District officials face barrage of questions

Jessica Garrison

NEWPORT-MESA -- District officials were hammered relentlessly Thursday

night. And that is just how they wanted it.

At the second meeting of the district’s Facilities Advisory Committee,

the group of local business and community leaders convened by Supt.

Robert Barbot to figure out what to do about the district’s crumbling

classrooms peppered officials with one tough question after another.

Last month, district officials estimated that the total cost to repair

and modernize schools will be at least $127 million, money the

cash-strapped district does not have. Options include selling district

property, applying for state funds and asking voters to approve a school

bond.

The committee has until Sept. 28 to tell the school board what they think

should be done. But before they decide what to do, committee members

wanted to make sure they agreed with district officials about the scope

of the problem.

* Had the district’s facilities consultant properly factored in the

amount of money it would cost to make classrooms earthquake safe, one

wanted to know.

* Why were district officials planning to install carpeting in all

elementary school classrooms? What if a kindergartner vomited on the

floor? Had the costs of cleaning up such inevitable accidents, and

combating the bacteria they would cause, been properly considered?

* Had district officials accurately estimated how much money the state

would give the district, if the state is indeed willing to give any money

at all?

Barbot, along with board member Wendy Leece, Assistant Superintendent for

Financial Services Mike Fine and the district’s facilities’ consultant

Fred Good, sat stone-faced as the questions came down on them. They

politely answered each one and even engaged in a 10-minute debate about

vomit-repellent characteristics of many modern carpet fibers for

elementary schools.

Fine said he was pleased with the way the meeting had gone.

“That is exactly what the committee’s purpose is” Fine said -- to

validate and verify the district’s plan. “I thought it went very well.”

Rush Hill, a prominent architect and father of two Newport Harbor High

School students, said his pointed interrogation of district officials

does not mean he thinks there is anything wrong with their monetary

estimates.

“It’s the natural reaction of individuals as it relates to government,

and especially government in Orange County and Newport Beach,” he said,

ticking off the county’s bankruptcy and the embezzlements in Newport

Beach and the school district. “This is the only process you can go

through.”