District Purging Pupils Who Fake Residency : Schools: At least 46 students have been expelled. More being investigated. Phony addresses are used to take advantage of the city’s well-regarded system.

The Beverly Hills Unified School District is methodically purging dozens of students who use fake addresses to take advantage of the district’s highly regarded schools.

Since the beginning of the school year, 18 students have been asked to leave Beverly Hills High School and as many as 25 more are under investigation, said Assistant Supt. Carol Katzman.

At the district’s four elementary schools, 28 students have been expelled. Up to 12 more are under investigation, Katzman said. Many of the students still under investigation will probably be vindicated, she said.

Except in cases where a student has blatantly lied to school officials on an ongoing basis, the illegal students are allowed to finish the semester before they are barred from attending Beverly Hills schools.

“We’re not immediately calling in students and telling them they’ve been dropped,” said Beverly Hills High School Principal Ben Bushman. “We try not to interrupt their school progression . . . by doing it at a time that is educationally sound.”

Last November, the school board approved spending up to $10,000 on a residency investigator to help a part-time investigator catch up on a burgeoning caseload, said Supt. Sol Levine.

“We’re continually in the process of investigating out-of-district residencies,” Levine said.

Suspected students are discovered in a number of ways. School principals may notice a combination of things that might indicate illegal residence, such as frequent tardiness and spotty attendance, Bushman said.

Other signals that might lead to an investigation include returned mail, out-of-district addresses on forwarding notices from the post office and complaints from other parents.

In order to be considered a resident, a student must sleep at a Beverly Hills address at least five nights a week. Investigators checked out some addresses and found only friends or relatives--but no students. In several cases, wealthier families rented apartments and did not use them.

Katzman expressed regret that more students cannot find legal ways to attend Beverly Hills schools.

“Many of the kids could have come in through child-care permits,” she said. “But once they are kicked out for being untruthful, we won’t honor the permit.”

About 100 students in kindergarten through eighth grade attend school on child-care permits that are issued to parents who work or have a child-care provider in Beverly Hills. Los Angeles Unified School District has been awarding more of these release permits lately, Katzman said. Beverly Hills accepts the students if space is available.

At the high school level, however, out-of-district students can apply for a permit only if they have a parent working for the school district. About 80 out-of-district students attend the high school in a separate multicultural program.

Illegal school attendance was a major issue in the November school board election. Residents at candidate forums frequently asked what would be done to solve the problem. They complained that illegal students increased class size and crowded other students out of classes with limited enrollment, including elective and advanced placement classes.

Board member Phil Harris said that parents who pay high rents to live in Beverly Hills so that their children can attend district schools are irked by those who try to get their children in illegally.

“Some parents have said they struggle to live in Beverly Hills, and it doesn’t seem fair for other parents to send their kids over illegally,” he said.

In recent months, district officials have seen an increase in reports of illegal attendance.

Board president Dana Tomarken said she thinks recent cutbacks in school services are responsible for the increase. Budget cuts have scaled back popular programs such as physical education and music, and they have caused class sizes to increase.

School officials say that although illegal attendance may provide students with the kind of education they are looking for, the students also suffer the emotional consequences of living a lie. They must always worry that the truth will come out and they’ll be sent packing.

“The child is under a lot of pressure to cover up,” Tomarken said. “I feel badly for children that are put in that situation.”