Broadhurst wants out of district
July 9, 2008
By Laura Geggel
One of the more frustrating parts of Blythe Manson’s day is watching school buses from Lake Washington School District drive past her house.The buses drive to Canyon Creek, a neighborhood farther from the school district than her house in Broadhurst, a neighborhood North of Northeast Ames Lake Road in Redmond. Unlike Canyon Creek, Manson’s house falls within the Snoqualmie Valley School District boundaries that were implemented in 1944, long before there were at least 11 Lake Washington schools closer to Broadhurst than any SVSD school, she said.
So, Manson and about 185 other Broadhurst residents have signed a petition to change school districts. Distance is their main concern: traveling on Highway 202 can turn any parent’s stomach queasy. They say there are few streetlights and one too many speeding vehicles and accidents.
A group of parents who spearheaded the petition efforts found there is a greater chance of a vehicle collision on Ames Lake Road traveling to any SVSD school than traveling to schools in LWSD. Parents are also concerned about diesel fumes – which are found in higher concentrations in buses and have been linked to asthma – heart disease, cancer and even death.
Manson said she always keeps her cell phone on her when her children are traveling to and from school on the bus. Jason Brown won’t even let his children ride the bus.
“It’s a ridiculously long ride for a 5- and 8-year-old,” Brown said of the 45-minute afternoon route from Fall City Elementary to his house.
Brown’s wife drives their children to school. This year, his wife will drive to and from Fall City Elementary three times a day – in the morning to drop off her children, at noon to pick-up her half-day kindergartner, and in the afternoon to collect her third-grader.
“We’re going to have to sell our home, unless we can change where we can go to school,” Brown said.
Carl Brandt, whose daughter will attend kindergarten next year, said the distance will make it hard for him to participate in school activities with his child. Normally schools help build a stronger community culture, but the commute to Snoqualmie Valley schools is tearing Broadhurst apart, he said.
“We lose two to three families every year in our community because of the distance from the school district,” Brandt said. “They try it for a year or two, and then they move.”
Broadhurst has a history of wanting to transfer. In 1997, the majority of the neighborhood petitioned to transfer to the LWSD – a measure that was denied. With a stronger tax base from the Ridge and new houses coming to North Bend with the end of the water moratorium, Broadhurst resident Myles Kahn predicted SVSD will not need Broadhurst for its tax base.
This time, Broadhurst filed its petition to change school districts from Snoqualmie Valley to Lake Washington June 20. Jane Murray, assistant fiscal officer with the Puget Sound Educational Service District, said the ESD would verify the names of the voters on the petition before assessing the value of the neighborhood to the school district.
Each school district will have 90 days to negotiate an agreement concerning Broadhurst.
In the event one school district approves the transfer and the other one rejects it, the petitioners can appeal the decision and send it to the ESD’s Regional Committee – a group of representatives who represent Puget Sound schools.
But the residents of Broadhurst hope Snoqualmie Valley will honor their request to transfer and allow them to avoid the appeal process.
“To me, it’s a no brainer,” Kahn said.
Of the 107 houses in Broadhurst, there are 56 students – 30 of them projected to attend Snoqualmie schools. Of the students, there are 25 – out of a possible 31 – who will attend Fall City Elementary, four – out of a possible 12 – slated for Chief Kanim, and one – out of a possible 13 – who will go to Mount Si High School. The other children attend private school, Lake Washington schools or are home schooled.
Brown said he liked Snoqualmie Valley schools, but they were “ridiculously far away” from his house.
“A lot of people choose to go to private schools, but we like the public school system,” Brown said. He could request his children go to Lake Washington schools, he said, but there is no guarantee on a year-to-year basis the request will be granted.
Brandt said some parents knew about the commute before they moved to Broadhurst, but “that’s why they have the petition process,” he said.
In the 2006-07 school year, WASL scores in LWSD were slightly higher in most subject areas. The two school districts might be academically similar, but the perception is that LWSD outperforms Snoqualmie Valley.
“Until we see the official notification, we can’t comment,” said Kathryn Reith, communications director for the Lake Washington School District. Once the district receives the transfer request, Reith said they would look at the capacity of the schools closest to Broadhurst.
Broadhurst parents said they would like their children to attend Alcott Elementary, Evergreen Middle School, and Eastlake High School, all which are closer to Broadhurst than SVSD schools.
Distance is a factor SVSD students encounter on a daily basis, with the entire district encompassing an area larger than 400 square miles.
“In a district of that size geographically, we’re going to have situations where students are spending time on the bus in order to get to and from school,” said SVSD Superintendent Joel Aune.
He and the school board would “honor and respect the process,” Aune said. Broadhurst is notorious for voting against the school bond, which has failed three times by about 2 percent of the vote.
Still, Aune said the voting tendencies of the neighborhood would not be factored into the transfer decision.
“We’re not inclined to make decisions on a group of people on how they’re going to vote on a bond or levy,” Aune said.
Kristy Sullivan, who serves on the District’s School Board, said she understood the frustration parents feel toward the travel distance. When she first moved to Ames Lake in the 1980s, she helped petition for her neighborhood to transfer to LWSD, an effort that failed.
Now, Sullivan said she accepts the drive as part of living in a rural community.
“If we were to change the rules for Broadhurst, you could make an argument to change even more of the boundaries,” Sullivan said. “We don’t want to lose those families to Lake Washington.”
Reporter Laura Geggel can be reached at 392-6434 x221 or lgeggel@snovalleystar.com.
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2 Responses to “Broadhurst wants out of district”
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I’m not sure Broadhurst can be called ‘rural’ when only 10 minutes from downtown Redmond. Perhaps it was in 1944. Additionally our understanding of kids has advanced in the last few decades for us to be ashamed of bussing kids up to two hours every day (1.5 on the best of days, but there can be traffic) to get them to school which lasts for 5-6 hours. Besides the obvious health issues, kids are having to wake up at 6am to get ready for school. Additionally there is no way they can actively participate in after school activities, let along having the parents coming together to form a strong union around the school system. I can see why the Broadhurst taxes are desired for the Snoqualmie district but can they really justify negatively altering the lives of so few children for this income? It seems that the time has come to start adjusting some boundaries based on the reality that times have changed. For the kids safety and to show them we care about their social and mental development, this should be a no brainer.
A clarification regarding Kristy Sullivan’s comment that they don’t want to lose all of their students to Lake Washington. According to the petition process the neighborhood/areas wanting a transfer, must be contingent to both districts. In other words, they must be bordering both districts as Broadhurst does. Thus, with that requirement, there is only one other neighborhood in the Snoqualmie Valley district that borders with Lake Washington.