Increasing Enrollment Sparks New School Discussion

Representatives from the City Council and School District of San
Carlos gathered today to collaborate about the potential of building a
fourth school in the city.

San Carlos School District Superintendent Craig Baker and School Board Member Seth Rosenblatt joined with Mayor Andy Klein, City Councilman Randy Royce, City Manager Jeff Maltbie and others to discuss ways the school district could cope with a projected enrollment increase.

"One obvious option is to build a new school, said Rosenblatt. "However, that's not a simple thing to do in practice -- you need suitable land in an appropriate location, you need to acquire that land, and then you need to fund the building of a school.  So, we're just at the very beginning of the process."

Superintendent Baker said the district is running out of ways to accommodate its constantly increasing study body size, as each of the city's schools are already operating at or above the enrollment capacity of their campus .

The issue is further compounded by more students entering the San
Carlos School District, which further stretches the district's already
thin facilities. And it is the predominant opinion of those in the
school district that the best way to overcome issue of enrollment
growth is to build a new school.

"I just don't see another option right now," said Baker, at the
meeting held today at the School District Office.

It appears likely that San Carlos residents would be asked to sponsor
a ballot measure, such as a bond, to help pay for the school's
construction.

But much work must take place if that effort is to become a reality,
said Andy Klein.

Mayor Klein old the school district's leadership that further analysis
regarding the new school's potential location, size, cost and other
associated information must be done before the city could support
asking voters for a tax increase.

Klein also said the district should examine modifying existing
facilities to handle enrollment increases before attempting to build
another school. He suggested adding a second story to some school
buildings as an example of the kinds of measures that may need to take place before constructing a new school should be considered.

He suggested that the school district consider building a second story
to Central Middle School as a project that would allow the campus, and
district, to handle more students.

But Baker said mitigating one issue, such as limited space, may only
create another, such as adding more traffic to an area that already
congested during peak commute hours.

"We would be trading one issue for another," he said.

The road blocks plaguing the early stages of laying the groundwork
toward building another school are plentiful.

A potential site for the new school to be built was one of the most
difficult to nail down, according to Klein.

Baker said a logical location to build would be in the east side of
San Carlos, since the area is lacking a neighborhood school and much
of the district's projected enrollment is rolling in from that region.

But, as Klein pointed out, there is likely not enough space in the
area to build anything that is substantial enough to accommodate the
needs of the district. And purchasing the land there that has been
developed into housing would to be too expensive and difficult to
realistically pursue.

Klein also said that a community that needs a school in its
neighborhood would likely be the most willing to support its
construction, and find a way to get it built.

Rosenblatt advocated for creative thinking in an effort to work around
some of the issues the district and city are faced with, should they
go forward together with the effort to build a new school. He
suggested the possibility that a local developer may be willing to
donate land, in order to pave the way toward the school's
construction.

Alternatively, Royce suggested that the city and school district
explore the possibility of sharing land to build a facility that would
benefit each entity, such a school campus that could double as a city
park during the time students aren't in class.

No action toward building the school was taken today, but the groups
did decide to meet more frequently than they had in the past, in an
effort to accelerate the fleshing out of ideas surrounding the new
school's construction.

The next meeting will be October 3, followed by another on December 5. Both will be held in the Conference Room at the District Office.

In the meantime, the school district plans to study the specifics
regarding potential size, location and cost of the new school.