EDITORIAL : DO THE RIGHT THING; BELMONT'S A DISASTER WAITING TO HAPPEN; THE DISTRICT MUST WALK AWAY.

TOSSING $200 million in the trash is almost unthinkable.

But so is committing $100 million more to open the toxic, potentially explosive and politically tainted Belmont Learning Center downtown.

Shutting down Belmont is the only safe and sane solution.

First, no one trusts the district to make the school safe for students, staff and teachers. Even the Belmont Commission, which narrowly voted to open the complex, expressed a complete lack of confidence in the LAUSD's ability to safely manage the site if they proceed.

Second, the cost. Litigation costs alone are prohibitive, says former District Attorney Ira Reiner, the commission's chief executive officer and legal counsel.

Reiner is so convinced of the district's astronomical liability costs, he has vowed to lobby against his own commission's divided recommendation and urge the school board to end the project.

If the district proceeds, it is committing up to $100 million or more to opening the school and maintaining costly ventilation systems to prevent deadly methane gas buildup inside the school and potentially lethal hydrogen sulfide.

The district can ill afford to bear that cost out of its general fund, which already has provided every penny for Belmont. The state wouldn't let LAUSD use its money on such a troubled project. The district's 700,000 students don't have enough textbooks now, and there's not enough general fund money for programs and teachers.

If more general fund money is spent on Belmont, where will LAUSD get the money to operate the 100 new schools that are needed around the city? And bear in mind, those schools can be built with bond and state money.

Third, the time. Going forward means at least a five-year delay - or as much as a decade - in opening a school in that area.

And what if the place opens and blows up? Are we really willing to take that chance?

The critical question the school board must answer is how can the district move forward quickly so that the children who have been waiting so long for a new school can get one? It is understandable that many students and parents now say go ahead and use Belmont.

There is a better way - turn the district's headquarters on Grand Street back into a high school. It would cost less and the building could be ready to go by the next school year. The district already is leasing expensive offices downtown. Moving into other downtown buildings can be done.

This solves part of the problem and gives the neighborhood some relief while the district finds other sites and builds additional schools.

The new, reform-minded school board could make all of this happen - unlike previous boards. The problem is that the board is trying so hard to solve so many problems all at once, it blundered in its handling of Superintendent Ruben Zacarias.

While that was a serious - perhaps critical - misstep, at least the board is trying to quickly straighten out the district's problems.

Let's face it. When it comes to Belmont, there is no good choice. That was evident in the commission's sharply divided 4-3 vote to go forward with construction, with two environmental experts and a public works director concluding the downtown site is a disaster.

Three others concluded too much money, time and energy and had gone into building it for the public to walk away.

But that is precisely what the school board must do - muster the political courage to walk away.