Frustrated San Ysidro parents want answers and they started getting them Tuesday night.
The San Ysidro School District hosted a meeting at San Ysidro Middle School to discuss the future of the schools and facilities. The discussion included the future of an empty lot where Beyer Elementary used to stand. The school district tore it down in 2012.
“I thought they were going to build it back really fast, but they haven’t done it yet,” said mother-of-three Andrea Rodriguez.
That’s what the district told the community. Rodriguez hoped to send her three kids to Beyer.
“We were told it was going to be built back in like two years,” she said.
The lot is mostly weeds four years later.
“Just to see that every day, in and out, driving up to work is really uncomfortable for me to see,” said San Ysidro School Superintendent Julio Fonseca, Ed.D.
Doctor Fonseca was candid about what happened in 2012.
“[The residents] were made a promise that at the time the administration really could not live up to,” he said. “What happened in the past here was that there was so much of that dictatorship-like leadership where no one had a chance to voice their opinions.”
Voters approved bond money that was supposed to be used for a new school and facilities. It never turned into a new Beyer Elementary.
Fonseca pointed out the district is on the rebound. The legal and financial problems that plagued the district the past few years are slowly disappearing. Doctor Fonseca and the district have a positive budget for the first time in almost a decade, which means no layoffs and no shortage of supplies. It also means the District can talk about the future of the Beyer lot.
“We’re focusing on how to engage the community to have them become real partners,” he said. “The idea that we have [for the Beyer lot] is to develop a learning complex that would allow for us to have an opportunity to have more seats for kids.”
