SIMI VALLEY : School District Fee Plan Is Criticized

Chamber of Commerce and building industry officials on Tuesday night protested a plan by the Simi Valley Unified School District to assess fees on developers to pay for the construction and repair of schools.

The officials told the school board that a district plan to impose the fees might be illegal because slow growth in Simi Valley has eliminated the need to build more schools.

Under state law, school districts are allowed to charge residential developers $1.58 per square foot and commercial developers 26 cents per square foot if it can be shown that new development will require more schools.

Supt. Robert Purvis recommended that the school board impose the maximum fees and based his opinion on a consultant’s study.

“I feel there’s sufficient evidence to show that our district will experience growth and that we will be impacted,” Purvis said Tuesday. “I wouldn’t encourage the board to give up on this. I feel it’s best for boys and girls.”

A final decision by the school board is expected on June 18 after a public hearing.

The Simi Valley City Council came down against the developer fees on Monday, declaring the school district’s study seriously flawed.

The council challenged the study’s projection that district enrollment will increase from 18,452 now to 20,357 by 1995. The council said the report downplayed the district’s enrollment decline in recent years and did not present an accurate picture of how the city’s slow-growth ordinance would affect enrollment in the future.

“You got hoodwinked,” Mayor Greg Stratton told school district officials. “The numbers you have here are just garbage.”

Stratton said the report also did not specifically outline how the school district plans to use the money that would be raised by the fees. “If you are going to build a new school, you need to say that’s what you are going to do,” he said.

The council warned against imposing fees on businesses, which the city has been trying to attract to reduce the number of residents commuting to Los Angeles. They said low-cost housing for seniors should also be exempt.

The council noted that because of low enrollment the school district recently gave a one-year extension for the Wood Ranch developer to build a new elementary school. Voters also approved in 1989 the sale of $35 million in bonds to update existing school facilities.