New zones to shuffle pupils

LAND O'LAKES -- Pine View Elementary School, under construction in Land O'Lakes, is on schedule to open in August. Now, all it needs is students.

The School Board will take care of that next month, when it votes on a proposed set of new attendance zones that will shuffle several hundred children to new schools. On Tuesday night, district administrators set the deadline for formalizing the proposed boundaries.

Pine View Elementary will serve about 900 children, who would primarily come from Lake Myrtle Elementary, although some also would come from Sanders Elementary. The proposed change affects Denham Oaks Elementary as well, because some of its students would move over to Lake Myrtle to alleviate crowding at their current school.

Two of those central Pasco elementaries -- Lake Myrtle and Denham Oaks -- are among the most crowded schools in the district. Lake Myrtle's capacity is 857 students, yet it houses 1,032 kids. Denham Oaks (capacity: 840) is home to 1,028 children.

District administrators have said that the proposed changes attempt to keep children from the same subdivisions in the same elementary schools. The plan also tries to balance the schools' demographics, keeping racial and socioeconomic diversity equal among the schools. Finally, the proposal also keeps central Pasco's middle school feeder patterns intact.

The boundaries were drawn by district planners with input from parents, teachers and principals. The proposed changes will be brought to the board again, for a public hearing Feb. 4. The board will vote on the proposal at its Feb. 18 meeting.

On Tuesday night, superintendent John Long said the district is having trouble finding land for a high school in or around Wesley Chapel. With high schools in Land O'Lakes, Wesley Chapel and Zephyrhills severely crowded, the district might have to condemn undeveloped land in order to solve its crowding, he said. After condemning the land, the district then could claim it through eminent domain.

"It's high growth and high demand," Long said of the real estate market in south-central Pasco. "We've talked to every single landowner, the Realtors, the developers. . . . It's not going as well as we would like it to."

© 2006 • All Rights Reserved • St. Petersburg Times
490 First Avenue South • St. Petersburg, FL 33701 • 727-893-8111

Contact the Times | Privacy Policy
Standard of Accuracy | Terms, Conditions & Copyright