Looks like the district will have to end their constant expansion plans (for a while at least).

Favorite quote from story "Williams said he is doubtful that the city will be able to lay the groundwork for building housing that could accommodate families."

So great to hear a voice of reason.

The school age population is a sine curve, up and down. Right now we are in a down. It was in a down period when my family moved to MP in 1970. My daughter attended Fremont School for KG and 1st grade, after which the district closed the school and sold the property now used for Rosner House. When the population began. to rise, the district had no places for those new children. Class sizes rose. At the same time, Sequoia district closed 2 high schools, San Carlos and Ravenswood. Again when the population swing went up, class sizes were very large, but the 2 high schools were gone. Now they've had to build second stories, but the campuses are small to accommodate so many students. Yes, right now MP may be seeing a dip in school aged children, but as older folks, like me, move on, young families move in. When I moved to my current address there were virtually no children on my block. Suddenly I'm seeing toddlers and strollers all over. Look back in the history.

Last year, MPCSD's superintendent asked council to reserve part of the USGS property for a future middle school. There were no bids at the auction, and I haven't heard that the property found a buyer. That land has great potential for housing. I hope the city's revised housing element removes a future school from consideration and takes full advantage of this opportunity.

Didn't the school district use increasing enrollment as one of the primary reasons for the need to have an additional parcel tax? Gee, I guess they lied to us all. I wonder if they will give the money back? Ha Ha

Brian:

Yes, they did. Despite repeated proof that what they were saying was a lie. Can't wait to see what the next lie is when they come calling for yet another parcel tax. They should try being honest. They have increasing costs for unfunded pension liabilities and they keep giving staff raises, which makes the unfunded liability worse.

Tax payers who send their children to private school should be refunding that portion of their property taxes. Public schools failed us during COVID and continue to do so.

Menlo Voter - the issue isn't the lie, it's the uncomfortable truth that there was not a strong effort to expose the lie.

Political organizations have discovered they can lie with no consequences, the misinformed voter will accept the messaging as the truth. Others will go along with the lie out of "feel good" voting, as in "let's do it for the children!"

The only way to counter the lie is for a few brave souls to stand up and point out the lunacy, and then volunteer their time and (gasp) money to spreading the word.

The problem is we have a shortage of brave souls. And thus, the frog boils.

margomca - you're not mentioning the fact that in the 60's and 70's, families had 3-5 kids. Nowadays it's one, maybe two. We are in a long term population decline. But don't take my word for it, google Japan population decline, or Europe population decline. Hungary is reducing and/or eliminating income tax if people will simply have children.

As populations decline it creates a burden on the younger generations, both in terms of taking care of the older, and in funding social security.