Rampant school growth puts pressure on neighborhoods

Friday, Aug. 25, 2000 | 11:22 a.m.

The ongoing battle over the placement of new schools in rapidly growing Las Vegas has fractured neighborhoods, pitted the Clark County School District against residents and become a political hot potato.

At the heart of the issue, all agree, is the flood of new residents pouring into the Las Vegas Valley. The population grows by about 70,000 people a year -- enough to make a small city -- and the schools add 10,000 to 15,000 students a year.

That means a lot of new schools, especially on the urban perimeter where the new homes are sprouting the fastest. And residents already living in those areas, particularly when they see chaotic scenes at the existing, overcrowded schools, aren't eager to see new schools moving in next door.

But the schools have to go somewhere.

The 1998 district capital improvement program schedules at least 88 more schools to open before the 2008-2009 school year. That program caps a 100-school building effort now concluding, with construction of a new high school at Cimarron and Robindale roads, paid for with three separate bond issues dating back to 1988. Six new schools will open their doors Monday and four more will open during the school year.

And with schools coming on line at that pace, there are sure to be more residents unhappy about the hustle and bustle of a school moving into their neighborhood.

D. L. "Dusty" Dickens, district demographics and realty director, said the district is trying to do more to head off angry opposition from affected homeowners.

The district will work with communities to let people know that a new school is going in and to get feedback on design issues that could affect the neighborhood, Dickens said.

She also pledged to do more advance planning -- even years in advance -- so that people will know before moving into a neighborhood where schools are planned.

The lack of advance knowledge and the district's requests for zoning changes to allow new schools has infuriated neighbors.

"We're against (new schools) when they require special use permits and rezoning," said Carroll Varner, president of the North West Citizens Association.

The association weighed in on the recent move to site a school at Lone Mountain Road and Conough Lane. The association represented members opposed to the school, to be named Leavitt Middle School.

Nearly equal numbers of residents for and against the proposed school crowded a contentious Clark County Commission meeting in June where commissioners voted to allow the zoning to build the school.

Residents opposed to the school said it should be built instead nearby at Ann and Campbell roads on land that the federal Bureau of Land Management could have turned over to the district for free.

Other neighbors -- especially those with children -- said they wanted the school.

The case not only pitted neighbor against neighbor, but put once-friendly politicians on opposite sides of the fence.

The school district said it wanted the new middle school at the Ann and Campbell site, but couldn't wait for the BLM property transfer. The BLM had delayed the transfer because of a request from the city of Las Vegas.

County Commissioner Lance Malone later publicly blamed delays on the city, which angered City Councilman Larry Brown. Brown said he agreed -- against his best instincts -- to a request from Malone and the county for a delay on the property transfer.

The flap split the two politicians, who in the past have generally agreed on issues in their overlapping districts.

Dickens said even if the Ann and Campbell site had been ready for transfer, it would have generated similar opposition there. The quandary for the school district is that siting a new school generates opposition anywhere they put it, she said.

The Ann and Campbell site will likely become home to a new school in any case within the next few years, she said.

That fight is typical almost every time a new school shows up on planning maps. People living in older, established neighborhoods often resent the noise and traffic associated with schools.

With a new school also comes restrictions on business activity in the area and that upsets plans by developers.

The planned new schools that generate the most contentious debate are often in areas that are lightly populated, with few would-be students.

"People say, 'There are no children here. Why are you putting it here?' " Dickens said.

But with the valley's population boom, it's not long before the houses and the children arrive, Dickens said. The schools fill up as fast as they are built.

Schools serve as a magnet for new residential development, Dickens said.

"We know that when we build schools, houses go up all around us," she said.

The intermixed problems of too many students, not enough schools, not enough places to put them and people who don't want them in their neighborhoods isn't going to go away soon, said Mark Bird, a professional planner and adjunct professor at the Community College of Southern Nevada.

"This is something that's not temporary. It's permanent," he said. "These problems are just going to escalate."

In the face of growth as rapid as Clark County's, students often are the losers, Bird said. That could be the reason for the district's poor overall performance on standardized tests, he said.

"Boom towns typically have poor educational attainment because of instability in the school system," he said.

The impact is greatest on the youngest students, who often rely on teachers to be surrogate parents and schools to be surrogate homes, especially when both parents are working, Bird said.

With new schools coming on line throughout the year, school boundaries are constantly shifting. That means students who haven't even moved are forced to change schools.

Pat Herron, the district's assistant superintendent for facilities, says that lack of stability is a real liability.

He points out that Madison Elementary north of downtown, one of the Clark County schools that is on state probation because of low test scores, has a 51 percent turnover rate.

"If you didn't have the kids last year, and won't have them next year, how are you going to bring their test scores up?" he asked.

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