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Gym on campus may not be allowed
by Robb Fulcher
Tentative plans to build a gym on the Hermosa Valley School campus may run afoul of state requirements for schoolyard open space. As a result, local educators are eyeing off-campus gym sites.
Many Valley parents want a gym for their kids’ winter sports. But school neighbors have expressed concerns about non-students on campus and traffic on their narrow, often clogged streets.
City school Superintendent Robert "Duffy" Clark told a joint meeting of the school board and city council on Monday that officials were trying to determine whether a new gym would meet the open space requirements.
The matter is complicated by Valley School’s non-typical makeup as a third-grade through eighth-grade school, Clark said. The state’s guidelines are based on more typical configurations such as K-6 or K-8, he said.
School board members said they were continuing to explore the possible purchasing land occupied by Adelphia Communications to the north of the school, a long-running effort that has met with failure in the past.
They also said they might want to build a gym on land now occupied by the Marineland mobile home park to the west of the school, if the city buys part of the park from its owners. City officials have discussed such an eventuality, in part to secure more off-street parking for residents and visitors.
School board members have been seeking the council’s help in developing plans for a gym, but a majority of the council members said they want more information before they decide whether to pitch in on such a project.
"The word ‘need’ is being tossed around a lot. We don’t need a new gymnasium, we’d like to have one," Mayor John Bowler said.
The council and school board decided to meet again on May 21 to discuss the matter further.
"We are in the preliminary stages of gathering information," school board President Mary Lou Weiss said.
A dozen members of the public showed up for the rainy-night meeting in an upstairs room at Ein Stein’s restaurant and brewery. Two of the residents, both of whom live near Valley School, reiterated neighborhood concerns over traffic from an on-campus gym.
"We’re a tight-knit group, and we’re trying to protect our interests in our residential area," architect Jerry Compton said.
"I don’t know if you ever had to drive down those streets when there is a large function at the school, but I guarantee you a fire truck couldn’t get down there," he said. "I can barely get my car down 18th Street."
Compton said the desire for a gym should be weighed against the possibilities of expanding library facilities or adding classrooms at the school.
"Haven’t we ‘maxed out’ that facility?" he asked.
"Without a gym our traffic problems are enormous," said neighbor Betty Evans, who publishes recipes in Easy Reader.
"I’m not anti-gym, certainly, but I believe it would have to be scaled down," she said.
"It’s a big problem, I wish you all luck," Evans said.
Currently the school uses its multipurpose room as a gym and a lunchroom on rainy days. The nearby Hermosa Beach Community Center gym is so overbooked that basketball games involving Valley School kids can begin as late as 9 p.m.
In November 1999 Alan Rasmussen, then superintendent of the school district, proposed building a 10,000 square-foot gym in partnership with the Beach Cities Health District, which would have shouldered the $3 million cost, and would have held fitness and wellness programs in the facility during non-school hours.
Since then officials have moved away from the health district proposal, discussing instead the possibility of a bond measure or a conventional loan to pay for a gym. With the passage of California’s Proposition 39 in November, a school bond can be approved by 55 percent of the voters, instead of the two-thirds majority previously required.
Preliminary drawings from an architect working on the Rasmussen/health district plan proposed three sites for the gym: the campus’ grassy northwest corner, a site near a maintenance building on the campus’ west side, or one on the southwest corner of the campus near the adjacent Adelphia cable company facilities. ER