Lawmaker Seeks U.S. Advice on L.A. School District Breakup

Joining the movement to split up the mammoth Los Angeles Unified School District, freshman Rep. Howard P. (Buck) McKeon has requested help from new U.S. Atty. Gen. Janet Reno to ensure that any breakup plan will not violate school segregation laws.

In a letter dated Thursday--the same day Reno was confirmed in the nation’s top law enforcement post--McKeon expressed support for dividing Los Angeles’ “overburdened school system” but told Reno that some critics contend that a breakup would isolate and harm poor and minority students.

“I am convinced this will not be the case,” the Santa Clarita Republican wrote. “Nevertheless, I am asking for your assistance in determining what guidelines such a proposal must follow to comply with federal civil rights laws.”

If Reno agrees to McKeon’s request, it would be the first federal involvement in the issue. Last month, state Senate President Pro Tem David A. Roberti (D-Van Nuys) introduced a bill that would create a commission charged with producing a proposal to break the Los Angeles school district into at least seven smaller systems.

Assemblywoman Paula Boland (R-Granada Hills), principal co-author of the Roberti legislation, has scheduled a hearing today in Van Nuys on the proposed breakup.

Armando Azarloza, a spokesman for McKeon, acknowledged that splitting the school district--the nation’s second-largest--”is really a state and local issue more than anything else.” But he said there is a federal role because national civil rights and school integration laws could be involved in the breakup, which opponents have promised to challenge in court.

“No one really has approached anybody on the federal level to come up with a solution” to the racial problems posed by dividing the district, Azarloza said. “We’re trying to clear the deck of federal issues so that we can go ahead with the breakup.”

Although most of McKeon’s district is in Santa Clarita, a third of it encompasses areas of Chatsworth, Northridge, North Hills and Mission Hills, Azarloza said.