EDITORIAL
Pasadena Unified School District Boardroom
Haste makes waste, says the old adage. This was on display last Thursday evening at the PUSD board meeting.
By the Editorial Board
At the Pasadena Unified School Board Meeting on Thursday, Feb. 1, 2024, the Board of Education was presented with staff recommendations to
- house Madison school at the former Franklin campus while Madison is under construction, and
- to house Longfellow school at the former Allendale school campus while Longfellow is under construction.
The plan for Madison was approved, but not the one for Longfellow, because this plan did not sit well with Longfellow parents. In response to their concerns, the board voted to revise the staff’s recommendation and place Longfellow at the former Jefferson school campus. It was a divided, 4-3 decision, with board members Kenne, Cahalan, Fredericks, and Velasquez voting in favor, and board members Bailey, Hall Lee, and McKenzie voting against.
Hasty and divided decision
One problem with this hasty and divided decision is that the Jefferson campus has been occupied with various city programs now for a few years, since Jefferson closed. It is home to a Pasadena library branch, a fire department training center, and the police department’s Police Activities League (PAL) and Explorer Program facilities. Library activities can include storytimes, youth programs, teen volunteer opportunities and a homework help drop-in program. Special collections available for checkout include educator and homeschool collections, board games, video games, book club kits, Chromebooks and hotspots, early reading kits with a focus on equity, jigsaw puzzles, juvenile Spanish materials, mental health kits, sensory storytime kits, and STEAM kits. The library also houses the Office of the Young Child and Teen Mental Health information centers.
Jefferson is also the home of the Pasadena Police Department’s PAL and Explorer programs. PAL is a nonprofit, youth crime prevention program that uses educational, athletic and other recreational activities to promote positive bonds between police officers and Pasadena youth. The Explorer Program provides young men and women, ages 14-21, an opportunity to work with the police department and serve the Pasadena community.
Pasadena Fire Department utilizes their portion of Jefferson as a training center. The fire department has converted several classrooms into training labs dedicated to emergency medicine and fire/rescue simulations. Two classrooms are used for continuing education and in-service classroom training. Additional classrooms are used for office space, separate male and female locker rooms, and a wellness/exercise room. The department uses the outdoor grounds for hands-on training, including vehicle extrication, hose and ladder operations, as well as scenario-based evolutions. Included at the site is a “pump pod” that allows for water to be recycled during various exercises, significantly reducing water waste. The facility is also being used for fire training academies, where recruits receive classroom and drill ground training, and education to become full-fledged Pasadena firefighters. In fact, 14 of the department’s newest firefighters completed their academy training at Jefferson.
$100,000 annually from the city for the use of the campus
All of these city-sponsored functions are possible because of an agreement between the city and the PUSD that provides PUSD with $100,000 annually from the city for the use of the campus.
During the board’s discussion, a board member who lives near Longfellow and whose children attended there said PUSD could break this agreement. We did not observe any legal guidance being offered to the board about this weighty decision. We would imagine that like the action item approved at this meeting to terminate an agreement with a construction management firm, there will have to be a future agenda item about the city-PUSD Jefferson school agreement if indeed PUSD wants to go through with severing that agreement.
We feel that caving to a crowd on the spot is ill-advised, and it is actually not real engagement, as illustrated by one parent’s comments, who said that he did not need a specific outcome, he just wanted involvement. The board is so eager not to waste any time that it is rushing decisions that should have been more carefully considered.
Solution
Another solution to the question of where Longfellow can be located is for PUSD to stagger the timing of the district’s two very substantial elementary school construction projects that it has prioritized at Madison and Longfellow so that first Madison and then Longfellow can use Franklin. There are plenty of projects that need to be done, and schools with much more urgent needs than these two schools, which have already been modernized under two previous bonds. Longfellow could wait until after Madison.
We hope that the Pasadena Unified School Board will reconsider its decision. When the lease with the city is brought before them, the board could vote to continue the lease with the city that allows for the various programs and functions located there. The Board could reconsider its facilities plan: either delay Longfellow’s construction until they can be located at Franklin, or approve staff’s plan to locate Longfellow at Allendale. The board could provide transportation for any Longfellow families that really need transportation to get to Franklin or Allendale.
We understand that Madison parents made a request for transportation for their children to be able to attend Franklin, and the board still approved the move of Madison to Franklin. A similar consideration could be made for Longfellow families. These twin actions would preserve the many important programs and functions that are currently at Jefferson, continue providing PUSD with much needed funds from the city, and also demonstrate a more careful decision than the one made at the last meeting.
Did PUSD or the Longfellow parents take into consideration on what it might mean legally for PUSD to break the lease? It’s not as simple as get out, we need the space. Especially after the city has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to modify the space to their needs (all of the city departments). Ordering equipment, furniture, and staff hours. It seems to me like PUSD likes to pay out legal fees for unwise decisions.
Would be so much simpler to just use Allendale. I hear people saying San Rafael needs to move is why Jefferson is needed. But San Rafael could move to Allendale after Longfellow goes back to Longfellow. Would work according to the schedule of the 5 yr plan. I think this just needlessly increases the complexity and has an unnecessary domino effect.
The “unwise” decision here is publishing this editorial. It’s factually incorrect, biased, dismissive of meaningful parent engagement, and most of all fails to recognize that when PUSD makes decisions, and when any of our community leaders make decisions, they need to be in the best interest of our children. Retract this editorial. It’s wrong.
The solution presented in this article is is not feasible because PUSD clearly stated that Franklin Elementary does not have the capacity to hold the large Longfellow student body. Also, PUSD is already staggering the construction projects with Longfellow and Madison renovating during the 2025-2026 school year, Webster and San Rafael during the 2026-2027 school year, and Don Benito and Field Elementary during the 2027-2028 school year. There is no reshuffling of this list of projects that would prevent at least some subset of schools like Longfellow, Webster, Field, and Don Benito from having to do awful cross-town commutes to Allendale.
If Longfellow would go to Allendale, with transportation like for Madison to go to Franklin, then both could go in 2025. And San Rafael could go to Allendale in 2027. And another school if needed could go to Franklin in 2027. I don’t get the comment about this being necessary because of too many schools needing a place to go.
Why would San Rafael go to Franklin and not Allendale which is much closer, and San Rafael’s dual language program feeds into Blair anyway. So I don’t get the comment about SR going to Franklin.
Parent input and local control of schools is the most important factor and you characterized it as “caving into a crowd.” Shame on you.
And “decisions that should have been more carefully considered” as you wrote would presumably have included announcing the Longfellow/Allendale plan to parents more than TWO DAYS before the School Board meeting, which is what happened!
Finally, characterizing parents’ concerns by quoting “one parent’s comments” is shoddy journalism.
It seems that this was written as hastily as the PUSD decision was made. While this editorial board researched (or received) an incredible level of detailed information about city programs, the editors have little knowledge of the school relocations. Longfellow waiting until the 2026-27 school year to use Franklin is not an option because San Rafael is slated to relocate to Franklin during their renovation in 2026-27. There are six schools that need to be relocated for Measure O renovations. Jefferson was chosen because it would be better for the hundreds of Pasadena families of schools such as Field, whose families live even farther east. The reason the decision was made so quickly was because the school board wanted to provide the city with as much notice as possible (a year and a half) to work out where to move. Unless Jefferson Elementary is going to be relinquished to the city in perpetuity, the city needs an exit plan. The difference decided by this vote is whether the exit plan is for 2025 or 2027. Nobody takes any joy in asking the city to move those services, but at the end of the day Jefferson Elementary is a school that is needed by students from 2-3 different elementary schools while their electricity and plumbing (and likely loads of old lead paint) are being brought up to modern standards.