Panel Faces $50-Million Decision on District’s Crowded High Schools

Faced with predictions that the Montebello Unified School District will soon outgrow its classroom space, the Board of Education will decide Thursday whether to build a new high school in Commerce or enlarge three existing campuses.

The question has been hotly debated for several weeks by community and business leaders and school and city officials.

They are at odds over whether to spend $69 million for a new high school when they could expand the old schools at a cost of $19 million. Backers of the new high school claim it would solve overcrowding for decades.

Opponents of the plan to build a new high school argue that the district would be forced to condemn commercial and industrial property for the proposed 40-acre school. The debate was fueled by the recent refusal of Montebello voters to give the Redevelopment Agency the power of eminent domain.

The issue will be one of the most controversial and politically sensitive board decisions in recent years, officials say.

“There is a lot at stake here,” said Darline P. Robles, a spokeswoman for the 31,000-student school district that covers Montebello, Commerce, Bell Gardens and parts of East Los Angeles, Downey, Monterey Park, Pico Rivera, Rosemead and South San Gabriel.

Over the past several weeks, the school board has held four public hearings and expects to hold another Tuesday night for business leaders, residents, parents and officials before voting on the issue.

“Everyone agrees that we need more classroom space,” Robles said. But that is where the agreement ends, she added.

On the one side, School Supt. John P. Cook’s proposal to build the school on one of two sites in mostly industrial Commerce is supported by many parents, the school board’s president, Eleanor K. Chow, and by its business manager, Stephen Phillips.

“We urgently request that you add a new high school to our already overburdened school system,” a coalition of parents wrote to the school board recently. “We feel this is the only viable solution to a problem that will only get worse with the passage of time.”

The student population, which has nearly doubled since the last high school was built in 1971, will increase by another 10% by 1995, Robles said.

And the three comprehensive high schools--Montebello, Schurr and Bell Gardens--and Vail Continuation High School are all operating at capacity. The libraries and cafeterias are outdated, and there is no more room for additional bungalows, Robles said.

But opponents of the proposal for a new school include school board member Herbert M. Stearns, three of the four high school principals, acting budget director Walter Popkin, the Bell Gardens and Commerce city councils and local business leaders, all of whom point out that adding classroom space to the three comprehensive high schools would save $50 million and cut construction time in half.

A new school could take up to eight years to complete, school officials estimated.

Opponents of the proposed new Commerce High School also say that expansion of existing facilities would not force the district to use eminent domain, the controversial power of governments to take land for public use.

“I think the district, students and community would be best served by expanding the existing comprehensive high schools,” Popkin said in a written testimony submitted to the board.

Charles Norton, principal of Vail High School, supports a new school, saying crowding more students onto the three campuses will increase the district dropout rate.

Board member Arthur M. Chavez said he supports building a new school, and board member Darrell H. Heacock said he is still undecided. “I see merit on both sides,” Heacock said last week. “I will have to wait to see what new testimony comes up on Tuesday.”

Board member Willard G. Yamaguchi was unavailable for comment.

Plan Halted Last Year

The proposal to build a new high school was introduced in 1987 when as many as 20 sites were identified, business manager Phillips said. But the plan was temporarily halted last year when enrollment seemed to stabilize, he said.

In March when enrollments increased again, Supt. Cook resubmitted the plan to build a 2,000-student high school either next to Commerce City Hall or near the Bell Gardens-Commerce border. The first location would displace 21 industrial businesses. The second plan would displace 18 businesses, according to school district records.

On May 2, the Commerce City Council unanimously voted to oppose the new high school plan, complaining that it would cost the city thousands of tax dollars and would take too many years to complete.

Mayor Ruth R. Aldaco, in a letter to the school district, said the city would lose more than $410,000 in sales tax revenue if the school were built near City Hall, and $70,000 if the school were built on the second site.

Bell Enrollment High

“We need immediate action against overcrowding, especially at Bell Gardens High,” Commerce Councilman Robert J. Cornejo said in a telephone interview last week. “Enrollment at Bell Gardens High is way out of line.”

Bell Gardens High is the most crowded of the three comprehensive high schools, officials said. With an enrollment of 2,900 students, the school was originally built for half that number.

Stearns said that expanding Bell Gardens High by adding several stories to existing buildings would alleviate overcrowding and the need for eminent domain proceedings against businesses.

“It would be a lot cheaper,” Stearns said.

But Chow and Chavez said expansion of the existing high schools is only a temporary solution to overcrowding.

“It’s a Band-Aid approach,” Chavez said. “We need to look out for these kids way down the line.”

“I am looking at the students who are in the second and third grades,” he continued. “Expansion would not service those kids in the year 2000.”