Keep or Toss? Tues. March 9th- County Council to Vote in Closed Session Re: Keeping Public School in BCC Cluster or Permitting Land to be Used without Restriction. No Public Comment.

What is going to happen to the former Montgomery County Public School building and land at 9411 Connecticut Avenue in Kensington?  

The school and land are currently owned by Grace Episcopal Church. The property was transferred to Grace Episcopal Church in 1999.  

The school building was built with tax dollars and has been in continuous use.  Will these empty classrooms be used for public school education or will this public school building be torn down and the land cleared for housing?  

Here's what we know about this property:  The school and land were put up for sale in 2020.  The Offering Summary states that, "Offers will be accepted through October 2020 and seller will evaluate offers and select a purchaser by the end of November 2020."  

The Offering Summary notes that there is a Limitation of Land Use as detailed in the original 1999 Deed for the property.  

The Property has the limitation that it be used for educational purposes.  However, if the Property is to be no longer used for educational purposes the Property is to first be offered back to Montgomery County at the fair market value.  

The Montgomery County Executive may accept the offer subject to Montgomery County Council approval of an appropriation.

IF the Montgomery County Council DECLINES the appropriation of funds to purchase the Property, Grace Episcoal Church may use/transfer the Property for any legal purpose without restriction.  

It appears the Property has been offered back to Montgomery County as the decision on what will become of this former public school site will be made by the Montgomery County Council tomorrow, March 9, 2021 in CLOSED SESSION.  

No public comment, no public notice on what should happen to this paid for public school.  The entire decisionmaking process will happen behind closed doors. 

Will the County Council decide to acquire the school and keep it in use for educational purposes, or will the County Council decline the appropriation and allow the Property to be sold for other uses?  

We would tell you to tune in tomorrow, but the decision will be made in a Closed Session out of the public view. 

https://www.montgomerycountymd.gov/COUNCIL/Resources/Files/agenda/col/2021/20210309/20210309_AG.pdf

KUOW: 'They Need To Go': The Environmental And Health Costs Of Portable Classrooms

...Those short-term fixes can lead to chronic problems. They burden schools with high energy costs and frequent maintenance needs. They expose students and teachers to mold and mildew, poor ventilation and the potential for volatile gases from cheap building materials...

...“If you can smell the humanity and taste the humidity, you know you have a ventilation issue,” Blake says.

Next comes a device that resembles a remote control and detects carbon dioxide (CO2) levels.

He runs a wire through what looks like a windsock and holds one end to the CO2 monitor, the other to the ceiling vent. The tool, which Prill sewed for him from a lampshade, funnels air directly into the device for a better reading.

Blake uses carbon dioxide as an indicator of whether enough fresh air passes through a room or if students are breathing germs, allergens and chemicals that accumulate in stagnant air. All of these trigger asthma — one of the leading causes of both school absences and child hospitalizations, Blake says.

When Blake started this work in 1995, Bellingham opened its doors to him first. It was a courageous move, he says. For most schools throughout Oregon and Washington — and the rest of the country — there is no Dave Blake. There is no ghostbuster to call...

http://kuow.org/post/they-need-go-environmental-and-health-costs-portable-classrooms

NBC4 Investigates Use of Classroom Trailers

...Montgomery County Public Schools use more than 430 portable classrooms, per state and district records obtained by the News4 I-Team. A row of nine portables, each of which is approximately the size of a trailer, covers an old blacktop playground at Summit Hall Elementary School in Gaithersburg. Principal Keith R. Jones said he installed security equipment, including surveillance cameras and tall fencing, outside the portable classrooms to protect the small buildings and ensure the safety of the fourth and fifth graders who must walk between the units and the main school. Jones said the cold winter was “very, very difficult for those students,” who must walk outdoors multiple times a day...

http://www.nbcwashington.com/investigations/Crowded-Classrooms-More-Students-Means-More-Portables-254618931.html

Opinion: "Semi-permanent Monuments to our Societal Indifference to the Educational Environment Endured by Children."

Are you at peace with the idea that students should need to bundle up in winter or carry an umbrella when it rains, simply to visit the restroom? You may stop reading now.
Are you not annoyed that the terrain previously utilized by children during recess has evolved into a trailer park sometimes surrounded by 8-foot-high chain-link fence? This op-ed is not for you.
You will sometimes hear them referred to as “modular classrooms.” Euphemistically, educators call them “temporaries” or “temps.” This, however, is a misnomer. Seldom are they “temporary.”
They have, instead, become semi-permanent monuments to our societal indifference to the educational environment endured by children.
We must forget, for a moment, that the climate in our permanent structures is sometimes so unbearable — leaking ceilings, mildew, sweltering in the summer, frigid in the winter — that, occasionally, teachers come to prefer life in the trailer park hidden behind the schoolhouse. That will be another story...

Continues at: 

http://www.gazette.net/article/20130912/OPINION/130919677/1014/a-tale-of-two-school-systems&template=gazette

Teen was electrocuted on the roof of a classroom trailer

...“It is my understanding that there is a shed on the back of the building that you can climb up and get access to the roof of the school from,” Torre said. “Apparently there are some wires along the roofline that may have been what was involved here.” 

According to a Fox Mills Estates resident who lives adjacent to the school and wished to remain anonymous, neighborhood teens often climb up on the roof of the school to “hang out.” 

Fox Mill Elementary School Assistant Principal Brian Moose acknowledged that there is a shed behind the school with wires and conduits that can be accessed. “You could climb it pretty easily,” he said...

 http://www.fairfaxtimes.com/article/20130619/NEWS/130619057/1117/teen-electrocuted-on-roof-next-to-fox-mill-elementary-school&template=fairfaxTimes

PORTABLE CLASSROOMS: These can be death traps.

March 2012 Atlanta, GA classroom trailer storm damage.

"PORTABLE CLASSROOMS: These can be death traps. Portable classrooms are most often constructed like mobile homes; and they are just as dangerous. Any sound tornado safety plan must include getting students out of portable classrooms and into a safe area in the main building, as quickly as possible, to minimize the time spend outside and exposed to the elements. While the seconds spent outside will pose considerable risk, the danger inside the trailer is just as great. If feasible, students should be evacuated from portable classrooms before the storm threatens -- before the warning, when a tornado or severe thunderstorm watch is issued. Remember: Tornadoes can occur with little or no advance warning. Moving those students inside the main building for every SPC watch may be a hassle; but it may also save precious seconds and the lives of students if a tornado or extremely severe thunderstorm hits later."

http://www.spc.noaa.gov/faq/tornado/school.html

If a tree falls in a school hallway, do children get hurt?

There are 494 classroom trailers in use in Montgomery County Public Schools. 

Over 10,000 MCPS students call these temporary structures "school" every day.

When a tornado, microburst, or derecho hits, how safe are the children in these trailers? 

What if a student is changing classes or going to the main building to go to the bathroom when a tree limb falls? See below. 

Damage from 2012 Derecho at Montgomery County Public School

$1,339,200 up for grabs. How should County spend it?

Police? Fire? Libraries? Teachers? Media Specialists?


It's your choice. And on February 14, 2012 at 1:30 PM the Montgomery County Council will hold a public hearing to discuss how these available funds should be spent. The Council will then immediately VOTE on how to spend these funds.


Call 240-777-7803 to sign up to speak or send your suggestions to county.council@montgomerycountymd.gov


The money up for grabs is $1,339,200 that Montgomery County earned by buying internet access for schools and libraries.  The money is a rebate from the federal government.  The rebate money can be spent any way the County decides. 


So how do you think the money should be spent? 


County Executive Ike Leggett wants to spend the money to lease more classroom trailers for public schools. 


Superintendent Joshua Starr wants to use the money to buy Promethean Boards, or so he says. The Superintendent's proposal for how to use the money is a little murky. More on that in a followup post. 


What's your opinion on how these funds should be spent?

MoCo Council MCPS Capital Improvements--Public Hearings

Montgomery County Council Agenda

Council Hearing Room, 100 Maryland Avenue, Rockville, Maryland 20850
(240)777-7900 · TTY (240)777-7914 · FAX (240)777-7989
www.montgomerycountymd.gov/council

FUTURE PUBLIC HEARINGS
To testify call 240-777-7803

Feb 7, 2012
1:30 pm Supplemental appropriations to the M-NCPPC’s FY12 Capital Budget and amendments to the FY11-16 Capital Improvements Program

$1,058,940 for Acquisition: Local Parks

$325,000 for ADA Compliance: Non-Local Parks

7:00 pm FY13 Capital Budget and FY13-18 Capital Improvements Program

Feb 8, 2012
7:00 pm FY13 Capital Budget and FY13-18 Capital Improvements Program –CANCELLED

Feb 9, 2012
7:00 pm FY13 Capital Budget and FY13-18 Capital Improvements Program - MCPS

Feb 14, 2012
1:30 pm Supplemental appropriation to the MCPS’ FY12 Capital Budget and the FY11-16 Capital Improvements Program - $1,339,200 for E-Rate Program for the Technology Modernization project and a transfer for the Relocatable Classrooms project

NBC 4 reports on Leggett's removal of land from school system inventory

With this transaction, County Executive Ike Leggett and former County Executive Doug Duncan will have moved the use of over 160 acres of public school land from the school system to private interests. 


This is not about the kids, its about the developers.  The kids are still in classroom trailers outside of their school buildings. 


NBC 4 VIDEO AT THIS LINK

178.66 acres of school land declared surplus since 1994

For your information, here is a listing of MCPS school sites that have been declared surplus by the Board of Education.  


The yellow highlighted properties were declared surplus since 1994.

Click on the image to enlarge the text.

Guest Post - Brickyard MS Site Slated to Become a Sports Complex

If you have been following the Parents Coalition for a while, you may remember one of my first countywide advocacy efforts.  The issue at the time involved two school sites in Potomac, including 20 acres of land designated for Brickyard MS.  


In 2003, the County Council "demanded" that the Board of Education turn over the land to the County, so the county could develop the property.


Many other school sites before then had been turned over in closed sessions of the Board of Education, even though many of our kids in county schools were in portable classrooms.   With the help of a lot of folks, we shed some sunlight on this issue, and the Potomac school sites were kept in the inventory.  


To quote Yogi Berra, "It's deja vu all over again."  (Note:  thanks to the the FDABlog and HPM)  

Even with a new County Executive at the helm, the Montgomery County Government just can't keep their hands off this property.


Now the proposal is for a "public-private" partnership to develop ballfields on the site.  Under the proposal, MCPS will "lease" the property to the County for $1500.  


Where is the public input?  Government in the Sunshine?  


Here is a guest post from the current tenant of the property.  This is reprinted with his permission.
***********************************************************
As my neighbor on Horseshoe Lane, you know that for the past 31 years I have been farming organically on the Brickyard School site at 8615 Brickyard Road.   

I have had a lease with the Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS) to farm the land, but at noon today I was told that my lease would not be renewed anymore.  My current five year lease expires in less than 3 weeks on March 22, 2011.   There is an agenda item this coming Tuesday, March 8, 2011 at the Board of Education general business meeting "Lease Agreement-Brickyard Road Site" http://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/boe/meetings/agenda/2010-11/2011-0308/030811.pdf    The action item for the School Board to vote on is presented in a memorandum from Superintendent Weast to the Board of Education http://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/boe/meetings/agenda/2010-11/2011-0308/4.2.5 Brickyard Land Lease.pdf  The Board of Education would grant a ten year land lease to the County but could recover the land if needed for a school.  After receiving the land lease, the County would then work with a private athletic organization in a public-private partnership to construct ball fields.  These agenda documents were posted only this afternoon.

It would seem that the local community is not being consulted.  As you know, during the Potomac Master Plan discussions, the community did not want playing fields, but would prefer a park if the land use had to be changed.

I contacted the Real Estate Office at the County to find out more about the proposal.  I was not able to get any information,  The Real Estate Office was only interested in knowing how I found out about this proposal.  I was told that there was a proposal but this particular employee did not know anything about it or who was handling it.  I was told that someone would call me back....

I contacted Roger Berliner's office, my Councilman on the County Council.  The staff person there said he would try to look into for me and tell me what he found.  I asked if this type of action, public-private partnerships for athletic activities, was a trend in Montgomery County.  He said he thought there were two such partnerships now, the Soccerplex in Germantown and the Ice Skating Ring in Silver Spring.  Based on this type of model it is not clear that any of the children in Potomac would be able to come home from school and head over to the Brickyard playing field for a friendly game.  It is also not clear what the impact would be on traffic and parking, nighttime lighting, noise and trash.

After talking to you about what happened with these public-private playing fields in Virginia http://connectionnewspapers.com/article.asp?article=247674&paper=68&cat=104 and http://connectionnewspapers.com/article.asp?article=278583&paper=68&cat=110 and after talking with Neal Fitzpatrick at Audobon Society about the ill effects to ground water if artificial turf is used, I think there are very real issues that should be debated before any action is taken this Tuesday, especially if it could affect our neighbors' well water.

I think our neighbors need to voice their opinions.   I think the Board of Education action should be delayed until all of the facts are made known.

The School Board Meeting is Tuesday, March 8 from 10 am-3:30 pm at Room 114, 850 Hungerford Drive, Rockville MD.  This is the main Board of Education Building on route 355 near Montgomery College.

The public is allowed to comment on agenda items for 2 minutes each between 10:05 - 10:35 am.  The agenda item is currently scheduled sometime between 2-3:30 pm.

To comment in person, you have to call 301-279-3617 between 10-10:30 on Monday March 7.  Only the first ten callers will be given the opportunity to comment verbally.  A show of popular support by attending the meeting is very important. 

Anyone can submit written comments on Monday March 7 without attending. You should reference "Agenda Item 4.2.5 Lease Agreement-Brickyard Road Site" and state your opinion.  Those who are able to comment in person will also be asked to submit their talking points or written statement on Monday so it can be distributed to the Board members.

As I find out more, I will keep you informed.

Nick