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In This Issue...
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Letters
Heads Up Aptos
The old Aptos Par 3 Golf Course off Mar Vista Drive fronting Highway 1 is potentially being rezoned from Recreation/Open Space to Residential. If re-zoned, Aptos forfeits the last large recreational land parcel. In its place would be 228 two or three-story high-density housing [units] with a sound wall facing the freeway. Traffic impact would be 550 600-plus cars in addition to the McGregor property housing, plus future residences planned for Aptos Village totaling 1,500-plus new cars on already congested roads, shopping centers and freeway.
If you want to preserve Recreational/Open Space land for our children in place of high density housing, please e-mail and send hard copy to Supervisor Ellen Pirie, Supervisor Jan Beautz, Supervisor Tony Campos, Supervisor Mardi Wormhoudt and Supervisor Mark Stone at 701 Ocean St., Room 500, Santa Cruz, CA. 95060 or fax at 454-3262. The Stop the Rezone Committee can be contacted through e-mail at stopaptospar3rezone@x-mail.net.
Deborah Vanderwoude, Aptos
Don’t Make Ordinance Permanent
You are considering making permanent an ordinance that has not yet been tested. Requiring 40 percent affordable housing on properties rezoned for residential use will require densities that exceed the current standards. These properties are within the urban services lines, in areas already congested, and in areas experiencing heavy growth now. Water is becoming a problem, sewers are a problem, traffic has been a problem for some time, and neighborhood compatibility is an issue. In some places, schools are at or near capacity. To expect our infrastructure to absorb more growth at higher densities may be asking too much. The densities resulting from your 40 percent requirement may not be tolerable. Before you make the ordinance permanent, it only seems reasonable to test it. Why not continue the ordinance as a temporary measure until you have seen that such high-density developments will succeed, without unbearable impact to existing neighborhoods?
Suzanne Shynne, Aptos
MDA Support Makes Difference
The recently launched groundbreaking gene therapy trial for Duchenne muscular dystrophy provides an appropriate opportunity to thank the local community for helping to make MDA’s important scientific progress possible. It’s been a long road to this significant event, and the local citizenry has steadfastly fueled the effort.
Building on 50-plus years of research by the Muscular Dystrophy Association, the new gene therapy trial is filled with promise for saving young lives or at least slowing the damage wrought by a relentless, progressive disease. It’s one of many cutting-edge investigative avenues that MDA’s worldwide research program is pursuing in quest of cures and better treatments for the 40-plus neuromuscular diseases in MDA’s program.
We’re deeply grateful to all the people across the country who’ve helped through their contributions to MDA, and we feel a special affinity for those among them in our own hometown. Thanks! The march toward a cure just took a big step forward.
Brooke Chappell, MDA District Director
Put the Children First
This letter is in regards to the recent resignation of Mary Ann Mays as Superintendent of PVUSD.
I am appalled with how certain members of the PVUSD have pushed Dr. Mays to the point of having her resign. Her first priority has always been the students of this district. She was liked by administrators, teachers, unions and students. Isn't that what you want a Superintendent to do? To quickly hire a new superintendent without an interim between certainly looks like this was all planned by certain members of the Board of Trustees. Doesn't it make more sense to wait until after the November election when four seats will be up for election? Then maybe the voters of the PVUSD can finally elect some leaders who put the needs of the children of this district first like Dr. Mary Ann Mays did.
Her resignation will be a loss felt by all who REALLY care.
Tere Carrubba, Aptos
Pajaro School Board Must Make Changes
Dr. Mays used the following words in her stepping down as Superintendent of the PVUSD, "I find that the majority of the members of the Board and I are no longer a match."
Unlike the reaction of "surprise" by some other PVUSD trustees, I am not the least bit surprised. This has been building for a long time.
A district cannot be effectively run when the board leadership becomes involved in its day-to-day operations. For many years, through two superintendents, our current board leadership has chosen to spend too much of its energy on micro-management rather than on how to work with and support the superintendent in achieving her goals. A clear example of this is a statement made by our board president, Sharon Gray, "I had even discussed a salary raise with her."
This is absolutely not the role of the board president. Individual trustees, including the president, have no authority unless acting on behalf of the board majority, which she was not. For our board president, who graduated from the two-year California School Boards Association's Masters in Governance program with me, to even have that discussion makes me wonder if she fully grasps the role of a trustee.
We are not managers or supervisors who direct individual staff or offer them raises. We should not be using friends and spouses in ongoing attempts at finding some district conspiracy or corruption. We should not be gossiping about personnel issues or trying to maneuver ourselves politically. It's not our role to fix individual problems but rather to help bring staff together who can. We are liaisons with the community, not staff members.
As a friend, parent and trustee, I want to publicly thank Dr. Mays with all my heart and soul for what she has accomplished under an extremely difficult board environment. We cannot, nor should we, expect that she will rescind her resignation. I applaud her willingness to bring this problem â€" one that privately many of us were all too aware of â€" to the forefront. It's been said that doing the right thing can be the hardest thing to do, because you open yourself up to the venom of others. Dr. Mays did the right thing.
Dr. Mays has worked wonders, bringing staff to a new and exciting level of discussion about education and our students. Not all of it has been easy, and not all has been embraced with absolute enthusiasm, but she has always, always had the best interests of our students at the center of each and every decision.
Dr. Mays, along with our great staff, has worked tirelessly to raise the educational standards for our students, with great results. Yes, there's more work to do and more rigor to add, and because of the knowledge and vision that she brought to the PVUSD, students throughout all of Santa Cruz County have benefited from her leadership, through collaboration with other local superintendents.
Sadly, comments made since Dr. Mays' announcement show that the "problem trustees" still do not understand their role in her departure. I doubt they ever will. These trustees and those who do their bidding will continue on their course of disruption and micro-management.
That leaves just one choice. It is time for the district staff and the public to demand that the board leadership limit their role in the district to the standards set by the California School Boards Association.
With that said, it is my opinion that unless there is a major change at the board level the next superintendent of the PVUSD will either be happily micro-managed or driven out as well, and our students will ultimately pay the price.
Evelyn Volpa, PVUSD Trustee, Aptos Area
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