Boundaries Set for New Lang Ranch Elementary School

THOUSAND OAKS —  Attendance boundaries are set for the Conejo Valley Unified School District’s newest elementary school, but hard choices remain in dealing with coming growth, officials warned trustees at a planning workshop Thursday.

Among those will be deciding whether to reclaim former elementary schools that are leased or otherwise earning the district money, said Sean Corrigan, facilities director, who briefed trustees on attendance boundary issues and the district’s master plan for the next few years.

Clearly, the people most pleased after the workshop were the handful of parents who discovered that their children will likely be able to attend Lang Ranch Elementary School when it opens in 1998.

“I’m ecstatic,” said Wendy Harris, a mother of three who lives in the Brock homes near Avenida de los Arboles and Erbes Road.

The Lang Ranch boundary includes the Brock, Meadowood and Eagle Ridge developments, an area near Westlake Boulevard and Avenida de los Arboles, and about 250 homes to be built in the Woodridge tract, Corrigan told the meeting.

But after the Lang Ranch segment of his presentation, Corrigan was faced with harder questions from the board.

When he told trustees that future Madrona students might have to be bumped to nearby Aspen Elementary School, President Mildred Lynch said she worries about how to “anticipate the big uproar” that would likely ensue from that decision.

Trustee Richard Newman also wanted to know if moving the students would create a new problem at Aspen.

Corrigan agreed that moving Madrona students to Aspen would be controversial. But the district’s options are limited, he said.

Among the possibilities for preventing crowding at Madrona and other schools are reopening Horizon Hills and Triunfo elementary schools, and converting the Conejo Valley Adult School on Waverly Heights Drive back to an elementary school.

But displacing those programs would cost the district money, Corrigan said. The Triunfo site is leased by a Christian school for $170,000 a year and the adult school turns a profit.

Some members of the public, however, said the district should concern itself more with students than making money.

“Let them rent a commercial building,” Terry Graves said.

But earlier, trustee Dorothy Beaubien said it would be a “horrendous problem” to move the adult school program. “It’s a successful program. You can’t just disregard those people. . . . You can’t just move it.”

Two other options that Corrigan discussed included adding portables to make more classrooms and possibly beginning a multitrack, year-round school schedule, an option that trustees have repeatedly discussed but never seriously considered.

“The kids are coming,” he said. “We have to figure out a way to handle this growth.”