SANTA ANA : School Board to Use Juvenile Work Crew

The Santa Ana Unified School District and the Orange County Probation Department have joined forces in an attempt to keep the district’s vacant land clean.

The district owns 84 acres of land on which new schools will eventually be built. In the meantime, the land serves as a temporary home for homeless people and a dumping ground for trash and debris. The situation has drawn complaints from city officials and concerned citizens, said Gaylen Freeman, the district’s assistant superintendent for business services.

To help combat the problem, the district’s Board of Education this week (8/14)unanimously approved an agreement with the Orange County Juvenile Work Program for it to provide a supervised work crew of 10 to 12 juveniles who will spend weekends weeding and upgrading the appearance of the land. Their services will cost the district $275 a day.

“They will be used on an as-needed basis,” Freeman said. “We think this is a good program that will be very beneficial to the district.”

The district, which has 43 schools, is the largest in the county and the ninth largest in the state. A rapid increase in student population, particularly in central Santa Ana, has forced the district to acquire land and to build new schools at a rate of about two per year.