DISTRICT RESIDENTS TO DESIGN SURVEY.

Byline: Sylvia L. Oliande Staff Writer

Concerned that the Simi Valley school board has not considered all solutions to overcrowding at their school, parents in Wood Ranch plan to create a survey to give themselves a voice in the process.

Parents said they are concerned the district is interested only in making boundary changes - an action that would carve up their neighborhoods - in reaction to the board's decision last month to reopen Arroyo Elementary School.

The survey, parents say, would send a clear message to the board on how residents want the elected officials to proceed.

``It would be a personal decision whether a family wants the school to grow or a family wants that school to shrink,'' said Marybeth Jacobson, a member of the school committee for the Wood Ranch Homeowners Association. ``The only way to get that information is to ask them.''

The school district has said that boundary changes are not a foregone conclusion just because it voted to reopen Arroyo next fall. Officials are considering enrollment caps, among other options.

Although the school district plans to send out a demographic survey to all 4,000 Wood Ranch residents in order to better gauge future enrollment in the area, the document will not ask for opinions about alternatives to boundary changes.

Therefore, the approximately 200 parents who turned out for a town hall meeting Monday night decided to create their own survey.

Organizers said the first option on their survey would, of course, be to do nothing. But school district officials said enrollment already has surpassed original projections by several hundred students, and they are concerned about their ability to handle future growth.

Therefore, the survey also would ask whether parents would be willing to bus their children to other schools, to implement a year-round schedule or to agree to a boundary change.

It would ask about using current homeowners fees or creating a new fee to help the district establish Arroyo as a magnet school - which would attract some students and reduce numbers through natural attrition.

Or the fees could pay for construction of additional classroom space on campus or on adjacent land. Both assessments would be combined with school district funds.

Other options are adding portables to the existing campus and using proposed parkland as playfields, or turning the school into a K-3 or K-5 school, or capping enrollment.

Gary Katz, a father of two, said the group plans to send out the survey within a week. It hopes to take the results to the school board before they are expected to make a decision on boundary changes or other options early next year.

Katz said the poll is not intended to dictate the board's action, and they are mindful that any decision made would also affect other areas within the city.

``We're not trying to make decisions for everybody, we're making decisions for Wood Ranch,'' he said. ``I wouldn't presume to make policy.''