May 8, 2012 | Subject: Reject BPSs $20 Million Spending Spree Dear Mayor Menino and City Councilors,

I am a Boston home-owner and a parent of a child in 1st Grade at the wonderful Mission Hill School K-8. Thank you for taking the time to seriously review BPS's $20 million school relocation proposal. I urge you to reject this plan. It is not a good use of $20 million in taxpayer funds. As noted by the Boston Globe, there are far too many questions casting a cloud over the plan, questions that are not being answered. BPS states that the plan adds 700 seats to high-demand schools. That means the cost to the district is a staggering $28,571 per seat. In the interest of accountability and datadriven decision-making--principles advocated by BPS--the City Council should consider whether $28,571 per seat is an appropriate allocation of city funds when so many of our schools are suffering budget cuts affecting vital student needs. It is well-known that both Mission Hill School and Fenway High strongly prefer to remain at their current, respective locations. Mission Hill School is well-positioned to expand in its current location, avoiding the need to spend $12 million to convert our building from what it isa solid, sunlit, simple old structure that is perfect for young childreninto something it is not: a state-of-the-art high school. Boston voters today are asking: why would school and city leaders spend our hardearned money in this way? Why not let a school stay in a building that suits its needs without adding a massive strain on our city budget? In a May 7th Globe report Superintendent Johnson states that "she needs Mission Hill K8 to move to Jamaica Plain to accommodate rising demand for kindergarten in that part of the city." That justification makes no sense. BPS has zoned MHS K-8 as a North Zone-and-West Zone school; the school can already fully accommodate new students assigned from JP. Further, 100 of the schools current enrollment of 168 students live in the schools Walk Zone. The number of children who would be forced to start riding a bus from Roxbury to Jamaica Plain would be far greater than the number of children who would need to ride a bus in the other direction. Here is another clear choice being made between thrift and overspending, and we cannot understand why wastefulness seems to be the BPS choice. In addition to the millions of taxpayer dollars at stake, there are, of course, many profound human costs that would be exacted on the school, the neighborhood, and the city by the uprooting of Mission Hill School. Sadly, we have learned that these costs, to us compelling, will be brushed aside by BPS with the statement that they are focused on the citys global interests. Let us focus on the citys global interests, then, and ask ourselves why on earth we should accept this massively expensive, complicated, traumatic and unwieldy plan when simpler, smarter, and kinder solutions are so apparent, accessible, and appropriate. Sincerely, Bob Goodman, Parent, Mission Hill School