Lexington School Closure, Relocation of Students Still Unknown

The Division of the State Architect’s Office will not approve the controversial construction of a new Lexington Elementary School at its present site until the California Geological Survey issues a final acceptance letter, an attorney representing the Los Gatos Union School District said Tuesday evening.

Glenn Gould, with the Dannis Woliver Kelley statewide education law firm, made the explanation to a packed audience in the multipurpose room after to close the Old Santa Cruz Highway campus in June and relocate its 170 K-5 students to Fisher next August due to geological concerns related to the site.

And because the district has received information about hazardous conditions at the Lexington site—specifically slope stability concerns—it must continue to investigate the issue or lose its “design immunity,” a legal condition that protects the district against a lawsuit as long as school buildings are built in corformance with building code and the Field Act.

Design immunity continues until the district knew or has reason to know of an unsafe or foreseeably unsafe condition, he said.

“If you have knowledge of a hazardous condition and you are not addressing it, if you have abandoned the CGS investigation or [are not] addressing those concerns, that will remove the design immunity from the district,” he said.

Given what the district knows about the site, it is prudent for the district to move students offsite by the beginning of the 2012-13 school year, Gould said.

Trustees met until 11:50 p.m. Tuesday to discuss the school's closure and relocation of its students, decisions that have angered many parents and Los Gatos residents. They will continue their deliberations during their May 1 meeting.

Lexington parents and concerned citizens turned out in force, questioning the board’s commitment to transparency, accountability and students’ best interests in light of the controversial decisions.

Public speakers also asked specific questions about "foreseeable risks" inherent in the site and whether those risks outweigh the ones that may be incurred due to the relocation, which many parents say will make them , or having portable classrooms.

“There is no established level of risk at the Lexington school site,” said Erik Anslinger, the father of three Lexington students and a school alumnus. “No responsible oversight authority has taken any action or issued any directive to the district that specifies that the district may not proceed with the modernization as planned.”

Trustee Tina Orsi-Hartigan posed to Gould whether any action taken by the district to address and investigate the hazardous conditions would grant the district design immunity.

“It would,” Gould answered, a response that prompted applause from the crowd.

To date, $4 million of the district’s money has been spent on the Lexington project. The proposed school, if it were to be built on the site, would cost . On April 10, trustees voted against spending more money on the project.

Money to build the campus would come from the district's passage of Measure E, approved by voters in June of 2010. Many Los Gatos Mountain residents are upset that while they worked hard to pass the initiative, they're now being denied the building of the new campus with such funds.

Trustees also voted unanimously to relocate students to Fisher, but said they would revisit their decision at their May 15 meeting.

District officials are planning to meet CGS representatives on May 11.

LGUSD Assistant Superintendent of Business Services Leslie Paulides said by May 1, trustees must approve or have a back-up plan for what to do with Lexington students to mitigate the risk of having nothing.

Lexington parents, teachers and Los Gatos residents also spoke against relocating the students to Fisher.

"We are talking about interim housing, and that is really what has gotten the community in an uproar," one Lexington parent said. "We all want to stay at the current site if we are not building another building. For $75,000, on the high end, it seems we can buy this design immunity because we are moving forward with the geotech [investigation]. For $75,000 we get to keep the kids where they need to be in the interim, your liability is covered and there's a chance we get a yes from CGS. It's a win-win-win."