After years of fighting each other in court, Bullis Charter School and the Los Altos School District are poised to make peace.
On Wednesday, the charter and district announced a tentative five-year agreement that resolves their longstanding dispute over facilities as well as a handful of ongoing court cases. The boards of the charter and district are scheduled to vote on the agreement on July 28.
“This is significant because it’s a five-year agreement,” said John Phelps, president of the Bullis Charter School Board of Directors. “It lets all of us in these positions of responsibility for the schools to focus on the students and what’s best for the students and this community as a whole.”
State law requires the charter and district to hammer out a “facilities use agreement” at least once every year. More often than not, the effort has culminated in a lawsuit. The tentative agreement lays out what the district will provide the charter over the next five years.
“It consumes an inordinate amount of time,” Doug Smith, president of the Los Altos School District Board of Trustees, said about the process. “So, doing this in a five-year swoop is fantastic, because it just frees up so much staff and board time for us to just focus on educating the kids.”
Smith said legal battles with the charter are costing the district approximately $1.7 million per year.
“It’d be really nice to be able to spend that money on kids,” he said.
The agreement also calls for the charter and district to work together to place a bond measure on the November ballot that would finance additional facilities for students. The amount could approach $150 million.
“We just need flat-out more school space,” said Smith, noting that 5,000 students are enrolled in the district.
The district is in talks with the city of Los Altos to potentially buy or lease land for another elementary school. Rosita Park is one possibility. A meeting scheduled for Wednesday was postponed when a city representative could not make it because of a work obligation.
While Phelps declined to discuss specifics of the agreement, Smith noted that it ends the charter’s controversial practice of giving preference to students from Los Altos Hills. It also requires the charter to be clearer about its willingness to serve the needs of all students, he said.
Smith and Phelps said the boards of the district and charter are seeking feedback from the public on the agreement, which is posted online at www.bullischarterschool.com and www.losaltos.k12.ca.us.
Email Jason Green at jgreen @dailynewsgroup.com; follow him at twitter.com/jgreendailynews.
