Council and School Board discuss collaborative efforts on overlapping issues in joint meeting
By SARA HALL
Discussion topics during a joint meeting between the City Council and the Laguna Beach Unified School District Board of Education on Thursday (July 15) covered equity education, electric bike safety, and exploring district-owned properties for the city’s housing element requirements.
Other items on the agenda included trolley status for the school year, potential for a second community pool, and reduction of water usage efforts.
The joint meeting started out with a number of non-agenda public comments that complained about the school district’s Equity Strategy Design and Capacity Building program.
Speakers said that the program by Education Elements, a K12 company that consults with schools, districts, and learning organizations, was “critical race theory” and criticized its implementation.
Comments included saying the district is implying its schools and students are racist, calling the program a socialist framework, claiming it removes individual accountability and perpetuates victimhood, and that it demolishes and demeans blended families. One speaker claimed that parents want their children to feel included and united, not divided, which is what they felt EE’s educational equity plan does.
Education Elements’ plan, as described at several previous LBUSD board meetings, identifies the district’s priorities, sets goals, and helps district leadership take action to ensure an equitable environment that ensures belonging, dignity, and love for all students.
Superintendent Jason Viloria responded to the comments during LBUSD staff reports near the end of the joint meeting. There’s a need to clarify some misconceptions and misinformation out there, he said.
“I just wanted to clear up our work around equity, it has nothing to do with critical race theory. We don’t teach critical race theory in our schools,” and they have no intention to start, Viloria said. “Equity is really just about making sure our students have the resources that they need to be successful in school.”
As an example, Viloria said they have data that shows LGBTQ students in the district suffer higher rates of bullying than any other student in the schools. So, they need to ensure that the district provides the resources to the students to show them how LBUSD will support them through this, Viloria explained.
Equity is about ensuring that all students have the resources, materials, access, and support that they need to be successful, Viloria said.
At another previous discussion on the topic, board members emphasized that there are many issues that cause students to feel marginalized and this gives them a great opportunity to learn and change.
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Photo by Scott Brashier
Anti-racism protesters at Main Beach last year
In another non-agenda discussion, during city staff reports, LB Police Department Interim Chief Jeff Calvert commented on the uptick in e-bike usage throughout the city.
The School Resource Officers conducted a community forum in May with about 40 parents, covering bike and helmet safety. They also provided more than 40 presentations at different schools to connect with kids on the issue of e-bike safety and talk about relevant laws pertaining to e-bikes.
The e-bikes are concerning, and City Council has received a lot of community feedback worried about a potential accident, said Mayor Bob Whalen.
“Whatever we can do to jointly try to educate on this and get students on board with the helmets and traffic safety laws, that would be much appreciated,” Whalen said.
Later, during the board’s regular meeting, LBUSD Board Member Jim Kelly commented during member reports that parents have mentioned the e-bike issue to him repeatedly.
“The electric bike thing is out of hand,” Kelly said. “We’re going to be going to a funeral of one our kids if we don’t get the police to enforce these kids being safe on these bikes.”
At the joint meeting, Kelly asked about the number of tickets given out to kids in an effort to stop this behavior.
They’ve been primarily in “educational mode,” Calvert said. The e-bikes are an emerging technology, so they are also trying to understand it better.
Direction has been given to the officers to start on enforcement, Calvert added. Although he was usure of how many tickets they’ve actually written so far, the officers are out there actively looking for violations and they’re going to start writing citations to the kids.
LBUSD Board Clerk Kelly Osborne noted that when some kids start getting tickets the word will spread quickly amongst the students.
Parents need to get involved as well, Calvert said. They need to work collaboratively to ensure the kids are safe in town.
Calvert also gave an update on School Resource Officers.
The SROs had some challenges during the COVID-19 pandemic, but were still able to engage with the kids, Calvert said. They taught a digital safety course, conducted more than 40 welfare checks, and are about to bring back their teen leadership academy. The Road Safety Expo is also returning this year.
A noteworthy discussion related to the city’s housing element was also discussed during the joint meeting.
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Photo by Mary Hurlbut
City Council and the LBUSD Board of Education discussed the housing element in a joint meeting this week
Community Development Director Marc Wiener presented the current status of the city housing element and using the district bus yard as a potential housing site.
As part of the process in updating the housing element and in order to meet state mandates, the city is looking at potential candidate sites for where housing could be built.
The bus yard site is currently zoned for light industrial; residential is not allowed with the exception of artist work-live units, Wiener said. If it were included in the housing element as a possible site, it would need to be rezoned.
Nothing would happen to this site unless the school district found it viable from their perspective, Whalen emphasized.
“I don’t know where the school district might be with this, but it’s certainly got some potential,” Whalen said. “If you’re even interested in exploring it, we would want to engage in a discussion with you about the potential for it.”
Overall, there was support from both groups in exploring the idea further.
Kelly thought it was a great idea, but they still have to park the district buses somewhere.
They still need a lot more information and data, added LBUSD Board member Jan Vickers. She also mentioned that there are a lot of restrictions on school district-owned land.
LBUSD Assistant Superintendent of Business Services Jeff Dixon said that a few members of the city’s Housing and Human Services Committee reached out to him and shared what they were looking at, in terms of finding potential affordable housing sites in the city.
They also looked at other district-owned properties, Dixon added, including the site of the old Aliso Elementary School on Wesley Drive (now Vista Aliso senior community), which is on lease until 2041 to National Church Residences, and even the district office parking lot.
These are just initial ideas that were presented, Dixon emphasized. The district is happy to work with city staff to evaluate the feasibility of these options, he added.
The housing element will return to the Planning Commission in October and City Council in December.
Council and the LBUSD board also discussed the potential for reduction of water usage. Both are big water users, Whalen said.
Governor Gavin Newsom has called for a voluntary 15 percent reduction in water usage compared to 2020 levels through actions such as reducing landscape irrigation, running dishwashers and washing machines only when full, finding and fixing leaks, and installing water-efficient appliances.
The city is actively looking at ways to reach that goal, Whalen said.
On the school district side, Dixon said they have made an effort in this department as well. For example, they got rid of the grass turf field at Thurston and replaced it with a synthetic field.
“That’s going to be very significant for us, in terms of water savings because irrigation is our biggest usage of water for the district,” Dixon said.
Going synthetic with the district’s primary play fields not only reduces water usage, but also provides more multi-use fields for a wide variety of sports.
“The district is always looking for ways to save and we’re big on sustainability,” Dixon said. “So (in regard to) water usage, regardless of a state mandate, we’d always look to find ways to reduce that use.”
Earlier in the joint session, Public Works Director Mark McAvoy provided an update on the trolley status for the school year.
An update on the on-demand trolley service that the city is proposing to bring back to the neighborhood routes will be presented at the July 27 meeting, he noted.
They will be using smaller vehicles, will continue the high school routes and times, and add a trolley specifically to go to Thurston, McAvoy said.
The joint session discussion also covered the potential for a second community pool. Many officials sitting on both the district and city sides noted the need and community demand for it but finding a realistic location will be challenging.
“We’re persistent, we’ll keep at it,” Whalen said.
City Manager Shohreh Dupuis said city staff can work with LBUSD staff to gather data and put a report together for both ruling bodies.
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Photo by Mary Hurlbut
LBUSD Board of Education approved a new management position under the title of district athletics administrator
Following the special joint session with council on Thursday, the school board held their regular meeting.
They discussed and unanimously approved the transition of the athletic director role from a Laguna Beach Unified Faculty Association (LaBUFA) position to certificated management position under the new title of district athletics administrator.
The new title also comes with a few job description changes, including additional administrative duties:
--Develop and implement an intramural sports program at the middle school level.
--Supervise and evaluate all coaches and classified staff that support the athletics department.
--In conjunction with Human Resources, create a more formal evaluation process for coaches and assistant coaches.
--Coordinate the District athletic summer camp program.
Assistant Superintendent of Human Resources and Public Communications Michael Conlon said the new evaluation tools to use with the coaches will help “tighten up” the process.
The new administrator is responsible for the planning, development, and implementation of the policies, regulations, guidelines, and procedures pertaining to a high school interscholastic sports program; and will serve as an administrator of record for the interscholastic sports personnel concerning sports and recreation activities.
The new position will be a 222-day work year and be placed accordingly on the 2021-22 LBUSD management salary schedule, which includes seven pay steps (step one is listed at $141,256) and a $1,500 mileage allowance.
The district has signed an MOU with LaBUFA agreeing to make this move temporary and negotiate in spring 2022 with the union, to discuss making the move permanent, Conlon said.
The position will be posted later this week.
There was quite a bit of discussion and questions from board members about the hiring process, evaluating coaches, qualifications, and the work the director and coaches do. Overall, the board was supportive of the transition.
“This is a very, very important position,” Kelly said. “I think it should be a management position, and I think it should be a year-round position.”
