Consultant to Study Capacity of Schools

A consulting company will begin studying the capacity of Simi Valley schools as part of a district reorganization plan to relieve overcrowding in the city’s growing west end.

Simi Valley Unified School District trustees decided Tuesday to hire a Glendale consulting firm for $48,750 to study how many children should attend each of the district’s 26 operating schools as well as four now-closed schools.

In conjunction with the study, the district will begin work on a plan to reset school boundaries according to capacity.

The board voted 4-1 to move forward, with Trustee Carla Kurachi objecting to using an outside firm to determine school capacity.

But other board members agreed with Supt. Mary Beth Wolford, who said the study was needed to help the district set new boundaries next year.

The board decided to contract with Osborn Architects of Glendale to study the school sites and recommend optimal student populations. Once that document is completed this summer, the district will begin preparing various scenarios and begin redrawing boundaries.

Public hearings on the new boundaries would be slated for next fall, with recommendations going to the board in November. New boundaries are scheduled to be approved in December and implemented in the fall of 1997.

The reconfiguration is necessary because of a series of events that left the city’s west end overcrowded, administrators said. The 1993 bankruptcy of the Wood Ranch developer left that community without its own school.

Additional building in the city’s west end has left such schools as Madera Elementary School on Royal Avenue near Madera Road overcrowded. Now, there are plans for another 400 homes near Los Angeles Avenue and Madera Road.

Among the scenarios being considered is a plan to reopen the now-closed Arroyo Elementary School a few blocks north of Madera School, to make room for about 500 students.