My humble report from the school board meeting:

The SMMUSD Board all agreed to fund the rest of the $4 million for district wide funding (DWF)(I believe $700K) Most board members were against allowing any schools to raise, what I will call, supplemental funds. They mentioned lack of participation from Malibu and that they had to stick to the rules they made. This seemed more about sending a message to the Malibu parents then putting the kids first.

Many wonderful Point Dume mom’s came to the meeting to speak about DWF, but left after 3 hours of waiting for their chance to share their thoughts with the board. When I addressed the board later, I asked the board to consider in the future, changing their agenda so that when parents show up at a board meeting, the board should prioritize hearing from the parents of their schools and not make them wait until the end. Let’s hope they consider this

I spoke to the board about the contract with the Department of Toxic Substance Control (DTSC). I urged the board to direct the DTSC and ENVIRON to include input from all stakeholders in the entire process; planning, reveiwing, testing and remediation choices. The parents are the biggest stakeholders and we have a right to decide what acceptable level of safety we are comfortable with for our children. This has to be an open discussion for all of us that includes both fiscal responsibility and our choice of acceptable level of safety.

The DTSC contract was approved. Jan could not explain what the DTSC would exactly do since it was not outlined in the contract. Oscar de la Torres asked to get more details on the contract. He asked very good questions about next steps and urged the board to make sure they direct Environ and DTSC to do comprehensive testing, so we will know what we have to do to fix it. I had a chance to speak to him outside the board room and he said he supports our efforts and that he is in agreement that we have an opportunity to do the right thing in Malibu and be a good example for all schools across the country. This is good news!

Many contracts were approved that can be found in the agenda at smmusd.org/brd1314/agn020614.pdf

Lastly, Environ has not signed the contracts yet, so no assessment has begun. Also, I believe Best Practice Cleaning as recommended by the EPA, has also not begun yet by our MHS maintenance staff.

Please remember, as always, this update is from my memory and includes my opinions and perspective

Warm Regards,
Jennifer