CUSD Update
Editorial staff

Capo Valley High School is finally in line to get its long-awaited theater. After years of effort, research and fundraising, two Capo moms have led the way in getting results. They’ve often worked behind the scenes, especially when requesting public records and balancing how to fund a new project while improving older facilities in Mission Viejo. A city audit of taxpayer money collected in Mission Viejo led to some of the information about how the theater could be funded. Both women are parents of CUSD students, so they had to walk a fine line – doing the research while being careful not to provoke any officials to react against them.

Plans for the theater were discussed during a CUSD facilities meeting on Sept. 16. The project isn’t a pipe dream, as funding for the $13-million project actually exists. Most of the money will come from CFD 87-1, and the balance will come from a state grant.

The natural order of a project seems to include “credit junkies” who attach themselves after the fact and put their names on the accomplishments of others. Beyond the CUSD parents who have worked so hard, taxpayers will fund 100 percent of the $13-million theater. Councilman Frank Ury was recently appointed by Mayor Trish Kelley to serve on a committee to deal with school issues. With Ury running for reelection, will he now tell CUSD parents he gave them a theater? If this sounds ridiculous, it’s the same type of campaigning he did in 2004 when claiming he was an “anti-airport fighter from the beginning” of the 10-year battle against a commercial airport at El Toro. Ury tried to put his name on the effort mere days prior to a vote on the final ballot measure regarding El Toro. Anti-airport activists were outraged at his lie of “fighting an airport from the beginning.” He apparently had no idea what was involved or how long it had taken.

On another topic, four reform candidates are running in the Nov. 4 election. Two elected in the June recall election, Sue Palazzo and Ken Maddox, are running to keep their seats. Two other reform candidates are Mike Winsten and Jack Brick. Candidates running against the reformers have the support of the teachers union, and they appear to be Fleming-regime loyalists. During the lengthy struggle that reform-minded parents and community supporters have waged against the old guard, they’ve uncovered enough wrongdoing to get voters’ attention. Reformers have exposed malfeasance and criminal acts of those associated with former supt. James Fleming. On Election Day, the last old-guard trustee, Duane Stiff, will likely be gone.

Newpaper articles have lately focused on the cost of the special election in June, more than $600,000 to recall two old-guard trustees. Some constituents said the election was a wasteful process when the district desperately needed funds for essentials. If reform candidates maintain their majority on November 4, they’ll be able to move forward on eliminating some of the real waste. How many top administrators can be eliminated without any impact whatsoever on the quality of education?