Panel Suggests 2 Plans for Disputed School Playground

A committee of the Los Angeles Board of Education on Thursday unveiled two alternative plans to expand the playground of Victory Elementary School in North Hollywood after neighbors protested the district’s proposal to buy their homes to make way for added play space.

The building committee promised the residents a June public hearing on the proposals.

Last year, the school board approved $1.3 million to buy eight Gentry Avenue homes next to the school. Because of Victory’s fast-growing enrollment, bungalows have been placed on its playground, leaving little room for the school’s 1,122 students to play. The playground is slightly smaller than an acre.

But Gentry Avenue residents complained that the board had not considered alternatives, including changing school boundaries so some Victory students could attend nearby schools, and building a school on city-owned parkland at Victory Plaza Park.

District officials said Thursday that they will look into the alternatives.

Fear Lower Property Values

The Gentry residents have been joined in their protest by homeowners from Ben Avenue, which borders the school, who fear that the expanded playground would lower property values.

At Thursday’s meeting of the board’s building committee, the district added these alternatives:

Buy all the homes on Gentry and Ben avenues, at an estimated cost of $3 million, to give the school a total of 6.2 acres for the school and 3.6 acres of playground.

Demolish a one-story building on the school grounds and replace it with a two-story building with 20 classrooms. This would allow the district to remove the bungalows on the playground, giving the school 1.9 acres of play space. The cost is estimated at $2 million.

Roberta Weintraub, whose East Valley district includes North Hollywood, said she would oppose expansion of the playground unless the district buys all the homes on Gentry and Ben avenues. Larry Gonzalez and Jackie Goldberg, the other two board members who sit on the committee, said they will reserve their decisions on the plans until June, when the entire board can review the alternative proposals of the district and the residents.