Damage at Dana
As a California taxpayer, I was appalled by the San Diego County grand jury report on the damage deliberately caused to the closed Dana Junior High School in Point Loma by the San Diego Police Department SWAT team, the FBI and Marine teams for training.
This deliberate damage was inflicted upon the school with the blessing of and with the permission of the San Diego Board of Education.
From a taxpayer’s point of view, it is unconscionable for the board to allow this damage to happen to public school property entrusted to its care and protection. It is even more unconscionable when we consider the fact that almost every school district in San Diego County is grossly overcrowded.
The statements made by Kay Davis, board president, and Tina Dyer, district legal counsel, concerning the grand jury report are nothing more than empty rhetoric and are irrelevant to the damage to the publicly-owned Dana Junior High School.
If vandals, young adults, or teen-agers would have caused more than $1-million damage to this school, district officials would be demanding restitution from parents of the offenders--and rightly so.
As California taxpayers, it is only fair that we demand that the offending school board members and administration officials make restitution to the taxpayers for violating the trust we place in them and for deliberately allowing more than $1 million in damage to our public property.
It also seems appropriate that the offending board and staff members be required to work alongside the workers repairing the damage to this school.
C.B. STODGHILL
Vista
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