Overcrowding Sorely Tests O.C. Schools

Just like the old woman who lived in a shoe, Orange County school officials have so many children they don’t know what to do.

They don’t know how they’re going to manage schools where 800 students are jammed into buildings meant for 400. They don’t know where they’re going to find the money to repair playgrounds and fields trampled by an increasing student population. And most important of all, they don’t know where they’re going to put all those kids.

When school starts this week, there will be a record 390,000 students entering study halls, classrooms and gymnasiums in Orange County. That’s 15,000 more than last year. And that, educators say, is a problem that cannot be solved merely by squeezing a few extra desks into already overburdened facilities.

“This is a crisis in our schools,” said Mike Vail, senior director of facilities at the Santa Ana Unified School District, the county’s largest--and most overcrowded--district. “No matter how aggressively we pursue this, there won’t be enough classrooms out there for these children. Children will be attending schools in substandard facilities.”

By the year 2000, the Orange County student population is expected to reach 546,000. Statewide, more than 5 million students are expected to be enrolled in public schools by the turn of the century, according to the state Department of Finance. The growth is attributed to higher birth rates, newly arrived immigrants and more people moving into the state.

The result: California has been hit by a school building shortage that is “unprecedented since the postwar baby boom,” said William Rukeyser, a spokesman for state Supt. of Public Instruction Bill Honig.

“There is such growth that the state would have to build 22 classrooms every single day of the year, including weekends and holidays, to keep up with the enrollment,” Rukeyser said. Honig is expected to address the school building crisis in a press conference on Tuesday.

Despite the record number of children passing through the public school system, there is little money trickling down from Sacramento to build classrooms. Indeed, there is a five-year backlog of requests for financial assistance for school building construction.

With student populations increasing by the tens of thousands every year, school districts can hardly afford to wait five years for funds they may or may not get. Thus, portable classrooms that hold up to 28 students are sprouting up around the county. For example:

* In Santa Ana Unified, workers have placed 500 portable classrooms--the equivalent of 20 elementary schools--atop playgrounds and parking lots throughout the district. Even Century High School, the district’s newest campus, has run out of classrooms. During the summer, 20 portable classrooms were tacked on to the 2-year-old school.

* Capistrano Unified, faced with a enrollment ballooning from 19,100 in the fall of 1985 to 26,250 in fall, 1990, to an expected 27,900 this fall, has installed 48 portables. If needed, temporary classroom space will be set up in auditoriums and conference rooms, officials said.

* The Anaheim City district has added 34 portable classrooms and converted three schools to year-round schedules to accommodate enrollment that has increased 5% annually in the past few years. In 1985, enrollment was 12,219. Five years later enrollment had increased to nearly 15,000, and 1,000 more students are expected this year.

“We have no land to build new schools and we have no money,” said Anaheim City School District Supt. Meliton Lopez. “As a result, there’s intense use of playgrounds and more damage done to buildings. There are simply more students.”

And the number of students--and the problem of where to put them--is not likely to ease in the near future.

Despite a five-year construction plan and the addition of portables, Santa Ana Unified still can’t find enough rooms for all of its students. By 2000, the district--with an expected student enrollment of more than 47,000 this year--is expected to enroll an additional 22,000 students. Besides relying on portable classroom space, Santa Ana will be converting as many of its elementary schools into year-round schedules as it can, said district Supt. Rudy Castruita.

“Our salvation will be the year-round schools and portables,” Castruita said. “It’s too expensive to build new schools.”

Throughout the county, district officials scrambling to find room for their children spent the summer seeking permits for the classroom trailers. The portables then had to be transported to campuses and wired for electricity at a cost of thousands of dollars per district.

The costs, however, are far less than the time and money needed for construction of new school buildings, which can cost a district up to $15 million for land and construction, said Robert Ours, facilities/planning administrator for the county Department of Education.

Though cheap and easy to install, portables can create as many problems as they solve. When a district plunks down portables on campuses, there is less space for children to play on, and existing buildings suffer from more wear and tear, especially those that are used year-round. In some districts, schools that were built for 400 students are crammed with as many as 800.

Such overcrowding creates a ripple effect that reaches deep into the heart of district budgets. Money that would ordinarily pay for instructional programs is often diverted to repairs to ensure that overused buildings and campus grounds are safe. That means less money to hire teachers to deal with the student population explosion, which means that districts are forced to increase class size instead.

“For every 30 new kids we get, we need a teacher for them, a classroom, textbooks and supplies,” said William Eller, assistant superintendent for instructional operations at the Capistrano Unified School District. “We also have to get them on a school bus. We have to feed them and make sure they have a place to play where they are safe. With more students, there is more work and less money to get the job done.”

The state has no dependable source of funding for districts that do not have enough school buildings, said Vail of Santa Ana Unified, who is also chairman of the Coalition for Adequate School Housing. Currently, money for new school building projects is raised strictly through statewide construction bond measures.

But voter approval of bond measures is declining. A 1988 statewide bond measure, for example, passed with 65% of the vote. Two years later, voters passed an $800-million school construction bond measure with only 51% in favor.

While $800 million may sound like a lot of money, Ours of the county Department of Education pointed out that the money must be spread among similarly overcrowded school districts throughout the state.

“Riverside is exploding. San Diego is growing. And Los Angeles keeps on getting bigger and bigger, just like we are,” Ours said. “Everybody needs that $800 million to expand.”

Rising Enrollment

All but three of Orange County’s school districts are projecting an enrollment increase for the 1991-92 school year.

Projected Percent Rank School District 1991 1990 Increase 1. Santa Ana Unified 47,909 44,519 7.6% 2. Anaheim City 15,908 14,800 7.5% 3. Fullerton Joint Union High 11,748 10,995 6.8% 4. Savanna 2,100 1,966 6.8% 5. Capistrano Unified 27,900 26,250 6.3% 6. Anaheim Union High 19,819 18,746 5.7% 7. Brea-Olinda Unified 5,056 4,846 4.3% 8. Los Alamitos Unified 6,585 6,325 4.1% 9. Magnolia 5,119 4,919 4.1% 10. Westminster 8,637 8,330 3.7% 11. Centralia 4,674 4,520 3.4% 12. Garden Grove Unified 39,142 37,969 3.1% 13. Tustin Unified 11,100 10,800 2.8% 14. Laguna Beach Unified 2,280 2,220 2.7% 15. Saddleback Valley Unified 25,820 25,170 2.6% 16. Newport-Mesa Unified 16,819 16,434 2.3% 17. Ocean View 8,754 8,574 2.1% 18. Buena Park 4,433 4,350 1.9% 19. Fullerton 10,829 10,629 1.9% 20. La Habra City 4,741 4,661 1.7% 21. Cypress 3,902 3,847 1.4% 22. Lowell Joint 2,638 2,602 1.4% 23. Orange Unified 25,374 25,099 1.1% 24. Placentia Unified 21,542 21,342 0.9% 25. Irvine Unified 20,392 20,350 0.2% 26. Huntington Beach Union High 13,360 13,399 -0.3% 27. Huntington Beach City 5,596 5,636 -0.7% 28. Fountain Valley 5,756 5,923 -2.8% Total Orange County Enrollment* 377,933 365,221 3.5%

*Total enrollment is only for school districts and does not include court, home and other schools run by the county. With these schools, total county school enrollment is 390,000.

Source: Los Angeles Times

Researched by: DAYE CLARK / Los Angeles Times