Fiery Newhall School Meeting : Parents Fight Board’s Division of Tract

A controversy over school boundaries in Newhall, apparently settled last spring, has erupted again just six weeks before the start of the school year.

After lengthy and sometimes acrimonious testimony Monday night, about 100 parents asked the Newhall Board of Education to restore boundaries that were approved May 9 but later altered.

At issue is where children from a development called the Summit will go to school. If the boundaries are restored, all children from the development will go to Valencia Valley Elementary School, a school built to relieve classroom crowding in the Newhall School District.

On July 11, trustees voted 4 to 1 to redraw the boundaries and bus children in the northern half of the Summit development to Old Orchard Elementary School in central Newhall.

Busing Necessary

Supt. J. Michael McGrath said busing students to Old Orchard is necessary because the district underestimated the number of students who would attend Valencia Valley. The new school, with a capacity of about 710 students, already has 719 enrolled for fall classes, he said.

Without busing students from the northern section of the Summit to Old Orchard, the new school would have 950 students in two years, he said. Such crowding is unacceptable, he said.

But parents said that splitting the development between two schools would destroy a close-knit community. They also said their children could endure crowded campuses to avoid busing.

The Summit is roughly bordered by the Golden State Freeway on the west, Valencia Boulevard on the north and McBean Parkway on the east and south.

One parent, Denise Cannon, said she recently purchased a home in the northern section of the Summit partly because she thought her children--Korry, 11, Michael, 8, and Tyler, 5--could walk or ride bicycles to school.

“When I closed escrow on my house, I did it knowing my children would go to Valencia Valley,” she said.

Language Issue Raised

At a meeting of Summit homeowners last week, a few parents said they did not want their children attending Old Orchard because bilingual programs are conducted there for non-English-speaking students. One man tried to raise the bilingual issue Monday, but parents shouted him down, saying language instruction did not concern them.

Two parents told board President Howard Hill and board member Pat Willett they could face tough reelection battles in November, 1989, if they do not vote to restore the boundaries approved in May.

“Do you want this audience to be fighting tooth and nail with you during the next year?” Ed Shalom asked.

The other trustee facing reelection next year, Charles Payne, was the only board member who voted July 11 against sending children from the Summit development to the two schools. He urged his colleagues Monday night to restore the May boundaries, but his motion died without a second.

But trustees did say they would consider the parents’ request.

Most of northern Summit is still under construction, but a few families have moved in. If the May boundaries are not restored, about 30 North Summit children would be bused this year, but 120 more would be bused by the time the development is completed in a few years, McGrath said.

Trustee Bobbie Summers said she did not know that some families were living in the northern section of the development when she voted for the boundary change two weeks ago. She also said the board did not realize the decision would be so unpopular. Other board members did not comment.

Valencia Valley is the fast-growing district’s sixth school. The district had 3,130 students in 1987 and expects to enroll about 4,000 when classes start Sept. 6.