Dana School Coalition Threatens to Sue Board

A community group trying to block the lease of the former Dana Junior High School in Point Loma threatened Tuesday to sue the San Diego Unified School District if the trustees do not rescind a controversial proposal made to the City Council.

The Community Coalition for Dana also claimed that a joint city-school district task force violated the state’s open meetings law by convening in secret for the last 10 months to discuss the fate of Dana and five other closed schools.

The coalition wants the trustees to rescind a “memorandum of understanding” they passed Jan. 6. In that document, the district asks the City Council to exempt it from a proposed “institutional overlay zone” that would hinder the district’s attempts to lease certain closed school sites for profit. The money is needed to build new schools in crowded sections of the city, school officials have said.

The council decided Tuesday to postpone discussion of the memorandum and the zoning regulations until March 9.

In 1985, the coalition sued the district over its attempt to lease the Dana site to a residential developer for 99 years. An out-of-court settlement last July delayed the lease until the district conducted an environmental impact assessment of the move and held public hearings.