One Fountain Valley School to Be Closed in Compromise Plan

Fountain Valley School District trustees, in a compromise move, unanimously voted Thursday night to close only one school--Arevalos Elementary--rather than both Arevalos and Fountain Valley Elementary, as had earlier been proposed.

The compromise came after two weeks of protests by angry parents, mainly from the Fountain Valley Elementary attendance area. There had been fewer complaints to the proposed closure this summer of Arevalos Elementary, at 19692 Lexington Lane in Huntington Beach.

The board said declining student enrollment throughout the district and an anticipated $500,000 budget deficit for next year forced the decision to close at least one school.

The board’s action in sparing Fountain Valley Elementary failed to placate a somber audience of about 65 people attending the meeting at school district headquarters. Some parents told the board that they believed Fountain Valley Elementary had only been given a reprieve and would ultimately be closed.

School board member Carol Mohan deplored such suggestions. She urged residents of the Fountain Valley Elementary School attendance area not to move because they think the school is doomed. “It is up to the Fountain Valley community to save the Fountain Valley School,” she said. “You will sound the death of Fountain Valley School if you start to bail out now.”

John Thompson, an attorney who has two sons attending Fountain Valley Elementary, told the board that it had “created this problem” by the initial recommendation to close that school. Thompson said: “People will read about this and say, ‘Whoa, we’re next.’ And they will get out of Fountain Valley. . . . I predict that next year on this night, Fountain Valley will be the next school closed.”

The vote to close only one school left the school board still pondering red ink in next year’s budget.

“Closing Fountain Valley School will save the district about $150,000, but we’ve still got to find ways to cut another $350,000,” said Cheryl Norton, director of communications for the school district.

In an interview before the school board meeting, Norton said the district “now has no choice but to cut (optional school) programs.” She said the cuts will mean some layoffs.

Optional positions that will have to be scrutinized for possible cuts, she said, include school nurses, counselors and assistant principals.

Students in the Arevalos School area next year will attend Gisler School at 18720 Las Flores St. in Fountain Valley, according to Norton. The school board said Arevalos would be closed effective June 30.

Fountain Valley, an elementary school district that serves most of that city and part of northeastern Huntington Beach, was one of the fastest-growing districts in Orange County 20 years ago. New families with young children were moving into the tracts of new homes springing up in the area. But since 1973, when enrollment peaked at 12,700, Fountain Valley School District has had a continuous decline.

The district now has about 6,100 students and is forecasting another decline next year, to about 5,900. Six schools had been closed in prior years. Arevalos becomes the seventh casualty of declining enrollment.

Fountain Valley Elementary, situated at 17911 Bushard St., across the street from Fountain Valley High School, is the oldest elementary school in the city. Many parents protested its proposed closure because of the school’s history in the community. But most objections were against the distance students in the area would have to travel to new schools. Many Fountain Valley Elementary parents also challenged the accuracy of figures that predict another decline in attendance at that school next year.

Arevalos Elementary’s proposed closure produced fewer complaints “because enrollment was already so low that people had seen the handwriting on the wall,” according to Norton.