Community members immediately appealed the Board vote to the State Board of Education.
The Gazette is now reporting that the Board of Education is not waiting for the Opinion of the State Board of Education and has reversed their own decision to spend $44,560 without community input. This vote was apparently taken in a Closed Session meeting because this has not been discussed at an Open Meeting.
Gazette: Officials to look beyond Germantown site for upcounty holding school
Feasibility study put on hold
More sites will now be studied for an elementary holding school in the upcounty...
...Neighbors in the Woodlake subdivision and environmentalists raised concerns about the site and said the school system had not conducted a formal site selection process involving the community...
...Alicia White, who has lived since 1998 on Summer Oak Court, which wraps around the site, submitted an appeal to the Maryland State Board of Education regarding the county board's decision to conduct the feasibility study.
White said she was concerned that the school system did not follow proper procedures.
"This isn't just about our community not wanting a school here," she said. "It's about process. There was no process followed. And they have to follow process — that's the law."
...the school board decided last week to follow a more formal process, after hearing from community members who said they had not been sufficiently involved, said board member Michael A. Durso (Dist. 5) of Silver Spring.
"I think we're going to have to work a little bit more on giving communities a little more lead time and maybe a little more input," he said. "The perception is that we sometimes rush things through and are not, to use the cliché, we're not always transparent."
Jerry Weast! We LIVE here in Woodlake! Do YOU?
ReplyDeleteWe are NOT whining! We are SENIOR Citizens who deserve to NOT lose any MORE of our hard earned LIFEtime investment into this house .. which we've always taken great comfort in counting on as an ASSET to SELL in our twilight years (NOW) for a move to a less challenging single level home! DESTROYING our WOODS & WildLife SERENITY CURB Appeal would drastically REDUCE our HOME VALUE which is a HUGE part of our SELLING factor! PLEASE think about THIS while YOU are STILL YOUNG .. because it could some day also affect YOUR future Lifestyle as well! Thank you!
Michael Durso appears to be the only thoughtful member of the MoCo Board of Education when it comes to school construction. Too bad that even he considers transparency a cliche. Remember the actions of various members of the BOE next time you vote folks.
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