Calabasas, LVUSD agree to abandon New Millennium school site, seek new location for primary school

By Michael Picarella pic@theacorn.com

The ninth elementary school in Las Virgenes Unified School District won’t be built behind gates in the New Millennium development at the western end of Parkway Calabasas. The Calabasas City Council unanimously entered into an agreement last week with LVUSD and New Millennium Homes that prompts the city and the school district to find another location for a new campus.

No location for a school has been identified, according to officials, but the goal is to find a site in eastern Calabasas, either on incorporated or unincorporated property.

The New Millennium project (called The Oaks) includes 550 single-family homes to be built behind gates. The developer holds 8 acres of land that LVUSD could have used for a new elementary school. At the time, LVUSD didn’t have the need for a school and would’ve been forced to take resources from other worthy projects to build it, according to Las Virgenes Unified School District Deputy Superintendent Donald Zimring.

As a result of the new agreement, New Millennium will now build seven homes on the site.

Home-developing giant Bald-win Co. created the school project option in the early 1990s, according to Zimring. The deputy superintendent said that Baldwin and LVUSD signed an agreement that would provide a site for a new elementary school "virtually free" to the district.

The school district wasn’t in a position to "just say no" to that, especially in 1991, Zimring said at a recent Calabasas City Council meeting. A new school would soon be needed because current school enrollment and traffic would grow as a result of The Oaks project, he said. Land for a new school site was scarce and expensive, he added.

In 1997, Baldwin went bankrupt and New Millennium took over The Oaks project.

The new agreement between New Millennium, the city and LVUSD says that the developer and the school district will relinquish their option to build a school in The Oaks. A total of $4 million that was set aside for the initial school project behind gates would be put into a trust fund for acquiring a site to build a school.

Instead of building a school New Millennium will now build more homes on The Oaks property. The developer will take 4 acres of the 8-acre site that was dedicated for the school and put it somewhere else in New Millennium for a community park, said Calabasas City Manager Tony Coroalles. "And then they’ll take another 4 acres somewhere else and grade those 4 acres into seven lots.

"Then they’ll take the 8 acres in the school site and grade those also for lots," Coroalles said. "In terms of open space, what we allowed them to do is to grade seven more lots and for that we get an additional $4 million into the trust fund."

The agreement accumulates $8 million of non-taxpayer money into a trust fund that the city and the school district will jointly agree to spend to acquire a site and build a school, according to Calabasas City Attorney Michael Colantuono.

If an alternative site for a school is not established within five years, the trust fund will be split. The school district would receive $4 million. The city council decided last week that the other $4 million would go to the city, which would allow Calabasas Park Homeowners Association officials to use in conjunction with other communities in the Calabasas Park area for traffic issues. The city will create a map that designates the area that would be affected in the matter.

Some members of the public were concerned about the lack of a future school site, especially residents of eastern Calabasas. They said they fear a school could pop up in their neighborhoods, specifically in the Parkway Calabasas corridor, and cause traffic issues and other problems.

The city plans to assemble a committee that would find and discuss school locations. The committee would include the heads of the homeowners associations in the affected areas. The council hopes to find a consensus.