Friday, February 24, 2017
MCPS: bringing Woodward High back online will not solve overcrowding problems
Study Group To Look at Using Woodward High To Deal With Capacity Crunch at Eight Schools: Group will also brainstorm about moving alternative programs into nontraditional spaces
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In the past, I've suggested moving some B-CC HS feeder students into the N. Bethesda MS / WJ HS cluster, once Woodward HS is re-opened. An alternate option is to move the Bradley Hills ES district over to the NBMS/WJHS cluster, which would free up Whitman HS and Pyle MS.
ReplyDeleteIf both B-CC and Whitman students are moved into the NBMS/WJHS cluster, then NBMS will certainly need another expansion (or have a new middle school installed -- but where would it go? SW MoCo is packed in pretty tightly).
Too bad MoCo sold Perry High School in Aspen Hill (Rockville) for pennies on the dollar. It would have been nice to have that 19.5 acre MCPS facility in the inventory to reduce rampant overcrowding. Yet another reason MoCo voters went for term limits.
ReplyDeleteReminder: Montgomery County gave away the entire Peary High School building for free. They sold the land for pennies and then had to pay back the state for their investment in the building. Lose - lose.
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DeleteThe Peary HS site was too small to host dedicated baseball and softball fields (something the county seems to want these days), unless the building was completely torn down and redesigned to make room. Also, the site isn't near the epicenter of overcrowding on the eastern side of the county. I don't know what the exact sale price was, or what a better price for that site would have been, but I figure the county thought it too expensive to maintain the vacated property for years.
ReplyDeleteI decided to look for alternate sites to place an eastern county high school, and found two sites in the White Oak area: One at the current White Oak Shopping Center (with the Sears), and the other on unused land at the FDA site, at the eastern corner of New Hampshire Ave. and Mahan Rd. Another site is the Sligo Creek Golf Course (if the course owner wants to close it), but that may require a relocation of the 1050 AM radio tower site.
Exact sale price for the building: $ 0
DeleteYou seriously think the building was given away because of a baseball field? Research the posts on this blog. Peary High School was a perk given away to supporters of elected officials. You can follow the money on this one. The public lost an extremely valuable, paid for asset. Location is of no import. MCPS is a county wide school system and any school building can be put to good use. There are centers, magnets, immersion, vocational, alternative uses.
Peary High School was also on a long, long list of public school sites that were given away for FREE in closed, behind door sessions. Giving away public school land in exchange for support from campaign contributors has a long, long history. Over 100 acres of public school land was given away in the decade before Peary.
DeleteOne additional note: the Montgomery County Board of Education publicly opposed the give away of Peary High School.
DeleteMoney is no object, just increase the property taxes.
ReplyDeleteThe only thing that will stop overcrowding is to get rid of this crop of council hacks -- the ones who put the current Planning Board members in place -- and elect people who are not in thrall to real estate developers. Get wise, folks. wake up. There is more than one infamous real estate developer witn an impact in this county.
ReplyDeleteIronically, folks wake up after the elections.
ReplyDeleteElections are coming up and the hacks are lining up to run. Voters should turn out and re-enforce the reason 70% of us voted for term limits. We do not want these same hacks, or new ones from the borg, in office. So over that.
DeleteThey should, but would they?
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