Battle Lines Drawn Over School Districts

WALNUT —  Sending the children to a private school or moving used to be about the only ways out of an unsatisfactory school system. After all, a school district’s neighborhood boundaries seemed as permanent as a mountain range.

But across the San Gabriel Valley, from Pasadena to Walnut, parents have been trying to move those mountains.

Despite a loss at the county level Nov. 7, a Walnut group called UNIFY, United Neighbors Involved for Youth, is continuing its efforts to break away from the Rowland Unified School District. Members say their children belong in the neighboring Walnut Valley Unified School District, with the rest of Walnut.

One Rowland board member, however, accuses them of trying to flee a district that serves a largely Latino area with a gang problem.

UNIFY will appeal to the State Board of Education. The Los Angeles County Committee on School Board Organization turned down the group’s request to move out of Rowland, saying the transfer would not improve education for students in either district.

Meanwhile, the transfer process has gone a step further in a tiny slice of the Pasadena Unified School District.

There, 71 homeowners from an unincorporated area south of Pasadena want to switch to San Marino schools. An election in the area is scheduled March 5; voter approval would be the final step there. The Pasadena district is suing to stop the election; a hearing is scheduled for Feb. 14.

In another case, the State Board of Education last June ruled against Sierra Madre petitioners who sought to leave Pasadena schools for Arcadia Unified, which draws students from a smaller, less ethnic and more affluent area.

The concerns of the unhappy Walnut parents typify the elements of a struggle that is becoming more common. Although it is not part of the UNIFY platform, some parents mention such things as test scores--Walnut’s are higher than Rowland’s--and concerns about crime.

“I don’t think it should be the parents’ primary responsibility to bring a school district up to any particular level,” said Walnut City Councilman William Choctaw, a UNIFY member. “That is the professionals’ responsibility, the responsibility of those people employed by the district.

“If you’re a parent, your first responsibility is to those children.”

Choctaw, a surgeon, and other UNIFY members say all of Walnut should lie within the 12,500-student Walnut Valley district, both to enhance community identity and to make available improved educational and recreational opportunities they say the 19,000-student Rowland district cannot offer.

Administrators in both districts oppose the move. Rowland Unified officials said their district would lose about $2.3 million with the transfer of the 1,800 students in the Walnut area; districts receive state money based on enrollment.

In addition, more than 100 Rowland faculty and staff would either lose their jobs or have to change over to the Walnut district, which has different benefits and pay rates.

As for Walnut Valley, that district’s junior highs and high schools are full and are already using hundreds of portable classrooms, Supt. Ronald Hockwalt said. “We can’t accommodate that many students,” he said. If the transfer is allowed, Oswalt Elementary School in Walnut would become part of the Walnut Valley district, but junior high and high school students would have to attend existing campuses, Hockwalt said.

The Walnut district will probably continue to grow even without the transfer. Since 1979, Walnut’s population has increased from about 12,000 to 29,300.

Rowland officials, for their part, have tried to address the petitioners’ concerns. “Some of their issues seemed to be legitimate,” Deputy Supt. Dick Angarola said, acknowledging a past lack of communication between the district and parents.

UNIFY members said their children have missed out on scholarship opportunities and honors handed out by Walnut service clubs. They said city recreational activities have been coordinated with the Walnut district and not Rowland and that local cable television coverage also overlooked their children.

Since parents raised these complaints, the Rowland district has contacted the local cable station and service clubs about remedies. Also, the city of Walnut has awarded Rowland Unified its next contract for providing recreational services for all of Walnut. The contract takes effect in July; previously, Walnut Valley had the contract.

But UNIFY members remain dissatisfied. “I don’t think there’s anything short of a transfer that will absolutely cure the problem that we have,” spokeswoman Susan Kelley said.

“We have to constantly remind people that we are part of the city,” she said. “You don’t think of Walnut and the Rowland school district together. Walnut is a small city, all residential, no big shopping malls, no freeways running through it. Why would anyone separate such a small city and cut a tiny chunk out of it?”

The origin of the problem dates to the 1880s, when area districts consisted of one-room schools that fed into a regional high school, said Ray McMullen, a Walnut Valley assistant superintendent and local historian.

The boundaries were originally drawn to align with parcel borders created for homesteaders. As the population and number of schools grew, district lines were only occasionally adjusted to run along newer borders--such as streets--and to avoid cutting through properties. Throughout the San Gabriel Valley, few school district boundaries follow city boundaries.

Walnut was not incorporated until 1959. Most of the spacious homes in the disputed area were built within the last decade, often near horse trails or on ridges along the city’s rolling hills.

The Rowland district lies mostly to the south and west and also serves students in unincorporated Rowland Heights and parts of La Puente, West Covina and Industry. Many of the neighborhoods resemble nearby areas in Walnut, but others are plagued by gangs and poverty.

This reality has convinced at least one member of the Rowland school board that the Walnut parents aren’t being frank about their motives. Rolland Boceta said he suspects that many Walnut parents are worried about gangs and crime. He says their fears are exaggerated and also wonders if they want to minimize their children’s contact with poor or ethnic youngsters.

Shootings, including one near a band practice, and concerns about gang violence caused the Rowland district to cancel a football game at Nogales High School in La Puente last fall.

Walnut petitioners deny that crime or ethnicity are behind their request.

Walnut Valley is 43% Anglo, 27% Asian, 19% Latino, 6% Filipino and 5% black. The Rowland district is 49% Latino, 20% Anglo, 14% Asian, 9% Filipino and 8% black.

Matters of race and poverty have clouded other such transfers. In the Sierra Madre petition, the state board denied the transfer in part because it said too many white students would be removed from Pasadena, debilitating Pasadena’s desegregation plan.

Another issue is property values. Area real estate agents use the high standardized test scores of the Walnut Valley district as a selling point. In the most recent California Assessment Program tests, Walnut students outscored Rowland students at every grade level.

“To say real estate is not an issue would almost be the same thing as saying Saddam Hussein is a saint,” Boceta said.

Property values may have played a part in the motives of Pasadena-area homeowners who wanted to transfer to San Marino schools. Some have said they want to become part of the city of San Marino as well, where home prices are among the highest in the nation. The annexation has been the subject of bitter debate in San Marino. A school district change could strengthen the case of the San Marino wanna-bes.

The district has more at stake than a handful of students from this tiny parcel, Pasadena Supt. Phil Linscomb said. “If one small area can be successful (in leaving), why can’t all areas be successful? We have 600 children from county areas.

“There is a natural tendency for people to want to go to a more affluent district,” he added. “This chipping away reduces student population and resources, which isn’t in the best interests of the students or the people in the school districts.”

An appeal to the common good, however, means little to many parents concerned about their children’s immediate needs. Walnut parent Choctaw, a frequent volunteer at Rowland school events, said he is frustrated by the gang problem and by the district’s money management. “I personally think parents should have a choice about where they go to school,” he said.

More parents now understand the process of changing districts, said Marc Forgy, secretary to the county school district organization committee. “I think people are getting fed up with their current school districts,” he said. “Instead of making their school districts work, they throw up their hands.”

BACKGROUND can take more than two years. If either district opposes the change, homeowners must gather the signatures of at least 25% of the affected area’s registered voters. The Los Angeles County Committee on School District Organization then decides the matter after a staff report and public hearings. If it denies the petition, petitioners can appeal to the State Board of Education. If that fails, the matter is closed unless petitioners present new evidence. If the county or state board sides with petitioners, the matter is put to a vote of those in the affected area, as defined by the state board.