Local News in Brief : District Delays Bids

The Palos Verdes Peninsula Unified School District has indefinitely postponed opening bids for the sale of the 43-acre Dapplegray Intermediate School site in Rolling Hills Estates.

District spokeswoman Nancy Mahr said the decision was made because of a lawsuit pending in Los Angeles Superior Court, which claims the district erred when it delayed for six months in 1987 the collecting of developer fees that would pay for capital projects for the schools. It asks that the district sell no property until the issue has been resolved.

Mahr said that the district is not required to collect the fees and that the board still intends to sell the property. Notice of the bid-opening cancellation was sent last week to more than 200 potential buyers of the property, which has an estimated market value of $5 million.

The board has also postponed completion of an agreement with the city of Rolling Hills Estates for the city to acquire 12.8 acres of the Dapplegray site for $375,000. The city, which plans to use the site for public recreation, has approved the 30-year lease-purchase agreement, which calls for annual payments of $35,000 at an 8% interest rate but gives the city the option to purchase the land outright at any time.

Critics of the Dapplegray sale--mainly people favoring a separate school district for the eastern part of the peninsula--contend that the number of school-age children is growing and that the school will be needed again. But Mahr said the district’s demographic projections do not support that view.

Dapplegray was closed in 1987 because of declining enrollment.