Pleasant Valley District to Study Camarillo Unification

Pleasant Valley school trustees have created a task force to study a proposal to bring Adolfo Camarillo High School under the district’s control.

After a sometimes heated four-hour discussion of a study examining the feasibility of unification, trustees agreed unanimously Thursday night to create the panel, which will likely include Camarillo parents, teachers and school district officials. The exact composition will be decided at a January school board meeting.

Before then, the five Pleasant Valley School District trustees plan to hold two in-depth study sessions on unification. Officials in the neighboring Oxnard Union High, Mesa Union and Somis Union school districts will be invited to participate at one session, because unification would affect several districts. The other session would involve only the Pleasant Valley trustees.

Simple in concept but more difficult in practice, unification would entail shifting control of the award-winning Camarillo High from Oxnard Union High School District to the smaller Pleasant Valley, which currently operates elementary and middle schools. The process could take two or more years to reach a public vote.

Unification advocates believe bringing all Camarillo schools under one district would increase local control of curriculum and spending, eliminate busing of some Camarillo students to Rio Mesa High School in Oxnard and make it easier for parents to participate in their children’s education.

“I think recent election results are enough of a Boston Tea Party to let you know unification is an issue residents are ready to pursue,” said Camarillo parent Roger Lund, referring to the election to the board last month of two pro-unification candidates. He ran with the pro-unification slate, including trustees Jennifer Miller and Ron Speakman, but was defeated.

“It’s an issue of local control,” Lund said. “That’s an issue America faced in the 1700s when America broke away from Great Britain, Great Britain being analogous to the Oxnard Union High School District.”

Foes believe the move could leave a substantially more segregated Oxnard school district and leave Pleasant Valley strapped for facilities and cash to cover employee benefits.

Citing those reasons and others, lawyer Thomas Griffin, former counsel for the state Board of Education hired to represent Oxnard, said the effort would not pass regulatory muster.

“We would urge you to not move ahead with this proposal,” he said.

Before taking action, the Pleasant Valley trustees heard hours of testimony from a consultant hired to study unification’s feasibility, from a lawyer hired to advocate for the Oxnard district and from half a dozen residents, all of whom favored unification.

By the time votes were cast, it was clear that Trustees Miller and Speakman were the most enthusiastic, while Virginia Norris and Ricardo Amador were more cautious. Board President Val Rains said she was concerned about the proposal’s possible effect on classroom instruction, racial diversity and district finances.