Simi Residents Hopeful About Plans for Wood Ranch School

Getting a current cost estimate for constructing a new elementary school and opening a bank account for the project--those are two small steps along the path toward constructing a much-needed Wood Ranch elementary school.

Heartening parents and school officials, both issues will be considered by the Simi Valley school board at tonight’s meeting.

The recent steady movement toward building the school--first proposed more than a decade ago but never realized--is welcome news to Simi Valley’s west-end residents.

“In the past, nobody has wanted to take the responsibility for getting [construction] moving at the school board level,” said Theresa Berenger, who heads Friends of Long Canyon, a volunteer resident group organized by a developer to push for the city approval of a Wood Ranch expansion. “Now the school board seems to be a cohesive group that wants to move forward.”

Part of that motion entails revamping the 7-year-old blueprint for the school, say officials with the Simi Valley Unified School District. The original plans called for a 500-student school that would accept students from the massive Wood Ranch subdivision.

But with the advent of tougher seismic standards, more stringent accommodations for the disabled and smaller classes for primary grades, the $6.2-million price tag may well be out of date, said Dave Kanthak, assistant superintendent for business services.

As a result, trustees will consider paying independent contractor Charles C. Monroe $9,050 for an updated cost estimate.

Another option, said board President Judy Barry, is scrapping the original Wood Ranch school plans. Instead, the school system would borrow a late-model blueprint for a bigger school--say, one that holds 600 or 650 students--that has already been used in another area.

This option would allow the school district to “save time and money,” she said, by skirting a lengthy state approval process.

Also at the meeting, trustees will consider forming a capital projects building fund--which will eventually hold $3.1 million from New Urban West Inc., the developer that plans to build 652 homes in the final section of the Wood Ranch subdivision.

That money would be the first installment of the $6 million or so that New Urban West has pledged to the school district to buy the remaining 1,850-acre Long Canyon parcel.

While the two agenda items are comparatively small, they represent a great deal when coupled with a recent school board promise to open a Wood Ranch school as soon as September 1998, Barry said.

“We are definitely committed to building this school,” she said. “We are moving forward just as quickly as we can.”

The board action continues a years-long Wood Ranch saga.

The Wood Ranch school--which would ease overcrowding at nearby Madera Elementary--was first initiated in 1982 as part of a proposed 4,000-home development project. But when the parent company of the original Wood Ranch developer, Olympia/Roberts, filed for bankruptcy 11 years later, no school had been built.

The school district then unwittingly became the Long Canyon landlord, when Olympia/Roberts gave the prime residential land to the district in lieu of the $6.2 million promised for school construction.

As it now stands, the school district plans to sell the land to New Urban West--possibly in December or January. With the proceeds from the land deal, trustees have pledged to build a school.

That will be a relief for Madera Elementary, which was built for 600 students but uses portable trailers to handle a 140-student overflow, much of it attributable to the Wood Ranch development.

“It will be nice when Wood Ranch is built because it will be a wonderful new school,” said Madera Principal Karyn Crytser. “And, of course, many of our students will go over there, which will make Madera a much smaller school.”

Added Berenger: “I cannot tell you how excited the Wood Ranch parents are just to see the school board resolve to going forward with this school.”