Seattle board votes to close 5 schools

The Seattle School Board voted Thursday to close five schools and move all or part of eight others at a tense, emotional meeting where audience members frequently booed, and security officers escorted several audience members from the room.

School Board President Michael DeBell repeatedly asked for quiet and warned more than once that if people did not stop yelling, he would adjourn the meeting to another room where only the media could be present.

James Bible, president of the local branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), was one of the people escorted out. District officials said he was blocking an aisle and encouraging other people to do so. DeBell later announced that Bible could re-enter the meeting if he would agree to sit or stand against a wall, but he reportedly did not return.

The meeting was a sharp departure from what's happened in the past two months as the board has discussed which — and how many — schools to close. At previous school-board meetings, parents, teachers and others gave largely respectful, if passionate, pleas to save individual schools or to avoid closing schools all together.

Thursday, emotions boiled over.

Outbursts from the audience started almost as soon as Superintendent Dr. Maria Goodloe-Johnson gave her opening remarks, and continued, with a little lull in the middle, until the end. As the final votes were taken, some of the board members had to raise their voices to be heard.

Not only were people in the room yelling comments, but the overflow crowd watching the meeting from the lobby outside periodically erupted in chants such as: "Hey, hey, ho, ho, our school-board members have to go."

There were cheers when board member Mary Bass introduced an amendment to take three schools off the closure list and to keep Lowell Elementary as it is rather than move many of its students to other schools.

Bass, who became a little emotional near the end, told the audience she'd done all she could to make changes to the plan and said she hoped she hadn't let people down.

Board member Harium Martin-Morris also was cheered as he talked about his desire to keep Cooper Elementary open and to split and move Summit K-12, an alternative school, rather than close it altogether.

In the end, through all the interruptions, the board voted down the amendments proposed by Bass and Martin-Morris. They approved three others designed to give more options to many of the students affected by the moves.

Then the board voted 5-2 to approve the plan recommended earlier this month by Goodloe-Johnson. She proposed closing two elementary-school programs — Cooper and T.T. Minor. Meany Middle, Summit K-12 and the African American Academy, a K-8 alternative school also would cease to exist. Other schools would move into some of those buildings

In all, eight schools will move in whole or in part to new sites. The vote ends two months of difficult and often emotional debate.

When Thursday's meeting had ended, DeBell, clearly drained, said if he'd had a better plan, he would have pursued it.

"There's nothing we can say that can take away the bitterness that these folks feel," he said.

Yet DeBell and other board members kept stressing, through the jeers and yells, that closing schools was a good, if tough decision that will strengthen the district and improve education for all.

Even Bass and Martin-Morris agreed some schools need to close, they just thought the plan could be better.

All along the way, critics have urged the board to keep one school or another. Many also urged the district to take more time to decide which schools to close.

Local leaders of the NAACP have talked about the possibility of a lawsuit, saying the plan hurts people of color, the poor and those with learning disabilities.

Goodloe-Johnson sought the board's approval in late October to consider closing schools this coming June, saying the economy made it necessary to move quickly.

Her final recommendations, approved Thursday night, will affect 1,775 students.

Along with the closures, one new school also will be created: a new elementary/middle combination at the Summit K-12 site.

The district has said it needs to cut expenses by at least $25 million for the 2009-10 school year, and as much as $37 million, depending on how much legislators cut school funding.

Linda Shaw: 206-464-2359 or lshaw@seattletimes.com

Information in this article, originally published Jan. 30, 2009, was corrected Jan. 30, 2009. A previous version of this story incorrectly stated that Mercer Middle would cease to exist. Rather, Meany Middle is among the schools closing.