Skip to main content

Let’s work together to apply for state and federal funds to upgrade Red Hill

By
Red Hill is the best long-term home for Ross Valley Charter School (RVC), the new, free TK-5 public school in Fairfax. Under the Prop 39 law, the district gets to choose where RVC is located, but finding a facility for RVC doesn’t have to be hard.

Allowing RVC to lease the Red Hill campus would have the least impact on other families in the district because that building is not currently being used as a district school. RVC has offered to pay for the entire renovation cost to make it usable for the charter school. About $400,000 is needed to bring the facility up to minimum standards for public charter schools. (RVC leadership commissioned this cost estimate from architects and engineers who walked the site carefully).

If the district wants the Red Hill property to be fully upgraded to meet the additional Field Act requirements and to address traffic impacts, then the cost of the renovation will likely be $1-2 million. These numbers are not out of reach.

With funds available to charter schools from the state (Prop 51) and federal government (Charter Facilities Incentive Grant Program) RVC can help restore an aging district building. The California Public School Facility Bonds Initiative, known as Prop 51, made $500M available to provide school facilities for charter schools. About half of the money has been allocated, but additional funds will likely become available next year. At the federal level, the Charter Facilities Incentive Grant Program “is a federal grant program designed to assist high-performing charter schools with rent, lease, debt service, and Proposition 39 pro-rata payments or costs related to purchase, acquisition, design, new construction, and renovation.”

This funding is available to create a home for RVC at Red Hill, but RVC cannot apply for funding to renovate Red Hill if the district won’t co-sign the applications with us. If the district ignores these opportunities for a win-win solution and continues pushing RVC to co-locate with existing district schools, then local parents should hold the district accountable for perpetuating controversy and strife in our community while ignoring an obvious solution.

Doesn’t this just make sense? Rather than letting a district-owned asset sit largely idle, why not infuse it with millions of dollars from the state and renovate? This school facility would be leased by RVC, a public charter school serving many local parents and families who are drawn to RVC’s progressive, creative, inquiry-based educational environment for their children. This would also improve a public school school facility that we all own together as taxpayers (which is currently in a state of disrepair) and make it a more valuable and functional asset for the district.

Let’s focus on solutions. Rick Bagley and the RVSD school board should reopen negotiations to locate RVC at Red Hill and apply with RVC for state and federal renovation funding.
Labels:

Popular posts from this blog

Proposition 39 & RVC

By
There is some debate in the community about whether Ross Valley Charter School (RVC) is “taking” space from District students by being at White Hill. The reality is that the law does not give District public school students any greater right to publicly-funded school facilities than charter public school students. In fact, the law requires that all such facilities be made equally available by Districts to charter schools so they may have a place to operate. How much space should RVC receive? The math is simple. RVC’s projected enrollment of 144 in-district students for 2018-19, which is 45% or roughly half of the average  RVSD enrollment of 319 students per school (projected). Under Proposition 39, this means that RVC should receive nearly half the amount of space a typical K-5 RVSD elementary school provides to its students. All four elementary schools in the district have at least 22 classrooms each, so RVC should be provided 10 rooms at a minimum. The actual calculations are m...
Read more

We believe

By
All children want to learn. Not all children learn the same way at the same pace. All parents do their best to provide their children with the best possible educational opportunities. There are many kinds of learning environments suited to many kinds of learners. Every child should have access to free, public education where they thrive as learners. All citizens share the responsibility for making this education available to all. If children have what they need, it is better for everyone. We do not have to compete for resources. When we work together, we are stronger. When adults model how to collaborate using conversation, children learn how to collaborate using conversation. All children deserve to feel included, welcome and safe in all schools and neighborhoods. We are all on the same side, the side of all children. - from a few local parents whose children attend Ross Valley Charter School
Read more

Better Salaries for Teachers

By
A worthy cause. Better salaries for teachers... Higher salaries for all school teachers would be a good thing, but West Virginia teachers are in a particularly bad spot. They are some of the lowest paid teachers in the country. Link to a Change.org petition to West Virginia's governor below. From Change.org petition: "Teachers in West Virginia have been on strike for more than a week, demanding the state pay their public employees more. West Virginia Congressional candidate Richard Ojeda started this petition because he wants to see teachers 'treated as professionals rather than inconveniences.' Sign now if you agree."
Read more