The Observation Deck

Jay Foran wrote:Danielle,

FWIW.

Back in 2003 when the 50 Year Committee made their recommendations to the Board, we indicated that based on our recommended plan, a minimum of 3 school properties would be vacant at the end of building program (2012?). We indicated that until that time, all existing properties would be needed in some form or fashion as valuable swing space to carry out the complicated transition steps required.

The 3 school properties would be Taft, McKinley and either Roosevelt, Franklin or Grant. We suggested that given it was 2003 and the building program would not be completed until 2012, it was premature and speculative to discuss the fate of those buildings/properties given how community needs and market conditions might change.

We recommended that at a TBD time closer to 2012, a separate citizen task force be established to make recommendations on how best to proceed with those properties. The Board accepted that approach and I believe to this day has purposedly not addressed what will happen to those properties at the end of all the building phases.

I continue to personally believe it is premature to determine what to do with those sites. With that said, we are not too far from the time (2008-2010?) to begin assembling that task force and determining as a community how best to address these de-commissioned sites.

I do not believe the district is interested in investing dollars into these sites and thus I personally see disposition of the sites as a likely outcome. These sites offer our community outstanding and much-needed economic development opportunities for Lakewood.

No doubt you have picked up on the term "minimum of 3 schools" in my opening sentence. At the time of our recommendation (2003) we only had confidence in the data (enrollment data) to recommend the closing of Garfield and Madison at the outset (2005) and a 3rd school (either Roosevelt/Franklin/Grant) around 2008. We did intimate within our presentation that at some time it may even become necessary to consider closing a 4th school. However, our data projection limitations could not allow us to say that unequivocally.

As you have since learned, even as hard as we worked on enrollment projections in 2003, actual enrollment has declined faster than projected thus leading to the decision to close Franklin School effective at the end of this school year. Simply, the facts changed. This is a difficult decision for our overall community, the Franklin community, our school leaders and the children impacted.

While continued enrollment decline may someday lead us to have confront closing a 4th school (Grant?), we (community) will be coming up to a point where we can not stretch the walking boundaries any further, either sensibly or legally (state regulations).

Sorry for the long-winded response to your post.

Ken Wilder

I highlighted a couple things that I found odd in this post from Jay Foran in 2005, who
I believe headed up the 50-Year-Committee, or at least worked very hard on it.

One Lincoln was never even mentioned or even considered to be closed. I find it odd that
it was somehow exempt from any and all discussion. I also find it troubling that it seems
to be more about economic development, than education. Which would leave one to see
connections between...

Oh never mind people think I am already a conspiracy freak.


FWIW


.

Jim, this is very discouraging to read. The committee has been repeatedly reassured by board members, administrators and committee leaders that despite previous committee's work, Phase III is a "clean slate" opportunity for the community to influence the final decisions that need to be made to complete the district's construction project.

Meg,

You are correct.

The post you are reading is from early 2007, over 2 1/2 years ago, and before the new information was obtained from the state that they would not fund a 7th elementary school. As you know, the state has indicated a willingness to only fund six elementary schools at this time.

Once that information was obtained, the Board properly made the decision to wipe the slate clean and reassess the original recommendation of the 50 Year Committee. Thus, Lincoln, Grant and Roosevelt were put in play as sites to consider.

I, like most other committee members, fully support the clean slate approach.

Meg Ostrowski wrote:Jim, this is very discouraging to read. The committee has been repeatedly reassured by board members, administrators and committee leaders that despite previous committee's work, Phase III is a "clean slate" opportunity for the community to influence the final decisions that need to be made to complete the district's construction project.

Meg

I want to make it clear. I did not take part in the 50-Year-Committee, nor this Phase III
Committee. I have no first hand knowledge.

I cannot say if it is or not. It would seem that the 50 Year committee saw the need for closing
schools, and I found it odd, that it seemed to focus more on economic development, and
walkability, than anything else. At least in this short synopsis provided by Jay Foran.

It would seem to be a clean slate but based on past findings. As I mentioned, it would
seem no one even spoke of Lincoln, and now it has been brought into the discussion,
even looking at if any homes would have to be purchased to keep it viable.

I would hope it was a clean slate, which would give your wonderful and very practical idea
a chance in this discussion. I mean, if that can come out of nowhere and get a real chance
I am not sure how a community could ask for more.

* PS, I will support any levy or bond issue put forward by this school district. We have
invested heavily and correctly in our schools and library. While we discuss what if any
school gets closed, rebuilt, moved, designed, whatever. We MUST stay committed to
funding our schools. They are back in the excellent rating, let's keep them there.



.

Jeff Endress wrote, in Feb 06, 2007:


“I would venture the opinion that the School Board will move into a renovated Franklin, making it the new headquarters. Grant will then be closed, thus creating a huge hunk of very valuable downtown Lakewood real estate for development, perhaps even coupling it with a Marc's plaza.”


I find this whole subject disturbing. In 2007 AND 2009. If the Phase 3 committee was supposed to be looking at sites in terms of development opportunities that should have been stated up front.

Grant is centrally located, ideal for “downtown development” except for the fact
that Grant is right in the middle of the most densely populated area in the city of
Lakewood, more houses, more families, than anywhere else in the city. These very
families are the people making our “downtown” as successful as it is. They live
and work close to Marcs, the Library, the Post Office, banks, drugstores, and the school. When Coventry Elementary school closed on Coventry Rd in Cleveland Heights, the businesses immediately felt the impact and haven’t recovered yet.

Phase 3 was given the task of coming up with a solution that would have the least negative impact on families, work for 50 years, take the entire community into account and enhance teaching and learning. It’s about taking care of kids, families, schools and neighborhoods, something that Lakewood has always been good at.

I am sure some of the Phase III Committee members that served on the 50 Year Committee (Phase I & II) are having a difficult time switching gears from their previous work, (I personally am having a hard time letting go of my Kauffman proposal because I still think it is a good idea. In fact the more I learn the more I think so.) but all we can do at this point is trust that the presentation tonight will be fair to the two remaining options and that attendees will respect the process.

Just to confirm what Betsy mentioned, our sub-group was not asked to consider economic development/city planning in our work. If we had, Kauffman would have come out a clear winner. Rats!

I was really disturbed at the forum tonight by the high number of times issues related to hypothetical economic gains from selling the Grant property came up, and how few times issues that are the best interest of our community's children were given by the table groups for their reasons for coming to the consensus they did. The data is available that the housing density is in Grant's boundary lines, removing Grant leaves MORE kids walking further than even removing Roosevelt would based upon last year's enrollment (the only enrollment numbers, dispiste REPEATED requests over the course of many months, we were ever provided with - I, myself, asked for longitudinal enrollment addresses so that I could compute out where families have lived over time, without regard to where the schools were/are).

I am also disturbed that Lincoln wasn't even on the table as possibly being decommissioned according to this 2.5yr old post. The elementary student population in the northern part of our city is DRASTICALLY lower than it is in the central and southern parts of the city. I know this from looking at enrollment data with help from the County Auditor's office. Approximately 30-35% of our elementary student population lives north of the tracks, but if the school board follows what looked to be the recommendations of the forum tonight, more than 50% of our available elementary student seats will be north of the tracks (because Horace Mann and Emerson are larger buildings with slightly higher student capacities, it's more than 50%). Last year's enrollment showed Horace Mann and Emerson were at the lowest percentage of capacity of the already rebuilt schools, off the top of my head it was close to 10% lower enrollment in those two schools compared to Hayes and Harrison (which had complaints about overcrowding). Emerson is listed as a "receiving school" for households currently within Grant's boundary lines, but the consensus of the April forum was that 3/4ths of a mile was the edge of acceptable walking distance, yet the northeast corner of Grant's current boundary line is .7 miles from Emerson, so pretty much any kid from Grant's current district lines is going to wind up walking 3/4th of a mile or more to go to Emerson.

People are making their decisions based upon the geographic spread of the schools, assuming that families are evenly distributed throughout Lakewood. *Housing* is not evenly spread out throughout Lakewood (our zoned Low Density Housing areas concentrated north of the tracks, in Horace Mann and Lincoln's current boundary lines). High density housing like that of the condos is not, from looking at enrolled addresses, equally appealing to families with small children as lower-density (i.e. anything less than 5 units) housing. There are only a handful of enrolled children in the condos along Edgewater, one or two per building with some buildings having NO elementary school aged children in them.

This kind of density information was not shared tonight. The people putting together the presentation had it - I know they did because I obtained it from the County Auditor's office in my roll as District Configuration Sub-Committee Co-Chair and made sure that it was in their hands. Horrace Mann and Emerson have room to absorb a lot more kids than Hayes, Harrison, and a rebuilt Roosevelt do. Closing Grant will result in having to send more than half the current Grant households north of the tracks to a school because those will be the schools with room for the influx. This will result in significantly longer walks for more kids.

Right now, about 130 kids walk more than 3/4ths of a mile. Decommissioning Lincoln would add about 70 to that number, decommissioning Roosevelt would add about 115, and decommissioning Grant would add the most - 120 - and those kids' parents have chosen to raise them in THE most walkable area of Lakewood - they are a reasonable walk to every ammenity of our town (main library, post office, grocery, dental, medical, pharmacy, movie theater, YMCA, etc etc etc). The area along the lake is, by its nature, significantly more car-dependant. But that's where this group of not-trained-community-planners seems to want to keep the schools, because of OLD assumptions about the "economic development" opportunities for the Grant property (and no one ever officially mentions selling the BOE building - that building is over 100 years old and has significant historical value. Who is really going to be interested in the Grant property commercially without the BOE building?). Since those estimates were made 2.5 years ago, in case folks weren't paying attention, we've had a national economic collapse and several already-through-the-land-aquisition-phase businesses in Lakewood have failed to materialize. We have an abundance of empty commercial properties in our town. WHY do people assume that a commercial or retail property at Grant would be successful? I don't think that's a good gamble with a COMMUNITY asset. Also, if we did experience a boom in elementary enrollment (which is entirely possible, I've heard enrollment numbers are going up with some of the parochial schools closing as well as families not being able to afford private school education anymore, plus birth numbers are on the rise - 2007 had more live births than 1957, which was the height of the Baby Boom, 2008's birth totals just came out this summer and I haven't had time to analyze them yet but it's unlikely that it was a random blip considering it's time the Boomers were becoming grandparents though due to extended fertility via medical technology, some Boomers are still having babies themselves). As was previously mentioned, number of children per family is also on the rise. We could well be back over Ohio's threshhold for needing 7 elementary schools instead of 6 in the next 10 years. Where would we put the new school? We wouldn't be able to re-aquire the land we sold at a pitance (the estimate is a net profit of $500,000 - interesting to note it costs an estimated $600,000 to run an elementary school for a year and the properties needed to be aquired to make Lincoln more viable would cost at least $400,000). Where would we put it and how much would it cost to even get the land back where it was needed? Buying commercial properties is a lot more expensive than buying some residential properties - if Lincoln were closed and then needed to be reopened, the cost of aquiring properties in that area would be less than foolishly trying to get Grant's land back. Or the BOE could chose to hold the land/building that Lincoln sits on since it's "less valuable for redevelopment", shift some offices over there instead and use the space for overflow until we find out if we might need it back for sure or not. I, as a taxpayer, would consider that a much better use of resources than trying to raise a bond issue to aquire more land in a few years.

The BOE building also brings up another issue that was not raised at the forum (and there was no time for Q&A for someone to bring it to the attention of the several hundred people assembled). Since this area first had public schools, before it was even called Lakewood, there has been an elementary/primary school within 500 feet of where Grant now stands. The northern part of the BOE building is the original elementary school from back when this area was known as Rockport. The southern part is the original high school. History and architecture have been repeatedly given as reasons to preserve Lincoln, but never given a moment's consideration in the discussion of decommissioning Grant. When Rockport schools were started, the three schools were the former McKinley site, the BOE, and Garfield. Only one of those still has an elementary school even on adjacent property. Our housing stock was built around the reality of those schools being there. Now the plan looks to be to hollow out the center of our town from having ANY elementary schools at all. The mythical mermaids in Lake Erie get a more reasonable walk to school to half of the 6 elementary schools but the dense population of REAL, VERIFIABLE households with elementary aged children in them in the center of our town are all expected to walk to the edges of our town's borders for their schooling, so the spread of the elementary schools can look nice and even on a map. The problem is the population and housing is NOT spread out nice and even on the map, never has been and never will be. But the people in the center of town are too busy working and trying to take care of their young kids to get to these meetings (which were half, if not more, populated by school district employees - half of the emails on my committee's list were to Lakewood City School email addresses, half the people at my table tonight received a paycheck in their household from Lakewood School District). These meetings have been scheduled on work/school nights, overlapping the reasonable bedtime for elementary school children (the committee meetings ran past 9pm, on Tuesdays), but yet there's been expressed suprize that there has been little involvement from parents of small children? How many families can afford to hire a sitter on a school night, after a day at work, having to get everyone up early in the morning for work/school, to attend these meetings every 2 weeks - especially when it's been the feeling of many all along that the decision was made long ago that Lincoln would be kept (which that reposted message from 2.5 years ago makes quite clear)?

As for Coventry's elementary school - there's another factor that's not brought up. Coventry's commercial district has something going for it that Lakewood doesn't - college students. I'm a CWRU alum from undergrad and now a grad student there. A LOT of the housing just west of Coventry is occupied by CWRU students, and has been for quite some time. Many of the businesses on Coventry even accept CWRU student IDs as a form of payment (we can deposit money into an account and then swipe it like a credit card at participating vendors - some on campus only take that or cash so a lot of students seem to use it to be able to, say, buy a coffee in the building where Access Services is located - which is cash or ID only). Lakewood doesn't have a large university within close proximity. We DO have a lot of working-class families (average household income in Lakewood as of I think 2007 or 2008 was approximately $42,000). Those families have to make the choice, are they going to keep their spending in Lakewood, or go across the boarder to one of the big box stores (the Target and Giant Eagle on 117th are technically in Cleveland, not Lakewood, for tax purposes). If we push them out of living in the center of our city by taking away the elementary school, that increases the chance that they'll have to hop in a car to do any of their shopping anyway, so why should they stay in Lakewood when they can cross the boarder and shop more conveniently with fewer stops?

Are we going to earn a few pennies from selling Grant, but lose a whole lot more in retail sales (and hence jobs, and the ability of our retailers to stay open, and the tax dollars they generate)? This issue has not been seriously looked at by ANYONE with the training to make realistic projections of the impact. We could be royally messing up our town in a way that'd be REALLY hard to recover from (if we ever could), especially starting from an already economically fragile situation.


This is just my thoughts and analysis as someone with a deep love of studying demographics and community planning - it's what I'm working on a degree in (Community and Social Development) thanks to this whole Phase 3 thing and the people I've come in contact with in my quest for data the school board wasn't coming forward with. I'm only partially trained, and mostly self-trained. There were people at the school board's disposal who are fully trained in this, but they weren't providing information to MY sub-committee if they were giving it to anyone. The community tonight got such watered-down information that the creater of Cliff's Notes would be ashamed. Me, I'm deeply disturbed by it all.

Sorry for the typos, my 2 year old feel asleep with grandma and grandpa, who were kind enough to watch him and his big brother tonight so my husband and I could both attend the forum - he's back awake with a 2nd wind now so I can't go back and edit this for spelling and conciseness. I need to get back to being Mom now. If this is posted in the wrong thread due to my distraction, someone please move it to the appropriate spot.


Ahmie

WOW! Ahmie, As you know we don't always agree but I too was deeply disturbed by the lack of content at tonight's forum. What happened to the information packets that were promised for each table? When did this process become about economic development, not education?

Ahmie, thank you, thank you, thank you.

I won't say much but I will say I am disappointed. When I came home my oldest son wanted to know if anything was decided. I told him no but he pressed me for more. I basically told him that time and time again people said Grant should close because they can hypothetically sell the land for more. It's sad that money is so important, that is a wonderful message to our children, let's look those kids that have no choice but to walk nearly a mile further because of money. Sorry honey I know this area is more densely populated with children but they might be able to sell this school, I mean you know there are tons of people out there vying for properties, which is evidenced in all our filled storefronts and no large parcels of land sitting vacant. *shakes head*

Having no child directly affected by the outcome of last night's discussion, I have heard (from my wife who as able to attend) that there were plenty of people upset about the Grant discussion but she noted that while economic development was an issue, it was usually the 3rd of three asked by each table (as was the format, correct? Name 3 reasons why a decision was reached for either Lincoln or Grant to go).

I am curious if we can have the actual results of the discussion. I know there are heated opinions on either side of the issue as we have friends who are in each area affected who feel very strongly for their school. I heard there was good data shared on how many kids would be affected with each outcome, who would go where and how many roads/track would be crossed and so on.

Yes, the economic question came up but it isn't unreasonable as long term sustainability of our schools is always a question and if selling/leasing/whatver that property in some way alleviates some financial worries of the entire district, I want that to thought about. That said, it shouldn't be the main reason and from a parent with kids at other schools I am told it wasn't the main reason discussed.

I am curious to hear from other parties not directly impacted. Can people who live in Grants area or Lincoln's area objectively weigh both arguments? I know for a fact economic wasn't the only reason discussed but based on this series of posts, it was the only one people came away with which is the real shame.

While I did not attend last night’s forum because I had to work, I did attend the spring forum and have participated in discussions with committee members. While I do have a child at Grant in the fourth grade, I am open to a fair and reasonable decision on this matter, even if that decision is the closing of Grant.

What I find interesting in all the discussion I have read or been involved in is that I have heard no realistic reasons to keep Lincoln open. It appears from the facts available that the school population near Lincoln is smaller, the square footage of the site is smaller, and property would have to be purchased in order to make the site viable. It is also located on one of the busiest streets in Lakewood. What are the arguments in favor of Lincoln?

The argument for economic development on the Grant site seems “pie in the sky” at best. Where are these mythical developers? Do we have any actual interest, or simply a “feeling” that they will come out of the woodwork when the property is put up for sale? What will we end up with - another Walgreens?

I don’t think I’m saying anything profound when I state that the area around Lincoln school is more affluent than the area around Grant school. As the cliché states, “Money talks.” In this case, it appears to be talking sneakily and stealthily to keep the elementary school open on a property that is smaller, on a busier street, with fewer school age children than the alternative. The end result for Lakewood is that we will wind up with an elementary school in the affluent area of Lakewood with lower population density instead of in the less affluent area with more children in need of education.

I am brand new to this forum, so hopefully I will not break any rules.
I attended the meeting last Tuesday night, September 15, 2009.
I need to hopefully provide people another view.
I am not on the Committee or employee of the School.
I am a parent of a Harding Middle School and Lincoln Elementary student, and my elementary child is done with Lincoln this year. Our table did not reach consensus.

I would request everyone review the following data. It’s long and a lot of detail and if your not interested, I will say the basic point is the current Grant and Lincoln boundaries will be greatly carved up by the other 5 remaining schools so that they can grow to meet the enrollment size required when the district is reduced to six elementary schools. It is not about all of Grant going to Lincoln and it is not about all of Lincoln going to Grant. The other 5 schools are going to devour large chunks of both Grant and Lincoln. The final boundary of the last school district a Grant-Lincoln hybrid will surprise you. Please read.

The April 2, 2009 Data Presentation (available on Lakewood City Schools web site–link included below) indicates PK-5 student enrollment is 2,610 children (you need to add the 7 elementary school enrollments yourself). Page 6 of 8, slide 11.
http://lakewoodcityschools.org/docs/Pha ... print2.pdf
This long range data was then studied by another source (a consultant that the School District hired). They provided an excel spreadsheet (also available on the school website–link included below) that states our PK-5 student enrollment will stay at this level through the school year 2018-19.
http://lakewoodcityschools.org/docs/Pla ... ection.xls
Now the question is, are all the schools going to be the same size or does the District plan to have small, medium and large size elementary schools. We asked the table moderator to obtain an answer. The answer provided to her and back to the table is that idea is that all the schools are to have approximate equal enrollment. All schools treated equally.

So divide the 2,610 pupil count by six schools and it works out to an even 435 children per school. It will never be this exact but it gives you a ballpark idea what the District shall expect.

Now go back to the April 2, 2009 Data Presentation and look at School enrollment again compared to needing 435 children at each school. The three schools to the south (Harrison, Roosevelt and Hayes) have a 2009 combined enrollment of 1,085 (do the math again yourself). If you do not know what the current boundary is once again please go on line–link included below. The School District provides a graphic map as well as a written narrative.
http://www.lakewoodcityschools.org/docs ... %20map.JPG
http://www.lakewoodcityschools.org/docs ... atives.pdf
If each of these south schools increases to the required 435 children, they will need a school boundary that provides 1,305 students. The current boundary of these schools needs to grow in order to capture 220 additional children. Harrison is actually just over the required enrollment. So it is really Hayes and Roosevelt that need to grow, Harrison could remain as is.
While looking at the map, where will the two south schools (Hayes and Roosevelt) obtain the children they require to reach the required enrollment. Horace Mann at the upper left is undersized as it is (it only has a 359 enrollment – needs to grow to 435). Emerson the school at the upper right is undersized (it only has 374 enrollment – needs to grow to 435). The place for these two south schools to gather the students they require is from Grant (green area) on the map.

The numbers show that the four schools that are scheduled to remain (take Harrison out of picture since it has about the right number of children) all need to grow in enrollment (increase boundary) These four schools all border Grant and two of these schools border Grant and Lincoln. All four need to grow in enrollment (increase boundary). They are going to need to pull kids out of Lincoln (yellow) and Grant (green).

Now the hard part, I will try to describe the left over boundary after the other four schools are done carving up Grant and Lincoln. Draw a proposed line starting at the intersection of Franklin Blvd. and Marlowe Ave. (upper left corner of existing Roosevelt boundary). Start at this point and draw a straight horizontal line heading west until you reach the Horace Mann boundary. This adds (ballpark) 160 children to the south two schools that need increased enrollment. This 160 number is interpolation from another source you can find online at the school web site–link included below. Draw the same proposed horizontal line starting at the intersection of Franklin Blvd. and Marlowe Ave. on the density map included on this link below. Due your own interpolation.
http://www.lakewoodcityschools.org/docs ... %20map.pdf
Remember, earlier the numbers indicated that 220 additional children are needed, so this is still 60 children shy of that number, but if the line is drawn any more north it would include the actual Grant School site in the Roosevelt-Hayes boundary and thus the whole point is mute. Why would you keep Grant open if it fell in another school districts’ boundary.

Now to draw the two new vertical north-south lines that will increase enrollment for Horace Mann on the northwest and Emerson on the northeast.
Use St. Charles Ave. as a proposed line running north-south from the lake to Franklin Blvd. The area east of this new line will become part of Emerson.
Use Northland as a proposed line running north-south from the lake down to the proposed line added following Franklin Blvd. running straight horizontal. The area west of this new vertical line will become part of Horace Mann.

Now Lincoln and Grant get to fight for what is remaining. Does it look like the boundary you had in your mind? Grant does not get to swallow up all of Lincoln and Lincoln does not get to swallow up all of Grant. Neither district gets to remain in tact as a whole. It is a new hybrid district.

Many people put a lot of weight on walking distance – last nights presentation had eight slides discussing this issue.

Personally, I felt these eight slides were misleading because it made you feel that a three quarter of a mile walk equates to the right number of students in that boundary and that is clearly not true. Also, the circles shown are not three quarter of a mile in radius, they are shown as five eighths of a mile in radius. Nitpicking yes, sorry about that. Also, the thirteenth slide of the presentation last night states 2,275 students. We know from reviewing the data that there are 2,610 children. This means 335 children are unaccounted for. I have been told that if your child is in Special Education or in Gifted you are left off the map. It doesn’t matter if your child walks or does not walk you are not on the map, you have no representation. Also, I was told that if you have more then one child in your home you are still only counted once. Even if both children walk or do not walk, not all your children are counted. Everyone is equal, everyone counts. No person should make a determination that just because of some category you fall under you do not get to be counted. Besides, people move, circumstances change, counting everyone gives a better long term picture as to where the children are.
Also, if you were to overlay these same circles on the colored map with existing school boundaries today with seven schools you would find that all seven schools have children outside these circles. Thus, all seven schools already have children that walk more then three quarter of a mile to school.

For these maps to be effective what they needed to show was walking distance after the five remaining schools are enlarged to reach 435 and then just show with Lincoln or with Grant in the new hybrid district.

If you use the description above for the new hybrid Grant-Lincoln boundary it results in the following.
If Grant remains (decommission Lincoln) there will be 60 children that need to walk more then three quarter of a mile to reach Grant. This number is interpolation of overlaying the new hybrid boundary on the slide presented last night and counting dots.
If Lincoln remains (decommission Grant) there will be 25 children that need to walk more then three quarter of a mile to reach Lincoln. This number is interpolation of overlaying the new hybrid boundary on the slide presented last night and counting dots.
The other 5 schools are what they are. The boundary needs to be drawn to make sure enough children are included to reach the enrollment level.

I will try to highlight one other point of contention regarding these maps, it may be hard to follow along without last nights slides. So once again the information is on Lakewood Schools website-link provided below.
http://lakewoodcityschools.org/docs/9-1 ... FINAL%20(2).ppt
Go to slides 20 and 22. Examine the yellow areas defined by the number 176 in slide 20 and by the number 56 in slide 22. With Grant remaining, 120 children were removed from the yellow data area of having to walk more than three quarter of a mile to school. But, from what was described above, in creating the new hybrid Grant-Lincoln boundary, the vast majority of these 120 children will still walk south more then three quarter of a mile to reach Hayes and Roosevelt, but the slide makes you think they are included in Grant and thus by saving Grant, you have saved 120 children from walking more then three quarter of a mile to school. But you have not!
If you care about walking distance then the choice is to use the Lincoln site but the way the maps were produced, without actual school boundaries, you are led to think just the opposite.

There are other ways to draw six boundaries and I am still looking at a few but I always find trying to satisfy Hayes and Roosevelt with an additional 220 children while respecting the walking distance issue logically leads back to the south part of what is now Grant needs to go to the Hayes and Roosevelt.

To have an honest discussion about walking distance our elected officals need to present the boundaries for the two options. Then pull out your compass and draw your circles, until then give the walking circles a rest.

The population density issue is a great concern to many, however, in my understanding, Lincoln has approximately 406 students and Grant has 330 students (please chime in if the numbers are incorrect). Does this change the mentality of the population density focus because more people/students in this area does not necessarily (in this case at least) equal more students at Grant?

I also understand the economic issues at hand concerning the use of the decommissioned schools/buildings, however, I think a more focused issue should be placed on the process of the land usage directly following the school being decommissioned - who exactly has the rights to the school/land (i.e. Charter Schools), if the land does sell then does the BOE select the realtor, who commissions what business/residential/condo/etc. would go in that location (is the city involved in that selection at all or is it up to realtors, contractors, zoning commission, etc)?

Corey

Should we also give population density numbers a rest too?

I am hoping that that telling map that was conveniently left out of the presentation and information packet last night will find it's way onto the deck. I would gladly post it but with my recent move my printer cable has vanished.

One thing, walking distance is important especially in the center of town where many students do not have access to vehicles. People choose to live in Lakewood because it is a walkable city, and people especially choose to live in the center of town because they are close to amenities. Those amenities include a school in the center of our walkable community. I know it is hard for many people to understand as they rarely get out of their cars but those of us who do walk understand the need to have things close by. One more thing about walkability is that time and time again the community has stated that the walkability to the schools is a major issue. This is an urban city, we are not a suburb. Our buildings need to be placed in the proper areas, the areas that serve the most students.

It's my understanding that that many pieces of data were somehow left out of last nights presentations and supposedly that missing information will be relayed to us soon. If in fact this is true and that there is a concerted effort to skew the facts, I just have to wonder what is so important as to throw children figuratively under the bus.

Really people let's look at what's best for the children not what's best because one school is pretty and one isn't, and not because one school serves a more urban population and one serves a more affluent population. Let's look at the facts, not a possible sale of property which coincidentally was not even supposed to be part of the discussion.

Yes I am a Grant parent although I no longer reside in the Grant area I still see the need for a school there. And while this issue will not really affect my family I feel that we all need to stand up for what is best for the children, especially the children that don't have anyone fighting for them.

Corey, there are more students that go to Lincoln but many of those students open enroll. If you are to look at the population density more children live around Grant. Many of those going to Lincoln are reside outside of it's boundaries. And as I said in my previous post I am hoping that someone posts the density map, it is an important piece of the puzzle.