Eighteen residents share concerns with School Board regarding condemnation and budget cuts

Eighteen Renton community members shared concerns at the April 23rd Renton School Board meeting regarding budget cuts and eminent domain takings. (This meeting was followed the next day by a special meeting to authorize the condemnation of a house on Tobin.)

Renton residents expressed deep concerns regarding the Board’s proposed elimination of school librarians and other key staff, while they simultaneously spend tens of millions of dollars taking homes and businesses by threat of eminent domain to adjust Renton High School’s footprint.

The zoom portion of the meeting was recorded, and the audio is good quality.  I’ve included it in this post.  Unfortunately, the visual part of the recording only includes a thumbnail-size video of the Board Chambers, and does not include the speaker’s podium during audience comment.  But this does not interfere with understanding the commentary.

There were two sessions of audience comment.  I’ve included both of them in their original audio, and in an Apple Notes “voice-to-text” transcription.  The voice-to-text is imperfect, and I apologize to the speakers that I don’t have time to go through and correct all the errors.  It is useful for helping those of you reading to quickly see what was covered, and you can listen to the video for an accurate record.

Here is the first period of  audience comment from the zoom video, including the first ten comments:

 

Here is the second period of audience comments from the zoom video:

For background on some of the concerns mentioned, please see my earlier posts including Renton High School is already $126 million over voter-approved budget;  The Renton High grad that made the music we grew up with;   Beautiful $11,500,000 Renton High Science Center, completed last year, to be demolished;  Renton High’s proposed baseball field could be the nation’s most expensive ever;  Did we really vote to condemn all these homes?;  Renton School Board sends world-class glass studio packing; and  Public Hearing tonight on School District use of Eminent Domain for Renton High School.

And then, below the cut is the automated transcript of the audience comment.  Again, my apologies for the electronic transcription errors…please listen to the videos for the official record.

First Audience Comment Period (ten speakers):

(Board President:)

All right, we will now allow up to 10 public speakers at this portion of the agenda when your name is called, please come to the microphone and state your name for the record prior to making comments.

Each speaker will be allowed to three minutes. Board an individual statement and may interrupt a speaker to require the that the board impos.

Again, public comment will be acknowledged by the secretary, who will state the name of the person providing comment and the subject of their comments.

Their comments will be forwarded to board members as correspondents and will become part of the record .

And again, written public comments may be emailed to board.public.comment atchools.us.

So first up this evening, we have Heather Gould.

(First Speaker:)

I’m Heather G. I work at McKnight Middle School and I’ve been there since 2001.

I’m the librarian.

You know the meme where there’s a job title at the top, like school librarian, and then different panels, like what my friends think I do?

What society thinks I do, and then what I actually do.

Most people imagine school librarians as quiet bookworms who check out books and shush kids , but that last panel of the meme, that’s where the real story begins the one that matters most.

School librarians aren’t a luxury.

We’re a strategic investment.

Study after study show students in schools with certified teacher librarians perform better on standardized tests , have stronger research skills, and read more frequently.

These benefits are especially pronounced for vulnerable students, Our English learners, low income students, and students of color.

Yet these are the very students most likely to have lost their librarians .

Librarians collaborate with teachers on inquiry based learning and are the experts who teach research, emerging technology, media literacy, digital citizenship, and critical thinking skills students need, not just to graduate, but to participate meaningfully in civic life , Cutting teacher librarians in a time of declining literacy rates, AI misinformation and polarized discourse is not just short-sighted.

It’s a threat to our democracy.

Here are a few examples from my practice to illustrate the vital role teacher librarian’s play .

I curated a diverse student-centered collection, earning many grants to meet the needs of students.

For example, this year, I earned a grant for $1,500 worth of Spanish graphic novels that have increased the circulation of our language books by 220% .

I’ve designed opportunities for student voice and choice by developing a maker space, obtaining grants for audio visual tools, and providing training on digital creation to staff and students.

I’ve engaged readers through author visits workshops and literacy initiatives to meet the needs of a range of learners.

At an author event this year, one student said her reason for coming , I wanted to meet a black author because I want to be a writer someday, too.

That is what you lose when you lose librarians.

This is not just about a job.

It’s about a future where all students have the tools to learn, grow, and think critically.

The consequences of eliminating librarians will echo far beyond a single school year.

It will undermine their future .

I implore you to reconsider your decision to cut middle and high school librarians to not believe what people think we do, but value what we actually do for kids in our society every day thank you Thank you.

(Board President:) Next, we have Tiffany Allen. ,

(Second Speaker:)

My name’s Tiffany Allen.

I’m at Renton High School .

Good evening.

Dr Dr. Pattonad and board members tonight.

I am here for a very important safety issue regarding rententon high school students.

I currently in the kitchen manager at Renton high school and I’m advocating for the students.

I am also here tonight to share with parents this issue since February 14.

I have been actively trying to get supervision in the cafeteria during a 30 minute breakfast service Renton high school breakfast starts at 6:45. But has since been moved to 6:50 to be able to accommodate a staff member to be in the cafeteria, which has failed.

Why we are talking about 30 minutes of supervision just 30 minutes to supervise a large number of students.

Why are students allowed to be in a building with no one to supervise?

What am I missing?

Are parents even aware?

I’ve gone to my supervisors principal of the school and HR for some reason for some reason supervision has been passed off as not important not important to supervise over 300 kids in one area.

Why am I being told this is not a requirement?

Are AFT contract states and 3.7 It is required, but I was told the verbage does not support rest contract states in 5.20.2.

There must be at least two adult supervising large number of students in areas such as playgrounds, cafeteria, comments, and arrival departure location when I have quoted this, I have been told the contract is being followed.

How there is nobody in the cafeteria in the morning other than myself who has no training and my back is turned to the room Breakfast supervision is a hit or miss with the average being no supervision at all.

Why is this OK?

I am here tonight pleading for you to be proactive and not reactive when it comes to our student safety at Renton high school.

I need help with supervision when serving breakfast.

I need this to be a requirement and not a second thought safety and security of our students should be a top priority.

Thank you for your time. .

(Board President:) Thank you.

(Third Speaker:)

Good evening, Dr. Patunod and Board.

Uh, I am here in solidarity with my coworker and Union Sister Tiffany Allen, the nutrition staff, and in support of our Redden High School community .

Last month, I attended a meeting and was told we could not guarantee adult supervision for 30 minutes of the breakfast period. 30 minutes.

When I hear that, I hear we cannot guarantee the safety and security of our students and staff. 30 minutes.

It’s our paramount obligation to these students.

Please don’t fail our proud Red high school community.

And again, it’s only 30 minutes.

Thank you.

 

(Board President:) Thank you. Next we have Jolyn.

(Fourth Speaker:)

Hi, my name’s Jolen.

I live in Renton, and I’m here to discuss the Renton expansion .

My one of the houses that is being or the people that are being forced out is a good friend of my son, and that good friend has a daughter who is a good friend of my granddaughter.

And my granddaughter and my son are both asking me, how can they be forced out?

How can people just come and take your house?

Can they come and take my house?

Can they come and take your house ?

And I can all I can say is, I guess so.

It’s a heck of a situation.

So now everybody’s worried, and my family that they’re Renton is going to come and take their house.

And I just think it’s a shameful, shameful way to do business.

These are not just houses.

There are families that live in there and have lived there for years.

And I just say shame on the board and shame on the city council.

And in closing, I’d like to leave you with the word from Maya Angelo, that when somebody shows you who they are, believe them the first time.

Thank you.

(Board President:) Thanks.  Next we have Nicole Huff.

(Fifth Speaker:)

Good evening to the board.

Thank you for having me…

My name is Nicole Huff and I am the Librarian at Tally High School.

I’m here today to discuss the programs that go on in a library, the things that unfortunately do to budget cuts will not be there next year.

I need you to know that in November, I worked with students in our culinary program and in our multilingal program to create cookbook stories and recipes where we wrote the story of how the recipe is important to ourselves and our lives, to honor our heritage, and then we also wrote the recipe that we use with this as a book that we can publish for our students.

We did this as three teachers together, the teacher librarian, the culinary teacher, and the multilingual teacher.

We did this together because I had the common planning time that I could do that with them as the librarian .

Every week, I have our ATP students, our adult transition program students come up to the library, and we do story time, much like you would in a much younger setting, we have students come up and point to the board at what they see and read aloud those words when they can .

We read stories about each season and what’s going on, and we make crafts.

We made flowers for Dia Das Muertos to put on an ala.

We created snowflakes and colored leaves to decorate the library in cold and dark seasons after reading stories that brought them joy.

And for the first time, a week ago, I actually was proctoring the SAT and had to not be there on a day that ATP normally comes up and shares this time with me .

I had to lock the door, even though I had also talked to the teacher and told them in advance, because the students all still wanted to come up.

That program means so much to me, and next year I can’t do it , because next year I have to be a classroom teacher.

And I love teaching in the classroom.

But when I taught English in the classroom, I couldn’t sponsor a school wide poetry jam where kids found their tribe and bonded together and saw slam poets .

I can’t make a schoolwide podcast where we build community because we all read the same book and we grow together with sacred reading practices where we claim that this book represents us and speaks for us.

I can’t do that as a classroom teacher.

I can only do that as a librarian.

And next year, our students will not have any of those programs because the board has cut a library program from all middle and high school to balance the budget .

Would you want your kid to go to a school without a school library?

Thank you.

(Board President:) Thank you.  Next is Angie Lilowan.

(Sixth Speaker:)  Good evening.  I’m Angie Lilowan and first I’d like to recognize ask that you acknowledge and and pay attention to the concerns of the school cafeteria, and the library , because they are very, very important issues.

The libraries are the core center of learning in all the schools.

And so I’m absolutely shocked that the librians are being cut.

But that’s not why I’m here.

I’m here because I’m, you know, you’ve heard from me many times about the Renton High School expansion and the taking of the properties around that area.

Spec specifically, the properties in north of Tobin, it is really unnecessary that those are taken by Renton School District.

And I know there’s a presentation coming tonight where you have the properties in green, yellow, and red, and it says, reached agreement, or, you know, we’ve purchased whatever .

But really, it should say, we succeeded in forcing these families out.

These families, we haven’t got out yet, you know, because really, these families do not want to be forced out.

People have lived there for years.

My good friend has lived there with her family, immigrated from another country .

This is not what she wants.

And while you can paint it in green and say that it’s all well and good, it’s not.

In addition, there’s a lot of waste. Funds, like in around 2006, the whole Ritton High School building was renovated .

I was told it was like $42 million.

I’m not sure you’ll have to look that up.

The 2019 bond had all kinds of improvements to rent in high school.

The gym was modernized for $5 million.

The science rooms just were finished for 115 million.

And then there’s a whole list of things on the website that have been spent from the bond, the 2019 bond on Renton High School.

And a lot of that is just going to be cut down and demolished, the science rooms that just were finished are going to be like plowed over.

Anyway, so that’s, because that brings us to the 2022 bond, where the voters were promised 40 acres and since you couldn’t find 40 acres, it’s like, oh, well, we’ll just take this 10 acres of families and we’ll just take that.

And then there’s a field that you’re counting as some of the acres.

But that field can’t be used.

And I don’t see an aquatic center.

I don’t see a stadium with lights and turf.

It’s not the same.

You’re really not providing these wonderful students that you just had here with all the things you promised in the bond.

You promised 40 acres, and it’s more like 23 And the way you did that is by plowing over a whole bunch of families homes with grass and it’s just so wasteful.

And I’m so angry.

And I almost didn’t come tonight because it just dealing with the anger is difficult.

I don’t I don’t really want to be angry all the time, but I just can’t believe we had all these ideas.

We came to you.

We asked you to reconfigure the plan.

Partner with the city.

They’re putting in all these ball fields.

We said, “Hey, build west to the school .

But you don’t listen.

We have never had any support.

The neighbors have tried to give ideas to maintain the building, but and still have the Renton high school rebuilt, but save the families.

And it’s just been so frustrating because the rent and school bird has not listened.

You have not given us any support in these families, they do not want to move, even though your presentation will show, we’ve reached agreement.

I’m sorry.

It’s just, it’s just not right.

(Board President:). Thank you.   Next, we have Kelly Lisk.

(Seventh Speaker:)

I am Kelly Lac I’m a seventh grade language arts teacher at McKnight .

When I first learned of the district’s decision to cut secondary certified teacher librarians, my stomach dropped.

I haven’t even considered the McKnight librarian Heather Good would be fallout from our budget shortfall because of the many services she provides our students . School libraries are not just about books.

They’ve become a technology and media hub and a creative space for students to gather and learn not simply a place where they silently check out a book .

When the pandemic hit, our librarian was the first to offer a list of resources and tech tools for teachers and students to try, Heather had already been using cool, unique ways to engage our students when they weren’t in the library, and it turns out we desperately needed those when we could no longer see our students in person .

We teachers couldn’t have navigated reading instruction without her.

We still need her.

OSPI has introduced new media literacy standards, and quite frankly, teaching seven unfamiliar standards, or rather 17 new pages worth of standards, sounds near impossible without the help of a librarian who is certified to teach media literacy .

We are already struggling to help our low readers make progress.

Our solution is to cut the certificated staff that can help our students improve.

Research shows that schools are full-time certified librarian have higher literacy rates, higher test scores , and higher graduation rates.

Less than 40% of Washington’s schools have a full-time certified librarian and am sad and angry that Renton is joining this list.

Especially compared to the national average, 70% of schools across the country have a full time certified library rian.

How is it that we live in one of the wealthiest, most educated states, and we are ranked 35th of 51 states for librarian FTE per school.

It’s devastating to learn our district values reading so little.

On top of all this, we are losing Heather, a woman so foundational to makenight culture.

It’s like cutting out a vital organ with no plan transplant.

Heather has devoted her career to Mcnight first as a teacher , and for the last decade, as our librarian, her love for her school, job, and students comes through before you even step into the library.

The display cases around the school are filled with recommended reading and creative genres.

The wall outside the library tracks school ride reading competitions with like a massive sparkling chart .

And then you enter a space that Heather has created to meet the needs of our students.

Our library is a sanctuary for so many students, whether or not they love to read.

You’ll find students playing chess, recording video projects on a green screen contributing colorful square stickers to mosaic posters that line the walls , or eaeagerly awaiting their project growing from the 3D printer.

And perhaps the most important thing to me as a language arts teacher.

Heather loves and notes young adult books, like nobody I’ve ever met.

I’ve eavesdrop many a time on her conversations with students, most of which go like this.

Heather will ask if they need helping a book.

The student will hem and because they don’t know how to express what they’re looking for.

Heather will ask a few more questions about five genre previously liked books, and in under a minute, she will have written two full sticky notes worth of options just from the top of her head .

And the student will be delighted and save the sticky note because the recommendations were a perfect fit.

And that’s because how their reads the books and talks to the kids about them and knows her library and her students like nobody else .

My students asked to visit the library every single day.

We should be encouraging and developing their love of reading, not ending the program’s designed specifically for that purpose.

I know I speak for many teachers when I ask the board and the district to reconsider the cots made to our library programs.

We are losing so much more than you know.

Thank you.

(Board President:). Thank you.  Next is Weston Order.

(Eighth Speaker:)

Just want to order to read.

Apologies if I mispronounced the last name.

Oh, everyone, name is Weston Horner.

Uh, I grew up in rent and schools, attending the same schools as many of the school group members here.

Or where their children attend now.

I was a student at the Old Hazelwood Elementary, the home program, then back to McKnight Middle School and graduated from Hazen High School .

I now live in downtown Renton by Burnett Park, and currently in my seventh year as an art teacher for Seattle school district at South Shore K8 in the Rainier Beach Neighborhood of South Seattle.

At South Shore, just 10 minutes north on Rainier Avenue, our community is not perfect, but we talk about who we are as a collective, often and on a deep level.

Mr. Booker, on the school board was my administrator and evaluator at South Shore for two years and can attest to the work the school does to foster community on campus and in partnership with families and neighborhood organizations .

This respect, outreach, and participation with the neighborhood community has been refreshing and eye opening to witness and feel in my role as an educator.

The other place I have felt a strong sense of community is here in downtown Renton.

In my years as a student in Renton schools, I don’t recall hearing much talk of the community, whether talking about community on campus or in the surrounding neighborhood, nor do I remember feeling like much of a community.

It kind of felt like I was invisible if I wasn’t involved with sports.

I don’t recall any outreach my parents were getting involved with the school or for the schools to work with their surrounding neighborhoods.

I will say my experience at the home program as an exception to this.

I don’t know the experiences of the members of the board here tonight who’ attended the same schools as me, but as I continue to learn more about the handling of the Renton high school project since the 2022 levy vote, I can only describe the school’s board.

The school board’s actions as ignorant of the community’s needs and voices and fiscally reckless.

I have three questions that I feel the Renton school board has yet to answer to his community for.

How do you justify the community impact of forcing the sale of hard earned treasured earned and treasured property from the community members who could instead have been collaborated with as assets and allies of educational operations.

How do you justify retroactively altering public information about the board’s intention to build on this site?

How do you justify the staggering expense of this real estate , nearing national records for projects of its kind and likely exceeding the voter approved budget.

Please stop the expansion project of the Renton High School campus and seek other solutions with community involvement.

What you’re doing may be legal, but it’s not very neighborly.

Thank you.

(Board President:). Thank you next we have Mark DeVos.

(Ninth Speaker:)

Good evening, I’m Mark and I live in North Renton and my home is not one of the homes that has been condemned, but I wanted to speak out of concern for my neighbors .

Eminent domain is a government power as reserve and private property needs to be taken for a just cause or for public good, and it should never be exercised lightheartedly nor for transient or trivial reasons .

When I first heard about the rent and expansion, as well as a condemning of 32 homes, eight businesses and a whole city street.

What came to mind was there must be a really good reason for this, must be a desperate reason .

Maybe classrooms are severely overcrowded, unbearably, maybe there’s been some sort of a projection in population where there’s going to be many, many, many more students on the campus can handle in the next coming years .

So I was astonished after about a year and a half that I don’t recall ever hearing that argument in any of the many meetings I went to, any of the things I read or any of the conversations I’ve been privy to.

I haven’t heard that come up, that population increase was a reason for the expansion .

However, I did hear other reasons.

Let me give you an example.

Several months ago, a gentleman whose name, I’m sorry, I don’t know, I don’t know organization who’s representing, but he was there in an official capacity promoting the expansion.

He came to the Renton Senior Center, and he spoke to the North Renton Neighborhood Association, and he gave a presentation, including a slideshow.

Now, one of the reasons he gave for the need for expansion was that the high school is just simply too old .

He said, there’s just too old, and really, they didn’t weren’t able to renovate it any further or just be too cumbersome, too much.

And I was a little skeptical of that because I know it’s gone through several renovations, and I can think of many great schools here and elsewhere that have been cared for and loved and are functioning great today.

But the other reason he gave was really more surprising.

The presentation spent a great deal focusing on the feelings of students .

And I will try to recall this the best I can without embellishing it, try to use the exact words that I remember.

But among the things that were said were students did not feel inspired to learn at their old school . That students felt like they were inadequate school because the footprint of their campus was smaller than other schools.

That students felt that other high schools looked down on them because they had a smaller campus , that other people talked badly about the school behind their backs, using the word that I heard tonight, ghetto, for example, that the Ikea Performing Arts Center, although it’s an asset, and it’s a wonderful facility that they use, other people use this facility, and therefore they don’t feel it’s really there, so they don’t really have anything to be proud of, like the IkeEa Center. And so forth.

Now, to me, these aren’t good reasons to take people’s property.

And if it has to do with feelings feelings can be changed .

I mean, why not have an attitude, okay, our school’s small, but you know what?

As small as we are, we have big school spirit.

Or as old as a school may be, “Hey, this is great.

We’re living in a school with a lot of history.

I can only imagine the people that walk these same halls before me and what they went on to accomplish .

And enclosing, I’d like to say that I did find it artening to see the students tonight and their accomplishments, and congratulations to them all.

One of the things that seemed over abundant to me was that they had school pride , and I don’t think it had anything to do with the building.

I think it had to do with their mentoring and the teachers they had and their families and their own attitude on life.

That’s all, thank you.

(Board President:) Thanks, Mark. Okay,  next is Amelia Peacock.

(Tenth Speaker:)

Good evening, my name is Amelia Peacock and I have been a homeowner and neighbor living in South Renton since 2019 and I am here to comment on the Renton high school expansion.

I am also a proud auntie of two little Rentonites and I want to see them grow and thrive in the best possible education environment right here in our community .

I support the ballot initiative to provide safe modern facilities to enhance learning for young people like my nephews into the future.

But what I strongly oppose is how the school board is using the funds to expand Renton High School.

I do not support your planned to demolish 32 single family homes and eight businesses displacing people who have been part of our rent and community for decades.

I do not support your plan to demolish the Science Center, which was remodeled just last year in 2024, costing rent and taxpayers 11.5 million And I do not support your plan to construct a redundant football field when there is one less than half a mile away from the high school.

This expansion project is a misuse of taxpayer dollars and shows an appalling lack of planning and commitment to keeping longtime families and businesses , living at local and thriving in Renton.

Today, I urge you to not condemn the remaining four homes tomorrow on Thursday today I stand with these homeowners because when you displace one of us, you displace all of us .

I work for a nonprofit.

My partner is a teacher.

We are privileged to be homeowners.

That opportunity is often so far out of reach for people in our age and income bracket.

And we were drawn to Renton not only because we could realize this dream of owning a house here, but more importantly, this felt like a community, a racially diverse, vibrant community that embodies the traits of pride, tradition, and excellence.

It is a community that seems to care and want to invest in the people and businesses that call rent and home.

El Kyosco, for example, is one of the first places my partner and I went to eat while we were here, and is now a weekly staple in our household .

If I, as a homeowner, were being forced out of my home in this unstable economy and precarious political moment, I would not be able to afford to live in Renton or even to purchase another home, offering market rate is an insult and not a viable solution that you claim it to be.

Please, I am asking that you set a better example for our youth and for our neighbors and I demand that you find a different plan that centers community feedback and buy in.

Please stop making rent tonight’s field devalued, unheard, and disposable.

I hope you make the right decision and do not condemn these homes on Thursday , because if you do, we will not forget it, and will make sure that everyone in this community remembers what you did and holds you accountable to that decision.

Thank you.

(Board President:) Thank you.  We have reached 10 folks for this first public comment section.

Second Audience Comment Session:

(Board President:) And again, when your name is called, please come to the microphone and state your name for the record, prior to making comments, Each speaker will be allowed after three minutes.

Board president may end an individual statement when the allotted time has passed and may interrupt a speaker to require the same standard of civility at the board imposes on self.

And again, any written public comments may be emailed to board.public.comment atchools.

First up, we have Anthony Peres.

(Eleventh Speaker:)

All right, uh, good evening.

Um, my name’s Anthony Perez.

I recently moved to Renton, I’m going on to, I think, two years now.

My partner and I moved here because of the VC inclusion and the strong sense of community, like we see here.

Now, I’m here about the Renton High School expansion while support safe, modern, learning environments.

I strongly oppose using our bond dollars to expand the high school at the expense of our community.

And here’s why, I have four points here, so the one is displacement homes and businesses.

You’re going to hear same numbers, and I want to make sure that you understand that, and that, you know, we don’t take this lightly.

So demolishing 32 homes and eight businesses fractures, neighborhoods, ties, and displaces families who’ve invested years.

Sometimes decades in Trenton.

Two, squandering recent investments, as you heard earlier just last year, taxpayers funded an 11.5 million dollar modernization of the Science Center , and now we plan to demolish that very facility, wasting resources, and betraying public trust.

Three, redundant athletic facilities.

You propose a second football field when there’s one less than half a mile away.

And four, silent decisions and unheard communities.

People are already pissed off, that the federal government is going rogue and making decisions without their input and best interest.

Imagine knowing something similar is going on in their backyard.

If the district sent me a notice tomorrow saying, I must leave, I would fight to the very end, and that’s why I’m here on Thursday, you will vote on condemning only a handful of homes left .

I urge you, halt this plan. Honor the commitments you made to voters, safe, modern schools, not mass demolitions, and displacements, and shoes transparency over secrecy.

Don’t condemn these homes when you force a retinite out, you’re sending a warning to every neighbor.

None of us are safe.

Thank you for listening. ,

(Board President:). Next is Margaret Perez.  Brower?

(Twelfth Speaker:)

Hi, my name is Margaret Perez Brower and I’m making a comment on the Renton High School expansion project .

I’m a homeowner in South Renton and I’m also professor of political science at the University of Washington.

I received a master’s degree in higher education from the University of Michigan and a PhD in political science from the University of Chicago.

I’ve consulted with public schools in Medford, Massachusetts to help embed curriculum across social studies, English language arts that empower young people to get involved in community engagement and activism.

I also published several articles on pedagogical approaches to support student learning , Fit builds efficacy and agency.

I share this history with you because I want to communicate that I am deeply invested in the education of young people, especially young people in Renton.

I mean, my heart melted listening to the seniors up here talk about their school , and I am all for giving them resources, and especially resources for librarians, I want to echo that.

And I do support the 2022 referendum to provide more funding for students , but I strongly oppose the expansion project.

What a horrible example the school board has set for its students, that people in our community are disposable for the sake of a plan that only adds marginal value to the educational experiences of RHS students.

This is not justifiable for displacing people from 32 homes, forcing treasured local businesses like El Kiasco to relocate, and ending a development plan to provide much needed housing with the Dreamliner apartments .

You’ modeling to RHS students that people in this community are disposable, and I’m here to tell you that they’re not.

You’re using your discretionary power to implement an expansion project that we did not vote for support, and I urge you not to condemn the remaining, I think, one home now , but it was supposed to be for tomorrow.

It’s It’s admirable that in spite of bullying coercion and no real efforts to work with them on an alternative plan, that these community members have remained persistently strong in holding on to their homes.

Today, I stand with them because when you displace one of us , you displace all of us.

This sets of precedent for removing reinis from their homes, for plants that don’t have full community buy in, and do not reflect the voting interests of residents.

And this particularly precarious political moment, with a volatile economy, high mortgage interest rates, instability and inflation, and the swaring prices of goods , I’m asking that you do the right thing, that you don’t condemn these homes and then, most importantly that you reevaluate this project with full community engagement in Bayin.

I am so incredibly supportive of education and young people and giving more resources to RHS to improve the educational experiences in their safety , but not like this and not under this leadership.

If pride, tradition, and excellence truly are the core principles of this school, as I heard from the students, then I do not believe that this plan aligns with those values.

Please make the right decision.

Don’t condemn these homes and please take a moment to reevaluate the plan and bring in real community members to give them by in.

Because if you move forward with this plan, I will not forget it, and we will make sure everyone in this community remembers what you did and hold you accountable.

And if other folks today, want to join us in our cause, we have an online petition.

You should feel free to see me afterwards if you want to sign it.

Thank you.

(Board President:)  Thank you.  Next is Meredith Farmer.

(Thirteenth Speaker:)

Hello.

Good evening.

Um, thanks for the opportunity to speak.

Uh, I want to first thank everybody for coming out and sharing your concerns tonight, whether it’s about the librarians.

I did not know that we were cutting librarian services, and that’s really sad.

So I always appreciate appreciate the opportunity to be educated by folks who come out to share their concerns.

So thank you for that. .

I don’t have anything else to add about the Rentton High School Ex expansion other than I am here to add my voice to the chorus of everybody who’s unhappy with how this project has played out.

I heard the Renton High School students tonight, you know, speaking about their aspirations, and I heard you all asking them to come back to the community .

And what why would they want to come back to a community that is now being taken away from the residents?

This is not the way to do it.

And I think that we’re asking for your help because you all have the power and we don’t.

And we’re not asking you to stop the work on the high school.

We’re just asking you to reconsider the plan and reconsider what we can do to save housing at a time where we’re desperate for housing and preserve what we can and still move forward with increasing, you know, the services that we had for the kids.

So thank you for listening.

Okay.

Let me make sure this system’t work.

Yeah.

Thank you.

(Board President:). Next is Albert Engel?

(Fourteenth Speaker:)

Hello, my name is Albert Ingle.

Um, I’m a homeowner here in South Rinton, and I have the privilege of teaching a lot of your students at South Seattle College.

A lot of her students come from Tuquila and Renton, and it’s a wonderful thing I get to do.

I teach engineering specifically, and I tell you this because it’s important to what I’m here to talk about.

As an engineering structure, I talk about the lasting impacts of design decisions on the built community, and the disparate negative effects that it has on poor communities, especially communities of color.

I speak of the power and the obligation that engineers, city planners, other designers, and government officials like yourselves wield in creating a built environment that serves us all.

So I’m here to speak about, and I’m here to urge you to to stop the downtown, to stop the image domain of these homes and businesses for the high school expansion project .

The plan to image a domain, 32 homes and businesses in the downtown neighborhood as a direct effect on the affordability and livability of our neighborhood.

It sets a dangerous president for the local government that I can no longer ignore .

Destroying homes and a Latino owned business like El Kiasco to expand the athletic fields for high school so close to Memorial Stadium, and replacing a building after multiple million dollar retrofit projects, including one as soon as like last year .

It’s It’s gross misuse of the taxpayer dollars that were entrusted to your care as the school board.

And I urge you to reevaluate this process, find other alternatives, and ensure that you have community wide by in for this project.

Do not take homes to expand a sports field.

I ask you to do your duty as elected officials to help ensure and build a community that serves all of us.

Thank you.

(Board President:). Thank you.  Next is Jada Campbell.

(Fifteenth Speaker:)

Good evening, My name is Jada Campbell.

I am a South Renton homeowner while I support the ballot initiative to provide safe modern facilities to enhanced learning .

I strongly oppose how the school board is using these funds to expand Renton high school.

I do not support your plan to demolish 32 single family homes and eight businesses, placing our fellow retites from our community , demolishing the science center, remodled in 2024 that meant taxpayers paid 11.5 million for and constructing a redundant football field when there’s one less than a half mile away.

When I was in high school, a STEM program changed the course of my life .

It opened my eyes the possibilities I had never imagined.

A degree in computer science at Johns Hopkins University, a career on the tech industry at Microsoft, and a sense that I belonged in spaces that I, as a black woman, was never expected to enter .

For students of color, at Renton High, the science center of represents more than a building is a sense to see themselves in science and medicine, and engineering.

To demolish that space, is to deny those students the same shot that I was given.

Athletics matters sure, but they cannot come at the cost of academic equity and community stability .

I beg of youe to consider what you’re telling these students. Mostly children of color, much like the outstanding seniors that I saw at earlier tonight, that their new science center, their new opportunity will be demolished in favor of playing ball .

You’re going forward with an expansion project we did not vote for support.

We voted for a new facility or for improved infrastructure, not for wasteful spending, for marginal improvement athletics.

Today, I urge you not to condemn the remaining four homes or apparently one, on Thursday.

Today I stand with them because one you displace one of us, you displace all of us.

Thank you.

(Board President:). Thank you next is Harris Melik.

(Sixteenth Speaker:)

Hello everyone, my name is Harris and I am a homeowner in South Renton .

I remember when I got the ballot for the expansion or at the time, the purchase of a new site, and I read it and I was happy, I read through it, I loved what it was entailing for the students a new opportunity, a new campus, something beautiful.

I thought, “Of course, everyone would support this.

And then I never heard anything years passed, fast forward to just a little while ago, I was driving and saw the Boarded up homes , and I saw one and two, and then I thought, “What’s going on?

Why are these homes like this?”

And I looked into it.

And then I read about the changes from a new site to an expansion, taking people’s homes from out under them to expand, and I wanted to give the benefit of the doubt.

I wanted to say, there’s got to be a good reason.

And then I see the plans and it’s just expansions of fields .mion Memorial is right there.

It’s it’s literally half a mile away.

There’s no reason for this.

It’s not practical. Doesn’t make sense.

And it’s a lie, a blatant lie to what we voted for.

If you had put on the ballot that you wanted to demolish 32 homes for a field, I went to voted for that.

I don’t know anyone who would.

I I feel betrayed as a voter, I feel betrayed as a resident, and I feel ignored, undervalued, and cut out of the conversation.

I feel like this is a misappropriation of funds and I can echo the numbers, the wasteful spending, all these aspects, but ultimately, I just feel betrayed and lie to.

I feel cut up from my own community .

I moved here in 2021 and I loved Drenton, and I just think, what if I bought one of those homes instead?

What if within a year of moving here, someone told me I had to leave Renton?

I couldn’t get another home.

I don’t know where I would go, what I would do , and with everything going on in the world, pulling their homes from them is laughably, comically evil.

It’s a lie, it’s a betrayal, it’s a displacement of rentonites.

I I condemn this, and I ask you to condemn this.

And I don’t know what can be done.

I know it’s very late in the process, but I hope you do something.

I hope that you make your voices known because we all spent hours of our time to be here to say that this is wrong .

And if a ballot went out today, everyone would be saying that.

And I asked that you echo our voices, because you represent us.

When you displaced one of us, you displace all of us.

Thank you for your time.

(Board President:) Thank you.  Next is Dominic Williams.

(Seventeenth Speaker:)

Good evening, I am a student at Albert Talley the Albert Talley High School, and I come to talk about the Renton High School expansion.

I’m not here to chastise you because I can understand that everything you do you do for me is a student .

You do for rent in high school.

I saw these amazing seniors.

Some people I hope to be one day, I guess next year.

But when I what I do see is people being displaced from their homes, people 32 family single family homes, and eight businesses for a couple of fields, which I can understand, but if we’re talking about people that need fields, my school has never had an updated field, my school has not been given the funding that rents in high school has.

And if we’re talking about equity and a presentation I’ve heard from Matt was that the students feel it they weren’t equal , that they were not treated the same, or they had a smaller campus, that could be the exact same for my school.

And if we’re giving 400 million, I may have got that number wrong, to build some fields, where is the funding for other schools that have not had the same rights, same equality ?

And I prepared a speech day to talk about all the things that I’ve heard from this initiative, but I decided, I just want to talk to you as people and reach your humanity on with everything that’s happening in the world.

I want to go into political science, and for some reason, I want to be a politician .

And right now, displacing people that they don’t know where they’re going to go.

They don’t know how they’re going to afford a home from what I’ve heard in my generation.

I won’t be able to afford a house.

It’ll be nearly impossible.

These people we have heard at our meetings have lived there for 50 years.

Veterans that are on veteran income taking care of their families and displacing them for a high school field , in my head doesn’t make sense.

And I’m sure there isn’t there are facts that I don’t know.

I’m sure there are some things that you guys are doing, and I know it’s all for our students and our education.

I know that everyone here is to here to help our students .

But when we take away these houses and we, for my view, misuse funds, specifically, to take away librarians like my librarian Miss Huff, that really hurts me as a student, and I know you guys are supposed to be here for me, but right now, I don’t feel hard , and rent and high school students that I’ve spoken to are shocked to hear what’s going to happen. Specifically.

I know everyone’s mentioned El Kyosko.

That’s a staple in our community, and that brings our community together.

And when we break it apart and we take those businesses in those homes , what is our community of renton going to be?

What is our students gonna feel when they come up and be at their standing seniors?

Thank you.

(Board President:). Thank you.  Last is Juliana D.

(Eighteenth Speaker:)

Thank you.

Members of the board, Superintend Patunod, Julian Dobel., listening to the folks here tonight.

Uh, a couple words are just ringing in my head, and so I’ve been writing comments about these words.

Restorative and transformative justice .

This is the only way forward.

It’s easy to hide behind.

Information that the public, parents, educators do not know for you to ignore their concerns.

It’s easy to hide behind our ignorance, but the fact that the cuts are not a thing our community is aware of speaks volumes of our district , having apparently no desire to be part of our real community.

As a union leader and educator, it’s hard work, educating people who are experiencing the crisis of capitalism about these complex processes and rules that we’ve set for ourselves to do with that democratically, it takes time.

It is hard.

It’s aging me.

You are not equipped to do that.

That’s not your fault.

It’s the way our electoral system is designed, but restorative and transformative justice is the only way forward.

The impossible decision to find a site to rebuild Bren High School.

That interses with economic and equality because housing justice is ignored in our democratic system.

Elected leaders in late stage capitalism are expected to solve problems that are legit unsolvable.

The scale of wealth in a polity is absurd.

Our brains can’t understand it.

So tax justice is a thing, that cuts to our incredible librarians, our facilitators, our mentors, our assistant predible principles, our CTE tech analysis, and Amani, behavior interventionist, HR.

All of these things are impossible for us to understand .

And the question is, how are we going to foster community?

If it’s all we can do to build up a society that cares for people, I ask you today, the impacts of the cuts are something we need to contend with as a community.

They’re not yours to solve.

They are ours to solve.

I bottom line a rally in Olympia today And because of brave activists willing to sit in, Governor Ferguson’s office, we got to talk to the Chief of Staff .

And I threw down and forced him to consider that the cuts to our incredible educators mean that kids who have suicide ideation are going to fall through the cracks.

These cuts are literally, literally, potentially going to end lives.

We gave you an immigrant protection resolution, and I’m asking you now, have you read it, and how are you going to respond?

You are the front line of democracy, and we are right now civilly letting you know that we care far more for our kids than we do for the system that got us here.

When a deep blue state, like Washington, is threatening even more cuts because billionaires are not paying their taxes, know that we are going to use our power to make sure that parents are meaningfully engaged and educators are valued.

I believe that RSD Aben and the board care deeply, but you are all stuck in a hierarchical system of power where you think that because you’ve been elected or because you have a degree in power and a huge salary, that your power will last, it won’t.

Our power is our labor, so please lean in to what we are desperately asking for , because asks turn into demands.

And when they’re ignored, demands turn into something else.

Right now, REA is bargaining and we are making incredible progress, but your power does not lie in your election.

Your real power is to solve problems and let us show up , restorative and transformative justice under a fascist federal government, you are still the front line of democracy.

You can radically accept that fact and use it to improve the fabric of the people in Renton.

Or you can continue on status quo.

Listen tonight, go home, ignore us we’re not going away.

Last thing to the eloquent young man.

There’s a huge difference between leaders and politicians.

Thank you.

(Board President:)

Thank you, and thank you all for coming out this evening.

We have heard you.

We do take you seriously, and we do work with the superintendent to address the issues that come forward .

So, thank you for spending your evening with us.

I know it’s a lot.

Okay.

Author’s note: As mentioned at the start of this voice-to-text transcript, it was done electronically and does have transcribing errors.  It’s just intended to give a written understanding of what is in the attached video files.  If anyone wishes for me to correct this transcript in any way, please leave a comment with the desired correction.