The estimate from the architect was that purchasing 2 homes south of Lincoln would be about $400,000 (this is in the architectural report the committee as a whole has had since spring).
With regard to table report-outs, what my understanding of what I heard from those guiding the process was that they didn't have to repeat if what their table's reasons were had already been stated, in the interests of time. After that was said, a significant majority of the tables standing up and saying Option B (keep Lincoln) ONLY sited land reuse/economic redevelopment as their rational. My own table did not reach consensus and my facilitator did not report out (even tho a woman at our table - who I know - pushed her to not only do so, but to also place our dot on the board. Our facilitator consulted Don Dyck and was told not to place the dot if the table didn't have 100% consensus).
From the "discussion" at the table, there was only maybe one person who didn't give the strong impresssion of having come to the "forum" with their minds already made up (yes, me included) - he barely spoke at all, though his wife spoke up vociferously in support of land re-use. Interestingly enough, there was also mention of him having a law degree and he filled out his preference sheet for either A or B.
As part of the committee process, we had had discussions repeatedly about getting the discussion materials out and available to the public earlier, let them have accees to ALL the data gathered by the sub-committees so that they could digest it ahead of time and come prepared for a full discussion. That didn't happen. Now I don't see any signs of seeking input from people who couldn't attend the forum. Less than half a per cent of the population of Lakewood was present at that forum. The "subject pool" was skewed to people who could afford to be there on a work/school night - something that single parents, working-class people with non-9-5 schedules, and many others couldn't possibly hope to attend. It has also been put out in the community vocally for a long period of time that the Powers That Be will never let Lincoln close, so proponents of keeping Grant were thereby discouraged from wasting several hours of their life to go to this forum (me, I sometimes feel like I've wasted several weeks worth of hours of my life over gathering this data and trying to get it presented, plus going to these committee meetings every two weeks where people have repeatedly tried to dismiss and play down the data in favor for keeping their preferred school).
For what it's worth, there were other reasons cited by the tables for keeping Lincoln (they made up maybe 1/3rd of the number of reasons cited). I jotted some of them down, but the bag with that paper in it is apparently back in my vehicle. I will try to remember to grab it and share what some of those reasons were. I do remember the 3 north/3 south configuration preference being named (which is a very simplistic form of city planning, since it does not take into account even the simplest of housing density zoning, a map that is readily available from the County Auditor's website - I can screen-cap it and post it later if desired). Also mentioned was the quality of teachers at Lincoln - a rational that wasn't challenged with the information the committee was given, that teachers WILL NOT be lost in this process, the number of teachers is tied to the number of enrolled students, the teachers will be shifted to the new schools and/or transfered to the other schools with higher enrollment. This is what happens regardless of how many schools we have. Having seen the absurd behaviors of one Lakewood teacher who was a part of the committee in particular, I would sooner homeschool my children than have them in this person's classroom for any length of time, but that's another story (and part of why I was irritated with having the majority of people on the committee not simply community members, but school board employees - if school board employees who were not also Lakewood residents were not permitted to be part of this process, the committee would have been only about 60% the size it was, if even that large - or maybe fewer community members who weren't employees would have dropped out of the earlier stages of this process, if they hadn't felt so marginalized from the get-go).
Self-interests have been served much more than our children's interests. Repeatedly. We were charged with looking for the lowest impact on the fewest families. The results of the community forum have absolutely NO relation to that charge.
I have created a petition regarding this. It's online at
http://www.petitiononline.com/lkwdelem/petition.html and titled "Use Evidence Instead of Assumptions to Decide Which Elementary School to Keep".
Ahmie
