UPDATE: I haven't been able to connect with LAUSD on the subject but I'm told that despite what the website says about non-profits only, the district has permitted developers and other commercial interests to use school sites in the past. And that's my point public rules for the public and private rules for special interests is the hallmark of LAUSD and City Hall for that matter.
It has been a long-standing policy of the LAUSD to allow the use of public school facilities after hours only to non-profit organizations.
That's why the Sunland-Tujanga community got so aroused when it found out Mt. Gleason school was being turned over to Home Depot for a community meeting June 24 to win support for its effort to convert a closed K-Mart into one of their stores.
They started an email campaign that inundated school officials this week with complaints that giving a permit to one of America's most profitable companies violated the district's own rule.
Whatever you might think about the community's years long fight to keep Home Depot out of Sunland-Tujunga, you should be concerned about how LAUSD solved the controversy.
This is what they put up on district's website today:
Civic Center Permits
The major function of the Civic Center Permit Office is the issuance of the appropriate permit to allow for the use of school facilities in conformance with the California Education Code mandate and the Board of Education rules, which require that each and every public school facility be made available as a civic center to members of the community and non-profit organizations for supervised recreational activities, meetings and public discussions, when regular school activities are not disrupted.
To qualify for a permit:
A group must be non-profit.(Incorrect)
Updated 6/12/08: The activity requested must be not for profit.
Poof, the problem is gone. Just change the rules. And for that I think the district with an unbroken record of failing millions of students for 30 years deserves the Chutzpah Award for pure blatant utter contempt for the public.
You got to give the bloated, overpaid and incompetent bureaucracy credit for nakedly showing exactly how they deal with all kinds of problems. Cross out the wrong answer and put in the right one. In a word, cheat.
That's exactly why the district fails. It gets the answers to problems wrong every day but instead of learning from its mistakes and getting better, it simply crosses out failure and writes in success That way there's no accountability, no growth.
And that's exactly why the people of Sunland-Tujunga feel that no matter what happens, the Home Depot store will be shoved down their throats Their experience with the city is no different than with the schools and that's what I'm hearing from people all over the city.
For my money, there is only one answer and that's to change tactics and to stop playing by the rules of a rigged game.
So if you care about the schools or the quality of life in your neighborhood or any other issues that affect your life because of local policies, join me and other community activists in a protest at City Hall on July 14, Bastille Day, the day the French Revolution began.
It has been a long-standing policy of the LAUSD to allow the use of public school facilities after hours only to non-profit organizations.
That's why the Sunland-Tujanga community got so aroused when it found out Mt. Gleason school was being turned over to Home Depot for a community meeting June 24 to win support for its effort to convert a closed K-Mart into one of their stores.
They started an email campaign that inundated school officials this week with complaints that giving a permit to one of America's most profitable companies violated the district's own rule.
Whatever you might think about the community's years long fight to keep Home Depot out of Sunland-Tujunga, you should be concerned about how LAUSD solved the controversy.
This is what they put up on district's website today:
Civic Center Permits
The major function of the Civic Center Permit Office is the issuance of the appropriate permit to allow for the use of school facilities in conformance with the California Education Code mandate and the Board of Education rules, which require that each and every public school facility be made available as a civic center to members of the community and non-profit organizations for supervised recreational activities, meetings and public discussions, when regular school activities are not disrupted.
To qualify for a permit:
Updated 6/12/08: The activity requested must be not for profit.
Poof, the problem is gone. Just change the rules. And for that I think the district with an unbroken record of failing millions of students for 30 years deserves the Chutzpah Award for pure blatant utter contempt for the public.
You got to give the bloated, overpaid and incompetent bureaucracy credit for nakedly showing exactly how they deal with all kinds of problems. Cross out the wrong answer and put in the right one. In a word, cheat.
That's exactly why the district fails. It gets the answers to problems wrong every day but instead of learning from its mistakes and getting better, it simply crosses out failure and writes in success That way there's no accountability, no growth.
And that's exactly why the people of Sunland-Tujunga feel that no matter what happens, the Home Depot store will be shoved down their throats Their experience with the city is no different than with the schools and that's what I'm hearing from people all over the city.
For my money, there is only one answer and that's to change tactics and to stop playing by the rules of a rigged game.
So if you care about the schools or the quality of life in your neighborhood or any other issues that affect your life because of local policies, join me and other community activists in a protest at City Hall on July 14, Bastille Day, the day the French Revolution began.
Ron Kaye is the former editor of the Los Angeles Daily News where he spent 23 years helping to make the newspaper the voice of the San Fernando Valley and fighting for a city government that serves the people and not special interests.
Twice in recent years, Los Angeles Magazine listed Kaye among the city’s most influential people, specifically in the area of politics. Kaye has been variously described in the media as the “accidental anarchist,” “the Patrick Henry of the San Fernando Valley” and a “passionate populist.” He is now committed to
carrying on his crusade for a greater Los Angeles as an ordinary citizen. Previously, Ron worked at the Los Angeles Herald Examiner,
Associated Press, Cleveland Plain Dealer and The Australian as well as papers
in Fairbanks, Alaska and Yakima, Wash. He also wrote for Newsweek magazine, The Guardian in London and the Naitonal Enquirer.
Maybe Home Depot could build a park on that site and a library? Call it The Home Depot Library and Park. They get naming rights, the community gets something educational. Win-win.
Ad again I say, how is this proposed Home Depot going to turn a profit? Is there really that much business in that location?
Oh My God, it's come to this. Just strike through the mistake and call it all good.
Amazing.
Maybe Home Depot is going to make up the LAUSD shortfall in this years budget! Why else would they rent out a space to a corporation that will put elementary school children in danger? Apperson Elemantary School is less than 500 ft from the proposed Sunland Home Depot. The traffic alone will put children in danger. Couple that with the toxic chemicals and the fumes belching from the diesel trucks and you have a toxic cloud ripe for inhalation. To top the whole toxic mis off, the proposed Sunland Home Depot is located above a water channel that leads to the ocean. If you don't get the kids at school they'll have a 2nd chance when they play at the beach during summer break!
Ron, you hit it on the head. LAUSD got the answer wrong so they just fixed it by cheating. No wonder our schools are a mess!
I am amazed at the lack of regard LAUSD has for the children attending their schools. LAUSD is well aware that the Home Depot will affect the health and safety of the children attending a school less than a few hundred feet away, so they further Home Depot's agenda. Are they idiots?
I am sorry for Sunland-Tujunga for this years long fight and the thousands of dollars they have put towards this fight. LA's City Council members have shown nothing but ill regard for their constituents obviously forgetting that government should be "of the people, by the people, and for the people." You all should fill a bag of (not coal) and mail it to your City Council member for Christmas.
LAUSD is such a corrupt bureaucracy who would expect anything they do to make sense, but this is relly over the top. Somebody got paid off to let this go. The education representative on the S-T Neighborhood council has been speaking out so forcefully and eloquently regarding the negative effects of the proposed Home Depot next to Apperson Elementary at all the meetings and then LAUSD allows one of their facilities to be used as a platform to persuade the public with their propaganda, INCREDIBLE!! The community and education rep, should feel betrayed by this re-writing of the rules.
This is outrageous!!! Now the LAUSD will allow ANYONE stage or create a publicity or advertising event in any school facility? Use of any LAUSD public school facility, school yards, auditoriums, cafeterias, media center, computer center??? They had better re-think that.
Amen to your commentary. There'e nothing more to say than what everyone's already said. See you in July.
Now this, from a district that has probably done more to "dumb down" the children than any other in the country.
Striking out the words do not change the ultimate aim of the activity. It simply is "for profit". What other reason can there be? It's time to get a restraining order and put an end to this.
A thorough investigation must be conducted to sniff out who profited from the "Not for profit" enterprise. What contacts were made to give Home Depot access to our educational properties.
Maye some one thought it would benefit the community in that after 12 years of education in the LAUSD the graduation gown would be an orange apron. that's all you you are qualified for IMO.
Is Brewer tiring of the Sup. job and looking for a nice position to land? He is certainly not doing much to earn his pay these days. Of course very few employed by the LAUD are worth their bloated salaries.
THANK YOU so much for your article.
WELL put! And sadly....so spot on. I have lost faith in our city big time. The city attorney's office has lost sight of its true purpose and has no idea who "the city" really is any more. US!! After telling us that they saw no problem in dealing with the law suit they then conjured up a deal to sell out and let Home Depot trample the citizens. Here, here! Bastille Day!
Thank you for bringing attention to this. However, I would argue that even with the new wording, Home Depot's use of LAUSD facilities is still an abuse of the rule. The new wording states:
The activity requested must be not for profit
I would argue that the promotion of a store by a corporation certainly does not qualify as a "not for profit" activity.
At least LA City admitted that they had erred when they allowed Home Depot a "Tenant Improvements" permit and overturned that decision. LAUSD obviously cares more about bending to the will of a major corporation than listening to the concerns of the communities it serves.
I attended an evening event at Culver City High recently and inside the school's Robert Frost Auditorium--a sweeping, bold and rakishly designed building from that ultra-confident American era of the early 1960s--I realized something: My belief that LAUSD, and the endlessly rambling (kind of like this sentence) geography of he City of Los Angeles are worth keeping in tact as mega entities with great power has been wrong. And how wrong I've been.
I've long thought that as the nation's second largest city, we are well served by our overwhelming vastness. While I've nodded and "understood" past drive for secession, current drives for neighborhood autonomy, I've been quietly loyal to a belief that sheer bulk gives L.A. and its institutions a kind of respect at the statewide, national, and global levels that would not be given if the region were made of a patchwork of separate cities and school districts.
But in Culver City, a place so like Van Nuys or Tarzana demographically, but with an aesthetic that is more like Encino or Sherman Oaks, you will find a level of civic pride that rivals Glendale or Burbank.
In fact, I know in my heart that the venue for the event I attended, a high school auditorium, would have been a weak echo of its original construction--just one neglected relic in forest of LAUSD's "structural assets," whose architectural uniqueness would have been long forgotten if it were in that district's jurisdiction.
But at Culver City High School, a jewel in the Culver City Unified School District crown, the Frost Auditorium's contrasting combination of red-brick and Jetsons-style load-bearing arches is honored with meticulous care and maintenance, as well as modern upgrades to its interior (perfectly maintained carpet and seats, with no missing fixtures or burned-out light bulbs).
The event itself was a testament to community spirit and civic pride. It was a graduation ceremony for Culver City Adult School. I can't help but think that a similar shindig at an average LAUSD high school would have been an equally earnest, however far bleaker affair, not least because of the facilities the district offers (save for the newly built digs).
The moving celebration of lately salvaged educational careers I witnessed in Culver City last week could only have happened in a California community with a manageable nucleus at its heart, i.e., an approachable City Hall.
Culver City is just that, a city. It has a heart at its heart.
I don't know why I'm just now discovering the value of smaller communities. My childhood home of Costa Mesa in Orange County and the towns surrounding it, from Newport Beach to Laguna and Huntington Beach, O.C. enjoy two characteristics...
One: Hometown governments must hear residents loudly and clearly if only because there is usually no more than a sidewalk and a parking lot separating officials and citizens. Two: Nationally and internationally people are aware of O.C. and see the region as prestigious.
But in Los Angeles and at LAUSD it's still true that "Big is good because big is, well...big."
I have no recourse against LAUSD. I have to pay my property taxes, therefore I am forced to involuntarily finance the lunacy of their actions. However, when it comes to Home Depot, that's a different story. I have owned about 50 shares of their stock for several years now. I've been meaning to get rid of it, because it (like most of the stocks I purchased years ago) is worth much less than I paid for it. I don't buy individual stocks any longer. So, I sold the Home Depot stock just now. And I will do everything I can to avoid shopping at any of their stores in the future. I know my actions will have ZERO effect on their profitibility. But you know what? I feel just a little better than I did 15 minutes ago.
How right you are, Ron! Thanks very much for calling attention to this reprehensible act of collusion by LAUSD. Home Depot's meet and greet at the school in Sunland is about as "not for profit" as their self serving contributions to "Extreme Home Makeover"! Someone at LAUSD got their palms greased and their kitchen refaced at the expense of the our community and our schools. What's next? Capitol One offering credit cards at graduation to Verdugo Hills High school students?
blah blah
Thank you, Ron Kaye, for bringing this to public attention. No wonder everyday folks are cynical about government at any level.
To qualify for a permit:
A group must be non-profit.(Incorrect)
Updated 6/12/08: The activity requested must be not for profit.
You mean Home Depot was the first time anything like this came up regarding the district policy? Where the city found it necessary to correct something that had been incorrect? This hasn't come up before? Are there groups that have been denied requests to use school facilities because they were 'not' non-profit?
And what about this other requirement:
"Any form of announcement or advertising regarding activities held on school property for non school purposes must include the following statement: "This meeting is neither sponsored by nor is in any way connected with the Los Angeles Unified School District. If announcement is in printed form, statement must appear in equally large and prominent type".
I don't believe the brochure announcing the Home Depot meeting at Mt. Gleason Middle School had any such explanation or disclaimer in the fine print, let alone in 'equally large and prominent type'.
Thanks Ron for bringing light to this story.
I was just contacted by Board of Education member,
Juli Korenstein's office and they said the LAUSD is preparing to release a statement about this whole mess.
Thanks Ron for shining a light where it needs to shined - again.
LAUSD changing the wording from "non-profit" to "not-for-profit" does nothing except to add evidence to the huge pile that already exists.
Home Depot is the 22nd largest corporation in America (from the 2008 Fortune 500). They made about $85 billion in top-line revenue last year. They made about $4.5 billion in profit. $4.5 billion in profit functionally disqualifies you from either the "non-profit" or the "not-for-profit" categories - dontcha think?
And all to conduct a Home Depot pep rally for a store within 500 feet of an elementary school. LAUSD should be ashamed and, for once, try to remember who their constituents are supposed to be - THE KIDS WHO ATTEND THAT SCHOOL!
The venue for the Home Depot Open House should be changed to Apperson Elementary School, so that anybody with any sense will no longer have any doubt how rediculously close it is to the proposed store. Let them try to spin THAT to their benefit!
So much for rules and regulations. I agree with ya Ron. This thing with the school district is --> blatant utter contempt for the public.
How about they put up a tent on the property on Foothill Blvd in the 100 degree heat and walk us over to Apperson Elementary so that we can pace off how close it is to the project site.
If they did such a thing (as put up a tent) I'm sure they wouldn't rent the tents, tables, and chairs from a local vendor--they'd probably go with some company from outside Sunland-Tujunga.
What about refreshments and catering? If they are able to go through with the LAUSD rental, will they purchase the refreshments and food from local vendors or will it be brought to us from Orange County or some other far off location?