Lomita Request to Quit School District Denied

In a setback to groups trying to break away from Los Angeles city schools, proponents of a new district for the South Bay city of Lomita failed to muster crucial support from the State Board of Education on Thursday.

Lomita’s request to hold an election on its proposal to carve a 2,000-student, three-school system from the Los Angeles Unified School District garnered only three yes votes--half of what it needed--from the 11-member board. Five board members voted no and three were absent when the vote came after an hour and a half of hearing and debate.

While Lomita’s proposal technically is still alive, Thursday’s vote sent it to the back burner. It dimmed the hopes of four other groups trying to break away from the nation’s second-largest school district, but gave comfort to the broad range of Los Angeles civic and education leaders who are trying to keep the district together.

“I’m disappointed,” said Lomita Councilman Robert Hargrave, a leader of the Committee to Unify Lomita Schools. Although he declined to say what the group would do next, he added, “I’m not through yet.”

But Marian Bergeson, the maker of the failed motion and a seasoned politician, said she doubts that the proposal can get the votes it needs to go forward.

“If I thought it had a chance, I’d bring it back,” said Bergeson, who was appointed to the board by former Gov. Pete Wilson. Four board members are appointees of Gov. Gray Davis, and they all voted no.

Lomita’s was the first of several breakaway movements to reach the governing body, and the state board’s decision was widely watched throughout the mammoth district.

The state Department of Education had recommended that the board deny Lomita’s request, saying it would upset the racial balance in area schools and would disrupt the educational program.

Under the Lomita proposal, the schools would go from 21% white to 36%, and almost 2,000 students from minority groups would be sent to other schools, adding to the Los Angeles district’s overcrowding problems, the state said.

Like others trying to leave the nearly 700,000-student district, Lomita proponents say they want local control, arguing that a smaller district and a locally elected board would be more responsive and more efficient.

But some on the state board said they were reluctant to take a “piecemeal” approach to reorganizing L.A. Unified.

“This would really start--I will be dramatic--an avalanche of secession requests,” said Beverly Hills Councilwoman Vicki Reynolds, a former local school board member in that city.

“The piecemeal approach is not good government. It is not good planning. It needs to be master-planned,” Reynolds said. She echoed a conclusion of a 1997 UCLA study of breaking up the district.

But Janet Nicholas, a Wilson appointee from Petaluma, voted yes, noting the poor performance of Lomita schools under the Los Angeles system. She cited a report labeling two of the schools “low performing,” while the third school, a magnet that stresses fundamental academic skills, was near the national average.

Thursday’s vote marked the second time the state board has stymied a secession bid by Lomita advocates, who began trying to form a separate district in the mid-1980s. Advocates drew up their proposal, collected voter signatures and won county approval before the state board denied their petition in 1987. As the city’s racial composition and other circumstances changed over the years, Lomita school proponents decided to try again. They won county approval in 1994, and had been waiting ever since for the opportunity to make their case to the state board.