Hermosa residents gathered at a special school board Monday night, rallying around a large school bond to ease crowding in the district.
The event divided residents into small groups to discuss two related issues: first, what sort of potential renovations to North School the community favored, and second, the size of the bond the community favors to renovate North School, as well as Hermosa View and Hermosa Valley.
The district currently faces a significant space shortage, with some students taking classes in a converted teacher’s lounge.
Many in the room had painful recollections of the narrow defeat of Measure Q last November, which would have floated a bond of $54 million for school renovations.
“As a parent, it hurt a lot that we lost by 32 votes,” said Hermosa resident Carrie Anne Blevins. “It hurt in my gut.”
The school district has a bonding capacity of $60 million. This would not cover all of the district’s renovation needs, but it would be an excellent start, said school board member Maggie Bove-Lemonica. Such a bond would result in an assessment of $30 per $100,000 of property value.
Most in the room agreed that the bond size was not the obstacle, and urged the district to reach out to the community when designing the bond, and to keep voters educated.
“We don’t want to win by 32 votes the next time, we want to win with the whole community,” said resident Tony West. “We have the most amazing deal as it is, without having to pay for a high school.”
While almost all of the 48 community members at the meeting agreed on the need for a large bond issue to address the, some disagreements emerged over how the funds ought to be spent.
A key issue was whether the parking at North School ought to be surface parking or underground. The underground option would cost an estimated $3 million more.
Resident Chris Schauwecker, who lives near, North School said the underground option made the most sense.
“Space is limited, and you want to utilize it as efficiently as you can,” Schauwecker said. “We need to be thinking about this as if it’s our own home.”
Other residents raised concerns that underground parking could present a safety hazard for students and teachers, saying that the area around North School has a transient population that could be attracted to the lot and use it as a makeshift shelter.
While traffic and parking were prominent concerns with the North School project, many residents seemed resigned to the idea that the community would have to deal with some inconveniences in the process of renovation.
“While this meeting is about mitigation, we have kind of have to share the burden,” said Monique Ehsan, a resident who is running for a seat on the Hermosa Beach school board. “We live in a town that’s only 1.3 square miles.”ER
