Forster Ranch Developer Vows to Make School Improvements

Concerns that Centex Homes, the master developer of Forster Ranch, might renege on an agreement to refurbish the playing field at Truman Benedict Elementary School are unfounded, a company spokesman said Thursday.

Centex will make the improvements that it promised to the school, which is in Forster Ranch, said Larry Ludwig, president of Centex’s Southern California division.

“We are not pulling out of our commitment to Truman Benedict,” Ludwig said. “That work should be started as soon as possible, hopefully before the children start school.”

Centex had said in May that it would refurbish the playing field and donate some office equipment to the school as a gesture of good will.

When the builder put on hold its plan to develop 1,700 additional homes near the school earlier this summer, community leaders raised concerns that work on the field would be delayed too.

The elementary school opened in the mid-1980s to accommodate about 600 students, said Debra S. Coven, president of the Truman Benedict Parent-Teacher Assn. In the past four years, however, Centex built more than 500 homes in the neighborhood and the number of students has grown to more than 1,000, she said, forcing the school to add portable classrooms.

“The development has made the school very crowded and the field overused and very hazardous,” she said. “The kids are the ones who have borne the brunt of the unfettered development. They pay the biggest price.”