Schools
Parents Group Calls on Bullis to Withdraw Lawsuit
A 'special master' to take control of the schools is 'unacceptable' group says. Meanwhile, Bullis releases a letter to parents indicating why it believes legal action was necessary.
The Huttlinger Alliance for Education, a grass-roots organization formed by concerned parents, called on the Bullis Charter School board to withdraw its new lawsuit filed in Santa Clara County Superior Court this week.
The Bullis suit asks that the court compel the Los Altos School District to give the charter school a single campus for its K-8 program, and to declare the district’s 2012-13 facilities provided the school to be in violation of state law.
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"We have repeatedly called for the people in our community to do what the BCS and LASD boards have been unable to do – come together and negotiate in a respectful, dignified way to allocate education facilities, said Alliance president Elena Shea.
"More lawsuits will just be counter-productive."
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What particularly concerned the group was BCS' request that the court appoint a “special master” to take control of allocating space to the charter school.
“An unelected special master who would take control of our schools from our educators and elected district board is unacceptable to the Alliance," Shea said. “This latest court filing is a step in the wrong direction and should be withdrawn.”
That seems unlikely.
The BCS board released a letter it had sent to parents Wednesday, that indicated that it was committed to the action.
For one reason, wrote BCS board chairman Ken Moore, the board wanted to make sure that the substantive issues that Bullis has raised would be considered by the court. And secondly the district's performance on providing the space it said it would supply in its final offer that BCS unhappily accepted last spring, was so poor that the board was pressing ahead on the suit, he wrote.
Moore said the district had reneged on its offer for use of 5,000 square feet of the City Gym and instead was offering 1,20-square feet in the Egan Jr. High music room. The district had also indicated its intention to "sue for access to personal information about BCS students."
In August, the district had on previous occasions.
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