South Bay : Residents Threaten Suit Over Plan for School Near Park
The Manhattan Beach Unified School District may have a legal hurdle to clear if it wants to build a $17-million middle school next to Polliwog Park.
Neighbors are threatening to file a lawsuit against the school district because an environmental impact report, required for all new buildings and projects, was not completed to show how traffic and construction will affect the surrounding area.
The school district said it is exempt from filing a costly EIR because the proposed middle school, scheduled to open in September 1998, is on an existing school site, Assistant Supt. Scott Smith said.
A former elementary school building is on the Redondo Avenue site where the middle school would be built. District offices now occupy the old school. “We feel like we have followed the guidelines,” Smith said.
But Don Harling, president of La Marina Neighborhood Assn., said the residents are worried about the traffic generated by 1,600 students going to class every day.
“Most of these students will be driven to school or bused to school and dropped off on a residential street,” said Harling, who has lived in the same house for 21 years.
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