Media Advisory - NSBN Press Conference - Monday, March 3, 2003

March 03, 2003

Mayor Hahn, Councilman Reyes, LAUSD Superintendent Romer Sign Agreement for school, housing in Westlake neighborhood.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: Hilda Marella Delgado, 213/978-0741
March 3, 2003

MAYOR HAHN, COUNCILMAN REYES, LAUSD SUPERINTENDENT ROMER SIGN AGREEMENT FOR SCHOOL, HOUSING IN WESTLAKE NEIGHBORHOOD

School Board Member Jose Huizar, A Community of Friends, New Schools – Better Neighborhoods, First 5 Commission attend ceremonial signing

LOS ANGELES – Mayor Jim Hahn today joined Councilman Ed Reyes, and Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) Superintendent Roy Romer in signing an agreement that will bring to the Westlake neighborhood new affordable housing units and a school that would serve students in kindergarten through third grade. The agreement allows both projects -- rather than just one -- to move forward in the Westlake area, located just west of Downtown Los Angeles.

"This is a great victory for children and families in the Westlake neighborhood," said Mayor Hahn. "This agreement will pave the way for a much needed new school and more affordable housing in Los Angeles. The old way of doing business is no longer viable in neighborhoods where we have multiple needs and too little available land."

The Westlake projects became a community issue when the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) identified properties as a potential site for the Gratts New Primary Center. These properties included land that had already been acquired by local non-profit housing developer A Community of Friends (ACOF) to build a 58-unit family housing project. Mayor Hahn worked with Councilman Ed Reyes, LAUSD, ACOF, and New Schools - Better Neighborhoods (NSBN) to find additional properties so that both projects could move forward.

"It's difficult to talk about making our schools the center of our neighborhoods when we're busing our children up to two hours a day just to find a desk," said Councilman Reyes. "The notion of constructing large single family residential lots with a two car garage simply doesn't exist anymore in many parts of my district or the city for that matter, so we have to re-examine the manner in which we use our space."

"We're putting our actions where our words have been -- we are truly making this school the center of its community," said LAUSD Superintendent Roy Romer. "By agreeing to move the site of our planned primary center and working with the City and others in this complex transaction, we have helped provide not only a new school, but much needed affordable housing as well."

"This memorandum of understanding demonstrates the LAUSD's continued commitment to working with our communities and the City to bring much-needed schools to our neighborhoods. The children are the ultimate beneficiaries of these efforts," said LAUSD Boardmember Jose Huizar, who also attended today's signing.

"A Community of Friends has served the Westlake community for close to ten years. We are pleased to move forward on another housing project in this area," said ACOF Executive Director Dora Gallo.

"The Westlake project is particularly exciting for First 5 LA because it includes full-day preschool as part of the development," said First 5 LA Commission Chair and Los Angeles County Supervisor Yvonne Brathwaite Burke. "That kind of commitment to early education in a mixed-use urban project is extraordinary."

"Our vision at New Schools - Better Neighborhoods is to leverage construction of new public school facilities, so that schools are planned and built as community assets serving as shared use neighborhood learning centers," said NSBN Executive Director Susan Cline. "We are very pleased to serve as the third-party intermediary bringing together a collaborative partnership in this groundbreaking master planning effort."

The Westlake agreement is part of Mayor Hahn's efforts to ensure City departments are working to assist the school district to get new public schools built. Mayor Hahn created a new School Facilities Division is his office to work with LAUSD, Councilmembers, City Departments, and community organizations to help get schools built and to maximize the benefit of new schools to our local neighborhoods. For example, the School Facilities Division has helped reconfigure school sites and parks to give school children more playground space during school hours and the neighboring community an enlarged park after-hours and on the weekends.

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Additional information:

NSBN is funded by, among others, Los Angeles County's First Five Commission to convene and collaboratively master plan a portfolio of mixed use, neighborhood centered new school and family resource centers in L.A. County over the next three years.

Westlake is NSBN's first such master planning project. A NSBN new school master planning project is officially triggered when all the stakeholders involved in a potential project (here the school district, city, non-profit housing developer and early education provider) sign an MOU with NSBN pledging to invest staff and resources into a NSBN led & facilitated effort to consider all the possible and practical alternatives for the leveraged investment of available public and private funds in a community. NSBN, with such commitments, then funds a professional team of architects, planners, civil engineers, housing, healthcare and open space advocates, meeting facilitators and others to engage with the stakeholders and community in a master planning process to help ensure that the planned capital investments are responsive to all community needs, like child care; and, that the funds are smartly leveraged to ensure that shared use -- and community use of the new school facilities are maximized.