As the debate over whether to build housing at Cubberley Community Center heats up at the city level, the Palo Alto school district — the majority landowner at the Middlefield Road site — is for the most part feeling less urgency about developing its 27 acres, officials said in interviews.
The city and school district are engaged in a joint process to redesign the 35-acre site, with early plans envisioning Cubberley as a "shared campus" with space for a potential new school, a swimming pool, art studios, a gym, nonprofit spaces and other uses. At a final community design meeting in early May, city staff and consultants presented four options for housing at Cubberley, including proposals for housing for school district staff at Cubberley and a district-owned, adjacent site at 525 San Antonio Road.
The city's Parks and Recreation Commission backed last week a memo urging the City Council, which is set to discuss the project Monday night, against including any housing on city land at Cubberley. In the memo, the commissioners recommended that Cubberley be "designated as a public recreation resource to meet our evolving program and services needs over the lifetime of the new Cubberley Community Center." (The memo doesn't oppose adding housing at 525 San Antonio Road.)
The school board does not plan to discuss Cubberley in its two remaining meetings this school year, so the earliest it would come before the trustees would be August. The school board and City Council are planning to hold a joint meeting on Cubberley sometime in August or September.
In interviews, school district leadership said they have not yet taken a firm position on teacher housing at Cubberley and that they still need to gather more information before doing so.
"We're not in a position to decide anything about our appetite for housing at this point," said board Vice President Todd Collins. "We're not in a rush. We just need to do our work."
The board has been generally supportive of the idea of teacher housing, mostly in discussions about a Santa Clara County-led project to build regional staff housing in Palo Alto. In January, the board directed staff to identify a funding source to contribute to the project, which has also been supported by the Palo Alto City Council and other local school districts.
A survey on staff housing the district sent out to 600 employees this spring found that 59% of respondents (who were mostly teachers) are considering leaving the district within the next five years due to housing costs or long commutes. Unaffordable rental and housing costs are the top reasons preventing staff from moving closer to work, the survey found.
Sixty-one percent of respondents said they would be very interested in living in district-owned, below-market-rate housing offered exclusively to Palo Alto Unified employees.
Some board members said more analysis is needed to inform any potential decisions, including looking at the district's retention and attrition rates; comparing past and present hiring pools; and considering alternative models to meet the need for staff housing.
"Good decisions come from evaluating alternatives," board President Jennifer DiBrienza said.
Collins said he doesn't know if he supports teacher housing at Cubberley but that "it would be negligent of us not to consider this option as something that we might do."
Superintendent Don Austin said he's watching the city process on housing at Cubberley but feels no "sense of urgency" to move the district forward at the same pace.
He said he's not opposed to building housing at Cubberley or the San Antonio Road site but that his job is to "frame up the question with the best information we have and then let our elected officials direct our efforts."
One board member, however, thinks the district needs to be more proactive on an issue that many Bay Area school districts are already taking action on.
Board member Shounak Dharap plans to advocate for teacher housing at Cubberley, which he said makes even more sense than the county-led project given that it's public, district-owned land.
"If we really want to attract and retain quality teachers then we're going to have to build housing," he told the Weekly. "There's no question about it."
He keeps a list of local school districts and county education offices that are already building or discussing affordable housing for teachers and staff, including the Mountain View-Whisman School District (whose board recently approved a deal with a developer to reserve more than 100 affordable units exclusively for teachers and school staff at an apartment building), Los Altos School District, San Francisco Unified School District and San Jose Unified School District. Local examples offer both information on what Palo Alto Unified could potentially pursue on staff housing and caution that "if we're not offering the same benefits ... we're going to be left behind." Dharap said.
Gail Price, a former board member and city councilwoman, and Steven Lee, a Palo Alto Human Relations commissioner and Midtown Residents Association steering committee member, penned last week a guest opinion in the Palo Alto Weekly in support of teacher housing at Cubberley.
"The City and School District should not prematurely take teacher housing off the table without fully engaging our community," they wrote. "We ask that the City and School District take just a couple more months to conduct additional and broader community outreach and complete a financial analysis to inform how we can make teacher housing work at Cubberley."
Dharap said he's heard from community members who are concerned about the potential traffic and safety impacts of adding housing at Cubberley and wants to address those concerns as part of the public process. He disagreed with the Parks and Recreation Commission's position that housing conflicts with recreational amenities.
"I think we need the political will and the community will to really push forward with the idea of supporting teacher housing," he said. "It doesn't have to be exclusive of using Cubberley for a community purpose. I think a dual purpose is completely attainable."
• Hear Weekly journalists discuss this issue on an episode of "Behind the Headlines," now available on our YouTube channel and podcast page.
Comments
Barron Park
on Jun 3, 2019 at 10:26 am
on Jun 3, 2019 at 10:26 am
No teacher housing at Cubberley. It is a resource that should remain available to all Palo Alto residents.
Teachers are not low income; recent postings by TrainFan have shown that teachers make more/day than the average tech worker in the Bay Area, including Facebook and Google employees.
Pay teachers more if needed, and let them decide where and how they want to live.
Registered user
College Terrace
on Jun 3, 2019 at 11:16 am
Registered user
on Jun 3, 2019 at 11:16 am
Seems to me that 35 acres is sufficiently large that the Cubberley plan can be mixed use, including at least some affordable or moderately priced housing for PAUSD teachers and others in community-serving jobs. The option should at least be studied. What's the harm in that? I am often impressed by the way architects make the absolute best use of space; why not at least look at a plan?
The sorry fact of the matter is that several development-oriented CC majorities escorted us into this jobs:housing imbalance and the way out of this corner is going to involve some unpopular choices. All things considered, dedicating an acre or two of Cubberely's 35 to affordable housing so that we can retain teachers and others who make this place tick is a relatively palatable choice.
Adobe-Meadow
on Jun 3, 2019 at 11:23 am
on Jun 3, 2019 at 11:23 am
Dharap - good grief. "Everybody is doing it - we'll be left behind!" He keeps a list of projects he's heard of - wow, that's what I call thoughtful research. I guess he was just 8 when we went through the dot com bubble, but he does he at least remember the housing bubble?
I don't know what the answer is here, but please, don't build a project that will stand for 50+ years and consume a potential school site without actually thinking it through.
Registered user
Midtown
on Jun 3, 2019 at 11:29 am
Registered user
on Jun 3, 2019 at 11:29 am
I fully support PAUSD building teacher housing. The issue is where to find the land to do so. Before giving up what little property available for schools and community property, PAUSD in conjunction with PA should be looking at other city-owned property that could be used for both teacher housing and other low income housing. Not only are there odd parcels owned by the city, but there is also the very real possibility of increasing the density of existing low income housing, such as at Buena Vista and subsidized housing on San Antonio. It will require building parking structures especially in areas where there is no real mass transit (e.g. San Antonio x Charleston). Setting aside space for bus stops to be used by both the city and private shuttles could be done. VTA cannot be relied on to provide useful cost-effective bus service. But that doesn't mean another agency could not.
I still am angry that PA has lost several opportunities over the years to acquire property such as the option for property in the Ventura neighborhood that was given up once they determined they did not want to put a police station there. The price in that option will never come again. They could have acquired it for other purposes. The same is true for the Maybell property. Palo Alto had the right to purchase it and design BMR housing there that would have been good for the neighborhood and for the occupants, as happened when Terman was reopened. Instead, they let the PA Housing Authority reap the benefits of selling the property at a much higher value to developers and pocket the difference, even after they had shown their inability to work with neighbors to come up with a truly innovative project. Handing over half the property to private developers to finance the small inadequate senior housing as proposed was not a responsible approach.
At this point, I believe the function of the city and school district is to find and pay for appropriate land to be developed for BMR housing. If the nonprofits who develop BMR housing are not required to pay for land, I believe they can afford to build housing that can generate enough income to pay for the construction costs, without using tax dodges that only mean the BMR housing will be sold off 30 years later as was Casa Olga, now the Epiphany Hotel.
another community
on Jun 3, 2019 at 12:24 pm
on Jun 3, 2019 at 12:24 pm
@Wishful
What is TrainFan? I cannot believe the assertion that teachers are payed more than Google or Facebook employees.
Professorville
on Jun 3, 2019 at 12:33 pm
on Jun 3, 2019 at 12:33 pm
No teacher housing @ Cubberley! Cops, firemen, & EMTs get almost 200k per year. Teachers @ PAUSD get ~1ook if they're full time w/ some experience.
Keep Cubberley for a community center/park/future school.
The people I know who work @ F'ook & Goog make 250-400k per yr. These are kids who graduated from h.s. in the early '90s & they aren't techies. Coders may earn less. And none of these graduated from top-tier schools, as some other posters alleged several weeks ago was required to work there.
College Terrace
on Jun 3, 2019 at 12:42 pm
on Jun 3, 2019 at 12:42 pm
Perhaps the salary breakdown comparison between teachers and tech workers came out so high is because "wishful thinking" counted only the "school year" days worked and excluded the days school is out.
Another Palo Alto neighborhood
on Jun 3, 2019 at 12:52 pm
on Jun 3, 2019 at 12:52 pm
Is PAUSD having difficulty hiring qualified teachers at current salaries? I hear about trouble other places. I seem to recall that in the past, starting salaries were low in Alum Rock -for example-. As far as I know, PAUSD has had no difficulty hiring fully certificated teachers. Please correct me if I am wrong.
Another Palo Alto neighborhood
on Jun 3, 2019 at 1:00 pm
on Jun 3, 2019 at 1:00 pm
NO! NO! NO!
Registered user
Midtown
on Jun 3, 2019 at 1:52 pm
Registered user
on Jun 3, 2019 at 1:52 pm
@ Shounak, NO HOUSING AT CUBBERLY.
Respectfully, I voted for you. Please don't make me regret that decision by advocating for housing on Cubberly. Mountain View is putting teacher housing at an Apartment Building, NOT a school site and land zoned as a public facility! It's absurd to compare Mountain View's plan with the proposed housing at Cubberly in Palo Alto (San Antonio Rd, PAUSD land, is fine).
There have been no studies about the detrimental effects housing at Cubberly will have on traffic and safety of many kids commuting to school in that area. Why is no one at PAUSD and City Council talking about the mess this will create? Traffic is our biggest issue!
The Palo Alto community overwhelmingingly does not support this idea to add housing at Cubberly, a school site and public recreation land, for a myriad of reasons. It's why this idea was eliminated early in the process of community input (before it was brought back to the table at the 11th hour by PAUSD & City Council Member Cormack singlemindedly driving her agenda without community support). Listen to your experienced and wise Park & Rec Supervisors who are professionals, know what they are talking about, and unanimously OPPOSE housing at Cubberly. If a bond to improve Cubberly comes up for a vote with housing as part of the proposal, it will be voted down. And Palo Alto will end up with the same dilapidated Cubberly it started with after all the planning and brainstorming and community input. Maybe that's City Council's strategy so the bond won't actually pass. Hmmmm . . .
Registered user
South of Midtown
on Jun 3, 2019 at 2:19 pm
Registered user
on Jun 3, 2019 at 2:19 pm
@No Housing--as you say, there have been no studies to measure the impacts of housing. How can we say no to housing if we don't even know what the impacts will be? If we say yes to the concept, with the caveat that it will have to account for traffic, safety, etc., we're not making the decision to build tomorrow, we're only deciding to explore the possibility. Foreclosing on an idea before even measuring the impacts just doesn't seem to make sense to me.
Barron Park
on Jun 3, 2019 at 2:38 pm
on Jun 3, 2019 at 2:38 pm
Here's the analysis from Trainfan - another PAO poster.
PAUSD teachers make...easily...more than the average Silicon Valley tech worker.
Proof:
PAUSD teachers:
* Average PAUSD income: $109,894 (source: Web Link)
Web Link
* PAUSD teacher service days: 187 (source: Web Link)
* Income per work-day: $109,894/187= $587.67
Tech workers:
* Average tech income: $122,242 (source: Web Link)
Web Link
"Silicon Valley's typical tech worker makes $122K per year — how salaries at giants like Google, Facebook, Cisco, Intel, Oracle, Salesforce and Netflix compare"
(note: that was the HIGHEST average income for tech workers in the area. All other areas of the bay area are LOWER).
* Tech worker work days. Eliminate these days to make a comparable comparison with teacher 'service days':
- Saturdays: 52
- Sundays: 52
- Holidays: 10
- vacation: 10
* Income per work-day: $122,242/(365-52-52-10-10) = $507.23
So the average PAUSD school teacher makes over $80/day more per-workday than the average tech worker (using the highest average for a tech worker in the bay area, no less!!!)
To put that $80/day difference in perspective, if a PAUSD teacher had to work as many days as a tech worker, the average PAUSD teacher would make (587.67*241)...drum roll please...
$141628.47/year for PAUSD teachers
Just to be clear, I'm happy that PAUSD teachers make more than the average tech worker. But please spare us the "poor, underappreciated teachers" pity party. They are very, very well paid, and that doesn't even count some of their other perks (retirement pension, for example).
* PAUSD teacher income per work-day: $109,894/187= $587.67
* Tech worker income per work-day, plus alleged 'meals': ($122,242+5000)/(365-52-52-10-10)= 527.98
PAUSD teachers STILL make more than tech workers.
Regarding "lavish workplace perks"
Really...you want to argue perks between tech workers and PAUSD teachers???? Wow, OK, let's do that. We'll put aside the income and look at perks.
PAUSD teachers have perks that no tech worker comes close to matching. A few examples:
* Pensions:
- tech workers: 401k + Social Security. Funded by workers, taxpayers (and in some cases, employers offering some matching).
- PAUSD teachers: CALSTRS, with a government-backed guaranteed rate of return (regardless how the fund performs). Funded by taxpayers and teachers.
WINNER: teachers, by a landslide.
* Job protection:
- tech workers: at-will employment (for employees; not even that for contractors).
- teachers: union-protected, and for those with tenure, even more protection.
WINNER: teachers, by a landslide.
* Work|life:
- tech workers: periodically on call nights and/or weekends (people expect websites to work on the weekends, tech workers make that possible).
- teachers: no weekend or nighttime on call (how often does a teacher get paged at 3am because little Jimmy didn't do his homework? Answer: never).
And the above doesn't even include the 13+ weeks/year of downtime teachers get (which I factored in as part of those income comparisons earlier, so I won't factor it in here.
Registered user
Palo Alto High School
on Jun 3, 2019 at 3:55 pm
Registered user
on Jun 3, 2019 at 3:55 pm
If there is a plan to offer teacher housing, it will be critical to do something where they can only live there while teaching within PAUSD. I believe Stanford does that for tenured professors. There are also homes in the neighborhood where the home is purchased however the land is owned by Stanford.
It would be unfortunate in someone left PAUSD and was still able to live in and own the home and land when there could be other new teachers that would benefit from the housing.
It is a sticky situation for sure.
Another Palo Alto neighborhood
on Jun 3, 2019 at 4:44 pm
on Jun 3, 2019 at 4:44 pm
At one time we had 22 elementary schools, 3 middle schools and 3 high schools in Palo Alto. When these schools were built they were designed for much smaller school populations, about 350 per elementary, etc.
Now there are some of our elementaries that are around 500 students. We closed several elementaries and have since reopened them. Some of the closed sites are used by other schools although still owned by PAUSD, and others were closed and the land sold and housing was built.
At one stage Terman and Jordan were both closed and since reopened. At one time JLS was the only middle school and changed its name from Wilbur Middle School to JLS to make the transition easier.
The 3 high schools were well sited geographically around town. Cubberley was closed and at one time Gunn was in danger of closing, but fortunately that was changed at the eleventh hour. There has been plenty of discussion about Cubberley being used as a liberal arts high school or some other type of magnet high school.
We should be learning lessons from all this. There are more residential units in town now than at any other time Palo Alto history. There are housing projects galore and the senior population aging out are being replaced with families. All these factors mean that our population is growing and will continue to grow. These units are going to produce children. Even two bedroom units are housing children. Many grown children are moving back in with parents who live in Palo Alto and there are moves for those homes to have granny flats for the older generation while the younger families live in the main house.
We can't keep building more housing and assume that the school population will not grow. We may be in a static bubble at present, but the likelihood is that once again the school population requirement will increase. Housing produces children who have to be schooled.
Don't use school facilities to house anyone, particularly when that housing is likely to be adding to the number of children that have to be schooled.
We can't buy back the schools that have already been turned into housing. Don't make the same mistake again.
Fairmeadow
on Jun 3, 2019 at 11:59 pm
on Jun 3, 2019 at 11:59 pm
If you are going to build housing for those in most need in the education system how about for teachers' aides? They make a pittance compared to the well compensated teachers and have no benefits, pensions, union protection, etc. While there are many outstanding teachers in PAUSD there are more average and below-average ones who would not be effective without their classroom aides.
I would support housing for classroom aides. For teachers? NO WAY, they are well compensated and should be able to afford to at least rent in PA or surrounding city, especially if they are part of a dual income family.
Greenmeadow
on Jun 4, 2019 at 12:35 am
on Jun 4, 2019 at 12:35 am
Shounak Dharap
don't put high density housing/apartments at Cubberly to provide teacher housing. Cubberly backs up against Greenmeadow. Our bylaws restrict second story homes which would defeat the purpose if we had a ton of housing at Cubberly. Please keep Greenmeadow in mind when designing Cubberly. Greenmeadow is the best community in Palo Alto, we shouldn't mess with it.
Registered user
Adobe-Meadow
on Jun 4, 2019 at 6:22 am
Registered user
on Jun 4, 2019 at 6:22 am
So what did we learn last night?
1. We are discussing "Teacher Housing" yet it appears that the actual intent is "Old People Housing".
2. Next we learn that we are approving the expenditure of funds to evaluate every option for housing on campus when we in fact do not own the land - only about 20% while PAUSD owns the majority of land and they had no representative at the discussions which would clarify what they intend to do with the land.
3. Thank you to representatives for pointing out that sports activities at night are noisy and have lights. Old people, or any other residential people - possibly with babies - will not be able to tolerate night games, maybe even day games if they live in direct proximity to the fields.
4. Who lives there and who manages who lives there is questionable. Who is paying to manage this whole activity to retain what ever intent is legislated.
5. Stevenson House has a huge waiting list so that seems to be the motivating cause for Old People's home.
6. PAF appears to provide very young people to support housing - they do not qualify as old people - so are we building teacher's housing; old people's housing, or some mix of other PAF young people who are hiding behind the project?
There are subtle bottom lines here:
- PAUSD is still working the SU issues and has to evaluate what the results are - overflow of students and that requires CUB to perform High School functions.
- PAUSD will be asked to evaluate land on existing other schools to see if there is available land for teacher's/other housing.
- Representatives need to help guide this activity to a good end and not let any one individual overcome the whole project to the detriment of the whole community simply to satisfy one person's goals. This is not about one person - it is about the whole community retaining a community center for all to use.
- No - there is not plenty of land. CUB is actually a very small piece of land relative to it's intended purpose which is why it was shut down originally.
- housing on San Antonio would solve the issue of keeping residents separated from the center. Keep any housing on San Antonio so there is a buffer between residents and community center.
Registered user
Greendell/Walnut Grove
on Jun 4, 2019 at 9:55 am
Registered user
on Jun 4, 2019 at 9:55 am
Those of us in the Greendell neighborhood fought off Summerhill Homes for about three years when they wanted to redevelop the old school site that had become a daycare center into a dense housing development, one designed such that fire trucks could not make it around the tight turn in the road in their plans. We pointed out that the sewer system in the neighborhood is already badly outdated but was not in the city's plans for dealing with for thirty more years, that new homes would require the city to pay to overhaul it all, that there was no way that San Antonio Avenue and Road could handle the traffic and the intersection there would have to be majorly redone, backing up SA Road even further, and most important of all, that children need their soccer fields and room to run and once you develop it it's gone forever. Add more housing, add more children who need that space.
The school district initially refused to buy back the land from the daycare owner, and only did later at Summerhill's markup after realizing how important that land was to the community.
All of that is still true.
No teacher housing on any of Cubberley, none at 525 SAA. Public land is a public resource, not for private profit, no matter how much developers may be champing at the bit to get to it and telling the city what it wants to hear.
We need housing for school district staff. This is not the place to put it. This is the only park area in walking distance of small kids in Greendell neighborhood.
Note to the city council members who thought at last night's meeting that Greendell was a street, not a neighborhood--you need to pay a whole lot more attention to details, to the future, to the impact of what your choices are going to be now and in the future to the people of this city. You don't get land back once it's gone, and we've paid for that land twice now.
Because we want it to stay available to the public for public use. All of it.
Registered user
Midtown
on Jun 4, 2019 at 3:07 pm
Registered user
on Jun 4, 2019 at 3:07 pm
@ Shounak, Thank you for your response. However, it's manipulative to say "how can we say no to Cubberly housing if we haven't explored the impacts". We KNOW the negative impacts of multi-story housing on zoned public facilities land next to an established single story neighborhood with historical status. Wasting and time and money to verify the negative impacts of Cubberly Housing is just that - a waste of time and money. There will be more traffic (which no one wants in this location near safe routes to schools), and residential combined with recreational facilities that residents want to use in the evening does NOT work (which if anyone from PAUSD had bothered to attend last night's City Council Meeting they would've learned about). The City Park and Recs Commission OPPOSES housing at Cubberly 6 to 1!!! The Parks & Rec Commission had SEVERAL representatives at last night's meeting who spoke. Again, why weren't you or anyone else from PAUSD there to consider their valid reasons? (I also would've been happy to introduce myself to you.) Exploring all the options includes listening to city experts and community members who oppose it. It was pathetic that not a SINGLE PAUSD SCHOOL BOARD Member attended last night's City Council Meeting where almost 40 community members spoke against adding housing - clearly the majority. Even the City Council publically made note that it was shocking that no one from PAUSD attended the meeting since PAUSD owns 80 percent of the land in question. Not to mention, many community members, and a City Council Member, also cut to the chase and asked how this community input process was hijacked with housing appearing at the last input meeting when the community had already made it clear this was not appropriate for the Cubberly site. The consultant's weak answer was that "well a certain person asked for it". We all know based on her presentation last night promoting the maximum level of housing that the person who hijacked this process was City Council Member Alison Cormack. She has made a mockery of the entire community input process. Respectfully, please attend these meetings in the future. Clearly, City Council and PAUSD needs to start talking.
Registered user
Palo Verde
on Jun 4, 2019 at 3:30 pm
Registered user
on Jun 4, 2019 at 3:30 pm
In case people don't understand it already, the reason why PAF is arguing so hard for senior housing is because they want housing for tech workers. They badly want seniors to vacate their too-big houses in the city so that the tech workers can move in. But the seniors have nowhere to go. This will free up homes for tech workers. You know those nice quiet houses you have on your street? Well...
Registered user
University South
on Jun 4, 2019 at 6:56 pm
Registered user
on Jun 4, 2019 at 6:56 pm
Hmm
So why does [email protected] want housing at Cubberley for low income seniors?
And why does Palo Alto Housing want housing at Cubberley for low income seniors?
And why do the members of Housing Choices who spoke and wrote want housing at Cubberley for low income seniors?
And why did all the council members say they wanted more housing for low income seniors whether at Cubberley or elsewhere in the city?
Are they all in cahoots on this tech worker fantasy the previous poster ranted about?
HaHa man I wonder what Tom Dubois and Lydia Kou (who both voted to explore housing for seniors there think now that you claim people who want housing for low income seniors are really shilling for tech workers?
HaHa Are you auditioning for Donald Trump's BS team?
Haha
Midtown
on Jun 4, 2019 at 7:00 pm
on Jun 4, 2019 at 7:00 pm
@Why PAF wants senior housing
Why would seniors move out of their homes? I think that this is wishful thinking that makes no economic sense.
Neighbor across the street bought their home in the 1970's for $17,500, currently worth over $3 million. I'm assuming the house has been paid for for years. Taxes are less than $1000 per year and cost of operation is minimal.
Husband has passed away and even if the widow needs full time live in care that is only $125,000 per year.
A reverse mortgage would last her 25 years or more and given that she is in her late 80's that may be plenty of time.
Why would she move to a smaller condo that would cost her over $1 Million? Even if her taxes stayed the same, how does that
make economic sense? It doesn't even make sense to move to assisted living.
And if you do need assisted living care and want to use medicare/medicaid to pay for care, your primary residence
is not counted as long as you live in it and don't rent it out.
So why does everyone think that seniors are going to flock to new developments and free up all their current
dwellings?
/marc
Registered user
College Terrace
on Jun 5, 2019 at 12:32 am
Registered user
on Jun 5, 2019 at 12:32 am
Annette, how will you be able to make sure that only people working in Palo Alto get that housing/
I'm not in favor of giving up community space for someone who just wants to live in Palo Alto.
Registered user
Old Palo Alto
on Jun 5, 2019 at 11:18 am
Registered user
on Jun 5, 2019 at 11:18 am
@Dharap I'm neutral on housing at Cubberly, but please make sure teachers really want to live in employer owned housing on school owned land! Subject came up at dinner with 5 young PAUSD employees the sentiment was 100% against this idea...not a single teacher was in favor.
All in the group were in favor of a subsidy for housing within a certain distance of PAUSD and one teacher wishes there was still district collaboration with mortgage brokers to help with buying a home/condo/townhouse in the area. Evidently that used to be a thing...
@Wishful Thinking Why so angry towards teachers? As to the teachers not working over the summer break, many teachers and administrators DO continue to teach/work for PAUSD through the summer. And it's not as if the other teachers choose that schedule. If Palo Alto moved to a year round school calendar (some other local schools do this) I doubt the teachers would quit. It's just the nature of the schedule at this time.
If you think teachers in this district make too much, perhaps you should spend 5-10 years working in an elementary classroom. I'm sure you'll be making reservations at French Laundry and enjoying long stays Four Seasons George V in Paris...BTW, the stock options, free daycare, free bus service, and free lunch programs for teachers are amazing!
Oh...as for that vacation, you'll need to schedule it ONLY during the school breaks...teachers are not allowed to take time off during the year....especially on staff development days.
And @Wishful Thinking & @TrainFan Please list the percentage of home ownership for 10 year tech workers vs 10 year teachers in any local district. That will truly demonstrate the difference in wealth. It's NOT the pay...it's the equity offered @ private employers! Tech workers might service their loans with their salary, but the down payment comes from converting company equity into cash. No teacher will ever have that option.
Registered user
Adobe-Meadow
on Jun 5, 2019 at 11:44 am
Registered user
on Jun 5, 2019 at 11:44 am
We have too many different articles on this topic. I noted on another that my brother's niece in a very high end high school cannot retain teachers who live on campus. The teachers want a separate life away from school and other teachers. They do not want to be on-call 24 hours. They cannot keep the teachers beyond their contract period. It is a concept only - does not work in real life. People come up with selling points that sound good but do not work in real life.
An alternative is to contract with one of the apartment buildings behind the car wash on El Camino to contract teachers at a reduced rate that the PAUSD supplements to the apartment complex. That way the apartment keeps it's financial profile intact and the teacher's get a break at a R-2 apartment building. A win-win for everyone. And the teacher's have a separate life of their own when not a work.
Registered user
Adobe-Meadow
on Jun 5, 2019 at 12:12 pm
Registered user
on Jun 5, 2019 at 12:12 pm
I am concerned with Stephen Levy's response above. Mr. Levy in one realm calls himself a PAF person. He also positioned on another article that CUB was a good place for both senior and teacher housing. I suspect he is the group that would like to see CUB becomes a concrete block of buildings as per the JCC.Oshman model. He is probably one who thinks there is a huge amount of space there that everyone can build on.
Reality check here. Drive down Middlefield to Mountain View and look at the high school - it is huge. Then look at the empty space at Middlefield and Moffat - it is a huge piece of empty land. And it is not directly next to the school site.
As to JCC and it's concrete block it has overextended itself and the employees park on residential streets. That is so that the "visitors" can use the garage.
I like Oshman and have attended events there and have noted that their underground garage at one end is used to store stuff so no parking in that section of the garage. Major disconnect between use of garage and where employees park. Oshman - please fix that.
As to huge blocks of concrete that is not what a community center is that has soccer, other sports, and if marketed well more teams that overflow out of the Greer Park area. We need to keep CUB green and available for future high school use as we keep adding more residents.
Other note - Webster House was originally built for senior.retired SU professors who lived on campus and now had to free up their homes for incoming professors with families. It has gone through a number of owners since then but you get the idea - a business model of how you use land and transition older people in. Note: CUB is not a Webster House and it not a Channing House. Get over it.
Do not appreciated the political reference in Stephen's response - is that a dog whistle? Not working here - has negative effect now on what ever he is saying.
University South
on Jun 5, 2019 at 3:48 pm
on Jun 5, 2019 at 3:48 pm
Dharap,
Put all the housing you want - teachers, seniors, etc. on San Antonio. Don't put the housing next to the playing fields. Any thinking person knows that is not a good idea. Your inexperience is showing.
Talk with teachers and find out how many of them want to live at Cubberley. You may not find as many as you think. Build the teacher housing in stages and if it works, build some more.
For senior housing, build it in or near downtown -- Channing House, Lytton Gardens, the location seems the best. Cubberley is too isolated.
Registered user
Old Palo Alto
on Jun 5, 2019 at 4:39 pm
Registered user
on Jun 5, 2019 at 4:39 pm
If it's a good idea for teachers to live in PAUSD / city owned apartments, then we should build housing @ 25 Churchill and require all PAUSD administrators and Trustees to live there! That will free up a handful of places in town.
To accelerate the process we can start right away by adding some (more) portable classroom units in the parking lot. Those "temporary" portables are good enough for our kids and PAUSD offices. They can tell everyone they're super cool "container houses"!
They will need to be careful about Brown Act violations though.
If it works, we can just install more and more portables at each school to house teachers. None of them will mind living at work...right?
Problem solved!!!
Old Palo Alto
on Jun 7, 2019 at 6:27 pm
on Jun 7, 2019 at 6:27 pm
@Wishful Thinking
As far as I am concerned the pay teachers get is justified. On any given day, they work with children, prepare lesson plans, address concerns of parents, and attend professional development workshops or may be working on obtaining a Masters Degree, while working full-time. The important distinction is that they work with children.
People who complain about what teachers make are often the same people who complain about the quality of education. A society only gets what they pay for. Seems like Palo Alto is getting a deal considering the intense demands teachers face.
Registered user
Adobe-Meadow
on Jun 10, 2019 at 9:15 am
Registered user
on Jun 10, 2019 at 9:15 am
I checked out the San Antonio neighborhood yesterday. There is a street Byron Court that has a lot of apartments. Consider it already DONE. There are apartments directly in the vicinity of the school. That is on the residential San Antonio. If you cross over to the commercial San Antonio there are blocks of apartments on that side. You have apartments.