DOWNTOWN L.A. : $30-Million Plot to Be Bought for New School
The Los Angeles Board of Education will purchase a $30-million plot of Downtown land to build a new high school, despite the objections of some residents who say that low-income housing should be constructed instead.
The board’s 6-1 approval clears the way for the State Allocation Board to free the construction funds for the campus, which will be on a 24-acre site at Beaudry Avenue and 1st Street and will help relieve crowding at nearby Belmont High.
Once slated for a high-rise office and housing complex, the site has been the focus of a neighborhood dispute over whether the community would benefit more from low-income housing or a school.
The landowner, Shimizu Development Inc., had been unable to develop the land because of the poor real estate market.
In a compromise, the school district agreed to study turning over a portion of the land for low-income housing.
School board President Leticia Quezada opposed the purchase, saying that construction of a high school at the site was poor city planning. Within a six-block area, the community will have about 10,000 teen-agers at the new high school, a new middle school and Belmont.
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