Special safety design OK’d for school

By Emily Richmond (contact)

Friday, April 25, 2003 | 11:02 a.m.

When the gunshots ring out in the West Las Vegas neighborhood surrounding Booker Elementary School, fifth grader Bruce Tate knows that means he won't be going outside for recess.

Instead, he and his schoolmates will have another day of "lock down," when the students are confined indoors to protect them from criminal activities outside.

"Our neighborhood has some really good people living there, but there are also some bad people like drug dealers and gangs that use guns a lot," Tate told the Clark County School Board Thursday. "I don't feel safe in my classroom."

Tate, along with about 20 other students and parents, came before the board to ask that the planned rebuilding of Booker not be one of the prototypes used in other district neighborhoods. Instead, they asked that the design incorporate special safety designs recommended by a task force made up of both school district personnel and community members.

The school board voted 4-1 to approve making safety a priority in the new school design, provided it doesn't exceed the $15 million budgeted for a prototype construction, with trustee Larry Mason in opposition and School Board President Sheila Moulton abstaining. Trustee Mary Beth Scow, who like Mason participated via telephone, was unable to vote because of technical difficulties that cut off her call.

The West Las Vegas community surrounding the school on Martin Luther King Boulevard has been plagued by drugs, gang warfare and crime, Booker Principal Beverly Mathis said. Since the school year began last fall, the school has been locked down five times because of reports of shootings, fights and other dangerous situations, Mathis said.

According to reports from the Metro Police Bolden Substation, which serves the school's immediate area, last month alone there were 97 residential burglaries, 39 business burglaries and 126 cars thefts, Mathis said. There have also been 44 robberies, Mathis said.

"We know they have built in grass-green Henderson (prototype) school facilities they are very proud of," Mathis told the board. "We are asking you to move forward with a design that is sensitive to the needs of our community."

The task force recommendations include a perimeter that prevents outsiders from using the school's playground as a shortcut and more secure entryways between the front of the campus and classroom areas.

Work at the school is overdue, the students said.

Most of the school campus was built in 1963 and is in "serious need of repairs," said Menyawn Fields, also a fifth grader at Booker and the student body president.

"Some classrooms smell because there are leaks and the rooms get musty," Fields said.

Fields said she was disappointed she wouldn't get to attend the rebuilt Booker, but hoped the board would design a school that would provide a safe learning environment for her three younger siblings.

Mathis also asked the board to guarantee the minority-owned collaborative firm of Perez-Green Architects/Winston Henderson Architects would do the rebuilding, a request backed by Hannah Brown, president of the Urban Chamber of Commerce.

"They are not only a minority firm, but they are capable," Brown said, noting the architects recently completed an addition to the county's Young People's Library.

The board approved the hiring of a minority-owned firm for the rebuilding, which will be paid for using funds from the 1998 bond program. Booker is one of five schools being replaced under a pilot program approved by the Legislature during the last session.

Mason questioned whether allowing the Booker community to "custom design" the new school would set an expensive precedent. The prototypes, in place as a part of the $3.5 billion capital improvement plan approved by voters in 1998, save the district time and money by eliminating the need for extensive design costs every time a new school is built, Mason said.

"Every area does deserve a special school," Mason said. "But we have to be prudent. We are responsible for this bond money. It's not Monopoly money."

Trustee Ruth Johnson voiced similar concerns.

"We can't do a new design for every school in this district," Johnson said. "We're serving one community with this issue, but we have to look at the larger picture."

Fred Smith, construction manager for the district, told the board the new Booker design would likely be the first of its kind in the district, and could end up becoming a prototype of its own for other urban schools in the district facing similar security concerns.

"We could end up learning a great deal from this," Smith said.

After nearly two hours of public comment and discussion by the board, trustee Denise Brodsky suggested "We're making more over this than we need to."

If incorporating the safety recommendations of the task force do not exceed the allotted budget for the new school, there should be no question of do so, Brodsky said.