NOISE to LAUSD: ‘Fix Pedro High First’

“We’re a force to be reckoned with,” NOISE leader Yvonne Schuller told a meeting this week of Neighbors Organized and Involved to Support Education, which opposes construction of a public high school at Angels Gate.

About 45 people gathered to watch NOISE’s slide show of schools that the Los Angeles school district has upgraded by replacing “temporary” classrooms with brand-new buildings.

Schuller said removing the three-decades-old classroom bungalows at San Pedro High School and constructing new buildings is the most cost-effective way to get more seats for students.

She quoted school board member Richard Vladovic, who told her, “If a new classroom building were built [at San Pedro High] instead of a gymnasium, we wouldn’t be in this mess.”

Schuller pointed to the $102-million cost of the proposed Angels Gate school and suggested a new building at San Pedro High would have a much lower cost.

Joe Janesic of the Fort MacArthur Museum Association talked about the recent action of the state, which granted historic district status to the portion of Angels Gate owned by the City of Los Angeles. He said the association would be seeking a “boundary increase” to include the school district’s property.

Janesic said that historic designation would not prevent the district from tearing down buildings or putting up a high school, but would create additional hurdles.

LAUSD is expected to release additional environmental documents sometime later this month pertaining to the new plan for a 500-seat magnet school at Angels Gate. The school would be affiliated with San Pedro High and focus on marine education.

The district will also have an additional public meeting to take comment on the proposed magnet school.

On a table at one side of the room, NOISE merchandise was on sale. It included red “thumbs-down” yard signs, baseball caps and new black-and-gold T-shirts that proclaim “There is only one” (on the front) “Pedro High” (on the back).