Ballet dreams | Dancer outshines illness to compete on top stage. [3]
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POSTSEASON SPORTS | Wrestlers, swimmers, and the Renton girls basketball team move on to state tournaments. [Sports 11]
FRIDAY, FEB. 21, 2014
Renton schools to need 42 additional classrooms in near future Enrollment report shows rapid growth, need for space in next three years By TRACEY COMPTON tcompton@rentonreporter.com
Experiencing a rapid period of growth locally and statewide, the Renton School District is projected to need 42 new classrooms in the next two-and-a-half to three years, a district committee found. The Enrollment Review Committee, led by Chairperson Louis Pappas, presented the findings at a district school board meeting Feb. 12. “Forty-two new classrooms represents the equivalent
of two new elementary schools, under normal enrollment growth circumstances it is a five- to seven-year process to justify the expense for new buildings and then convince our taxpayers to fund them,” said Lynn Desmarais, board president via email. “Two to three years is a timeline I don’t think we’ve seen since the 1960s during a period of rapid growth. “But keep in mind,” she added, “this is a statewide issue, unlike the local expansion of Boeing back then, and each district’s approach will depend on the number and condition of buildings they have available.” It was the task of the 25-person review committee to review enrollment projections, building capacity and analyze portable classroom needs for the 2014 to 2015 and 2015 to 2016 school years. They were also tasked with reviewing
last year’s middle-school boundaries and considering the potential impact on school facilities due to the McCleary decision and district-wide enrollment growth. The McCleary decision refers to the 2012 State Supreme Court decision that ruled Washington state is not amply funding basic education under the state Constitution. The specifics and guidelines as to how that will happened aren’t know yet, but district officials warn the effect could be significant. “We’ve got to be creative and we’ve got to plan; the clock is ticking,” said Pappas. Renton’s annual growth rate is 1.5 percent annually, which amounts to about 210 to 220 kids a year. Pappas called the steady growth rate fortunate, but called out the
Renton High magazine wins national award
Housing proposal has neighborhood worried
By TRACEY COMPTON tcompton@rentonreporter.com
98-home development would be built on ‘pseudo park’ used by residents By Brian Beckley bbeckley@rentonreporter.com
Helen Pacheco and Lucky walk along one of the unofficial walking trails that criss-cross the Tiffany Park neighborhood but are threatened by a potential housing development. Brian Beckley, Renton Reporter week. Located near Tiffany Park Elementary School in the Benson Hill Neighborhood and formerly owned by the Renton School District and bordered on two sides by a pair of pipelines, the tract of land is a spot of green in the neighborhood, but a November application from Henley Homes to build a new housing development is currently working its way through the city and neighbors are fighting to keep it from being turned into homes. “The community has several concerns,” said City of Renton Senior Planner Rocale Timmons. According to Timmons, a recent neigh-
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borhood meeting about the proposal drew a large number of comments from the community, with many residents concerned about an increase in traffic in their neighborhood as well as the proposal’s call to clear approximately 1,300 trees from a property that Timmons said residents use as a “pseudo park.” “All those trees would come down,” she said, adding that the Benson Hill area lacks in parks, according to the Benson Hill Community Plan. “It’s a travesty to lose these woods,” said Renate Beedon, a Tiffany Park resident [ more houses page 4 ]
Renton High School’s newsmagazine, Arrow, was recently honored with a national diversity award. This spring, the Journalism Education Association will honor Renton High with its Diversity Award on April 13 at the JEA/NSPA Spring National High School Journalism Convention in San Diego. Renton’s newsmagazine staff is being honored for promoting diversity in the scholastic media arena and taking steps to break down walls of misunderstanding and ignorance in their issue “Perfect Language.” Student editor Vanessa Abenojar and Ksenia Ivanova, student managing editor, have been credited with using the newsmagazine to share the stories of English Language Learners, or ELL students, at the school. Arrow staff interviewed ELL students and their stories appeared in print and on CD, through a project with KUOW Puget Sound Public Radio. Renton High School’s student body reflects an ethnic, racial and reli[ more award page 10 ]
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Every day Helen Pacheco takes to the informal trail system that runs throughout her neighborhood to get a little fresh air and some exercise. With her golden retriever Lucky or with her daughter, Pacheco estimates that she walks about six miles each day, starting from her Ponderosa Estates home and wandering through the large patch of green space that sits in the center of her neighborhood. But the trails on which Pacheco and hundreds of her neighbors walk every day are not part of the formal, city trails and parks system and the 21-acre piece of land has been sold and is set to host up to 98 homes in the near future, if developers have their way. “It’s a crying shame,” Pacheco said this
[ more enrollment page 4 ]