I attended the Strategic Planning Committee Meeting last night. It was the first public meeting I have attended, and it was interesting.
As a newcomer to this process I learned some things which you may know if you have been closely following the proceedings all along. This committee's sole purpose is to make recommendations to the Hermosa Beach City School Board. They have no power or function past that.
They claim to have not come to any conclusions or to have excluded any options thus far, which I find hard to believe given that they have been meeting for three months. What kind of person or group comes to no conclusions until the very minute they are asked to? Regardless, they would not reveal any preferences or any weighted possibilities for future outcomes.
Despite some praise back and forth between the committee and the public, the atmosphere was generally hostile. The chair was officious, and the committee members seemed to seriously begrudge the fact that public meetings are public. It was obvious that despite constant requests in public statements for public involvement, the committee had no interest in public involvement, at least at this stage of the process. I do understand that it probably gets tiring when new people keep entering the conversation and saying the same things over and over. But if one spokesperson for the committee could have communicated with the public in a less obnoxious way, I think the atmosphere would have been very much more positive.
For it's part, the public quickly became annoyed at the imperious manner of the chair. About 1 minute into the meeting the chair asked how many people wished to speak and one hand went up. But the chair and several committee members quickly annoyed the public, and the result was that 10 or 15 people spoke, which was nice.
Those people who spoke were almost completely unanimous in their support for a parcel tax. Several speakers reiterated the sentiment of my last post, which is that if you like Hermosa Beach the way it is now, then you have to support the schools so that they can stay the way they are now. Things change at the state level, and that needs to be treated like a natural disaster. Nobody begrudges having to pay to fix washed out roads after a flood, or collapsed bridges after an earthquake. Nobody should begrudge having to pay a very small parcel tax to shore up the schools after the unreliable State of California fails to take care of its citizens and schools. Take it out on the California Legislature for being short sited weasels, do not take it out on the children of Hermosa Beach.
The Strategic Planning Committee will present its recommendations to the Hermosa Beach City School Board at their meeting next Wednesday, March 9th at 7pm in the City Council Chambers.
To summarize, I was very pleased at the attitude of the public and the direction of their comments. There were some very passionate, articulate, and energetic people who clearly believe that a small parcel tax can be passed, and that Hermosa Beach's schools can be saved. And after the meeting, I believe the same thing.
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