5th Middle School for Conejo Unified

* Less than a month before the election, the Conejo Valley Unified School District board stated publicly that it favored a fifth middle school. The election is over, the incumbents have won, and it’s time for them to take action.

It’s been a year since the board’s task force recommended converting University Elementary School into a middle school. Since then, the board has looked at every available option. The conversion of University is still the only option that makes sense:

* It is the least expensive solution--$8 million compared to an estimated $25 million to build a new school.

* It can be done simply and quickly, and it will not require the board to ask the taxpayers for more money.

* It is the only solution that can immediately accommodate what the board’s own numbers show is a three-year bubble in the student population that will enter our middle schools in September.

We urge everyone to contact the school board about this issue--not just parents of middle school children who understand the overcrowding issues firsthand. Every homeowner in this community should be concerned. Please: Write letters, call the board, come to the next board meeting.

We do believe it’s important to spend money on our schools, but for once the smartest solution is also the least expensive.

So let’s send a message to the board: Stop wasting time looking at environmentally sensitive--and expensive--properties when a logical solution exists.

ROBIN HAGEY

Committee for a

Fifth Middle School

Thousand Oaks

Editor’s note: This letter also was signed by 16 other residents of Thousand Oaks and Westlake Village.)