequate enforcement of housing standards in the city was the root cause of overcrowding of Santa Ana schools.

City officials vehemently denied the charge, saying that sweeping housing reforms were already under way.

The current dispute between city and school board centers on Santa Ana’s need for a fourth high school. The school board earlier this month chose a site on South Grand Avenue for the new school. That site would be next to a proposed development of a multimillion-dollar McDonnell Douglas high technology project.

City and land development officials contend that a high school is not compatible with the McDonnell Douglas project. The city, in fact, has threatened to condemn the land rather than let the school board take it. City officials say the multimillion-dollar McDonnell Douglas project will be endangered if the school board persists in its plans to build.

The need for new schools in Santa Ana sets the city apart from most of its Orange County neighbors. School-age populations have decreased markedly in most of the 28 school districts in the county.

But Santa Ana has so many new residents, most of whom have children, that a special citizens’ committee last November urged the school board to build one new high school and up to five new elementary schools.

That committee, the Santa Ana Community Task Force on School Facilities, also charged in its report that “unchecked residential growth” in Santa Ana was hurting the schools. The committee recommended that the city declare a moratorium on such growth and consider developers’ fees as subsidies for school construction.

The recommendations prompted concern among Santa Ana builders and developers. The City Council last fall voted down both the developers’ fees and limited-growth suggestions. Councilman Robert Luxembourger said such a no-growth idea would be “suicidal” to the city.

Irked by Action

School board member James Ward, a former Santa Ana mayor, opposed the moratorium, but he nonetheless was irked when the City Council voted it down before seeking school board members’ views. Ward, at the board’s Dec. 11 meeting, told Robert Baylen, a city planning manager, that the City Council vote showed “a lack of credibility” in the city’s offer to help the overcrowded school system.

“The city is showing a credibility gap in its own resolution to show cooperation with the school board,” Ward said Friday. “But I want us to be part of the positive things that are happening in the city, and I’ve told the mayor before, and will tell him again, I’m ready to cooperate. In that regard, I’m willing to reconsider our position (on the high school site).

“Now, the problem is: How do we get the city to cooperate? We (on the school board) are planning up to $100 million in construction of new schools in the next few years. This is a good thing for the city, but we need the city’s cooperation.”

School board President Joan Wilkinson, in an earlier incident, told City Manager Bobb that the city wasn’t considering already crowded schools when it allowed residential growth.

Bobb, during his appearance before the school board, said city officials gladly would meet periodically with school board members. Subsequently, city and school board officials agreed to have a series of regular meetings during the year.

But the high school site dispute already has appeared to strain relations between the city and school board.

Meeting Proposed

Bobb said he feels sure the two can reach an amicable agreement on a new site. “I just hope they (the school board members) aren’t dug in so that we can talk,” he said. “The city has offered to meet with them next week. I’m sure another site can be found.”

The need to build even more schools may cause similar problems in coming months, district officials have said. School officials note that Santa Ana is heavily urbanized and has little vacant land for new school sites.

According to school district projections, Santa Ana will gain almost 9,000 students by 1988. Most of the new students, the district says, will be children of new immigrants from Southeast Asia and Mexico.

Said school board President Wilkinson last November: “We have a land shortage in Santa Ana. Among the questions we have to answer is where do we find places for new schools. Maybe the developers can help us. I would hope they’d work with us and not be in an adversarial position.”