School Meets Opposition to Expansion

A private school’s plan to add classrooms, grade levels and students drew both praise and criticism from the 100 people who packed a public hearing held by the planning commission Wednesday night.

Parents of children who attend Phoenix Ranch School said expansion meant they wouldn’t have to transfer their children at the end of the fourth grade.

But neighbors of the school, which straddles Oak Road near its intersection with Los Angeles Avenue, complained that an expansion would fill their neighborhood with noise and jam their narrow, private road with more cars as parents dropped off and picked up their children.

Neighbor Gary Bright was one of the four speakers in opposition to the plan. “We live with the current existing problems now--traffic and noise problems,” he said. “We don’t feel it will work.”

But Kathy Butler of Simi Valley, who has one son at Phoenix, said the school provides a needed service.

“I spend a lot of time at work, and I need a place to put my child that has quality care,” she said. “There is no other school in Simi Valley better than Phoenix. . . . I would like my child to be there from preschool through the sixth grade.”

The planning commission was still discussing the matter late Wednesday evening.

Officials at the school, divided into a preschool and an elementary school, hope to add three modular buildings for use as classrooms, a computer lab and library and school offices. An additional modular building, installed in 1993 on a temporary basis, would be made permanent.

Two new parking lots are planned, one just for staff. Plans also call for construction of a pool for use by students and children enrolled in the day camp the school runs each summer.

If approved, the changes would allow enrollment to increase by 118 students--from 169 to 287, according to the city--and give the school the space it needs to offer classes through the sixth grade, owner and administrator Frances Alascano said.

School administrators, anticipating that the project would win approval, already have increased their enrollment to 177 for the coming year. If the expansion is not approved, Alascano said before the meeting, the additional students may be taught off-site, possibly in a nearby office building, while the school tries to find a way to revive its proposal. “I’m going to move the children into those rooms and fight like heck,” she said.

The rising enrollment, however, worries Oak Road residents. The private road is just 20 feet wide, too narrow to handle the traffic more students would bring, Bright said before the meeting.

City planners estimate the number of daily car trips to and from the school would increase by 339, with 65 new trips in the morning and 52 in the evening. About half of the traffic would use nearby Shunk Road instead of Oak Road, planners project.

Bright said the school is increasing traffic on the private road without doing anything to cushion the impact.

“When a business grows, it’s the responsibility of the business to make sure they don’t impact surrounding land uses,” he said.

City planners, however, said the projected traffic increase was not great enough to warrant further study. To ensure that parked cars don’t clog the street, the school must place “No Parking” signs along its portion of Oak Road.

Residents also worry about schoolchildren crossing the road in the midst of traffic. “The concern is that they have facilities on both sides of the road and they’re bringing children back and forth,” said Larry Lagatta, who lives on Oak Road and, with his wife, owns a feed store between the school and Los Angeles Avenue.

Although not opposed to the idea of expansion, Lagatta said before the meeting that the crossing is already unsafe.

Although the school has been a good neighbor, it has cut the value of his home, Lagatta said. Twice, he and his wife have listed their house for sale, only to have potential buyers shy away.

“The fact that there’s a school and there’s kids there seems to turn people off,” he said. “Realtors have told us that clients wouldn’t get out of the car.”

Parents of Phoenix students, however, see the school as a community asset that deserves to grow. Two of Karyn Newbill’s children attend the Phoenix summer camp, and this fall two will attend the preschool.

“I was looking for a safe environment and one where the kids were not just baby-sat--one that was intellectually stimulating,” she said earlier this week.

She doubted the traffic would pose a safety hazard to the students crossing Oak Road. “Most of the people who drive it are parents with kids there, and they’re very cautious.”