Council OKs $1.25 Million for School

The Los Angeles City Council this week approved the allocation of $1.25 million in Community Redevelopment Agency funds to design and construct a cafeteria and lunch shelter at Mayberry Street School in Silver Lake.

The 7,700-square-foot cafeteria and lunch shelter will be the first permanent building constructed at the 50-year-old elementary school, school officials said.

It is part of a major construction project that will also include a 10-classroom building to be paid for by the Los Angeles Unified School District.

The school was originally designed as a temporary facility in 1939 to handle overflow from nearby schools but later became a permanent school site, serving about 400 students each year in portable classrooms.

Students at the school now eat under a shelter served by a classroom-sized kitchen in a portable structure.

Andrea Allen, principal of the school, said that during inclement weather, students eat in their classrooms.

The cafeteria is one of several school projects being paid for by the Redevelopment Agency with some of the $6.5 million it pledged to assist the school district with improvements to schools serving redevelopment projects near downtown Los Angeles.

The projects are expected to significantly increase enrollment at schools in the area.

Work on the cafeteria began in July, when 10 portable classrooms were moved to make way for the structure, Allen said.

Construction of the classroom building is expected to begin in January.