Saugus district advisory committee meeting set for end of month 

Main entrance of Santa Clarita Elementary School on Seco Canyon Road. Katherine Quezada/ The Signal
Main entrance of Santa Clarita Elementary School on Seco Canyon Road. Katherine Quezada/ The Signal
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The next Saugus Union School District asset management advisory committee meeting is set for Oct. 30 and will feature an information-gathering session for what to do with the Santa Clarita Elementary School property, according to Superintendent Colleen Hawkins. 

The committee had been set to meet on Oct. 9, but that was postponed this week. 

In a phone interview on Thursday, Hawkins said the meeting, set to run from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. inside the Bridgeport Elementary School multi-purpose room, will allow for community members to voice their opinions on what should be done with the property. 

Hawkins said there will be tables set up and each of the committee members will move from table to table so they can talk with as many community members as possible. 

“The purpose of this meeting is for everyone to come and participate,” Hawkins said, adding that it’s the type of town hall that the committee had been asking for. 

Committee members will also be introduced to attendees, along with how each of them fits the criteria of the committee structure, and the purpose of the committee will be explained as well. 

Hawkins said, in essence, the committee is meant to bring forth recommendations for what to do with the surplus lands that was Santa Clarita Elementary for the district’s governing board to then decide on. 

A rough outline of the schedule for the rest of the committee’s meetings is also slated to be presented. 

“If you look at other school districts, they had public input sessions along the way,” Hawkins said. “I’m not sure how many more we will have at this point.” 

Hawkins added that the community is invited to observe every committee meeting, as is the case with all public meetings. 

A large crowd that eventually began talking over the most recent meeting caused it to be called early after about 15 minutes on Sept. 18. The committee was supposed to tour the property and hear a presentation on an option for it to be converted into district employee housing, but those two things did not happen. 

Community members in attendance had said they found out on social media that the district was looking at converting the property into low-income housing, which Hawkins said on Thursday has never been an option. She also said reopening the school is not an option at this point. 

The presentation on the potential of employee housing, meant to be purely informational with no action taken, will be given at some point, but Hawkins did not want to commit on when that would take place. 

“I don’t want to rush through anything,” she said. “I want to understand (the community) and know what they don’t understand … Let’s really get the public’s idea and engage with them.” 

Hawkins said the hope is that what happened at the previous meeting does not happen again, something board member Anna Griese had requested to Hawkins. 

The full agenda for the Oct. 30 meeting will be posted on the district’s website prior to the meeting date, as required by the Brown Act, California’s open-meeting law for government bodies. 

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