A controversial vote by Morgan Hill Unified School District
trustees to sell a small portion of land at the edge of the former
Encinal Elementary School campus was overturned by trustees Tuesday
night.
Morgan Hill – A controversial vote by Morgan Hill Unified School District trustees to sell a small portion of land at the edge of the former Encinal Elementary School campus was overturned by trustees Tuesday night.
The board originally voted to sell the 450-square-foot parcel on the southern side of the campus, which is now home to the Charter School of Morgan Hill, to the Great Oaks Water Company. In exchange for the sale, the company would install a well on the parcel with enough water pressure to support a fire suppression system that the district would pay for.
The state has required that the fire suppression system be in place before new portables can be installed on the campus to make room for more students in the fall.
Trustees voted 4-1 to rescind the vote of the Jan. 30 meeting, which authorized the district to sell the parcel to the Great Oaks Water Company.
Trustees Don Moody and Hover-Smoot were absent from Tuesday’s meeting.
Board President Peter Mandel and trustees Mike Hickey, Bart Fisher and Shelle Thomas voted to rescind; Trustee Kathy Sullivan voted against.
“I don’t believe we should reconsider because though it was posted as an easement, we were aware it was a sale,” she said. “It sets a bad precedent.”
Thomas told Sullivan the board was not being asked to voted because two of the board, she and Trustee Julia Hover-Smoot, were not happy with the outcome. Both Thomas and Hover-Smoot voted against the original motion to sell the strip of property to Great Oaks Water Company.
“If it is a sale, there needs to be a public hearing, there needs to be an appraisal,” said Thomas. “This was not properly agendized.”
Mandel told the board the issue had been put on the agenda because he wanted to “be sure it was done properly.”
The issue will return to the agenda for the board’s next meeting Feb. 27, Mandel said.
MHUSD Deputy Superintendent Bonnie Tognazzini told trustees that the issue the board will consider will likely be a permanent easement to the property, not a sale. The original reason for the sale of the property, she said, was one of liability, a concern of the Great Oaks Water Company’s insurance provider.
Tognazzini said the district had invited Gene Scothorn with Civil Consultant Groups, who has been a consultant to the district for more than nine years, to address concerns trustees brought up at the June 30 meeting.
Scothorn told trustees concerns about the land’s value being reduced by the sale of the land were unfounded.
