2009-11-20 TPARKERSCHOOL - Laserfiche WebLink

Home

MELROSE: Okay, thank you. Good morning. COMMISSIONERS: Good morning. MELROSE: My name is Jeff Melrose. My address, 1405 Wainuenue in Hilo. IÓm a planning consultant whoÓs been working with Parker School through their master planning process and then through the permitting process to follow. What I would like to do this morning is getting into a conversation about the application and the permits, but IÓd like to start by letting Carl Sturges, the headmaster of the school, kind of address this conversation from the school perspective before we get into the details of kind of the land use issues. And John Ray who is a member of the board, both a neighbor and a parent, and actively involved in this process will provide some comments as we get through this. So let me just start by letting Carl talk a little bit about the school so you get the context of what this is and what kind of an organization and where their request is coming from. STURGES: Hello, IÓm Carl Sturges. IÓm the headmaster of Parker School. My address is 65-1221 Lailai Place in Waimea. And IÓve been Headmaster of Parker School now for eight years. Parker School began in 1976 as a community school. It currently has a student population of 251 in grades K through 12. About 60 to 70 percent of those students come from Waimea, with the balance coming from nearby communities and a gallant few who travel north from Kona. We have about 25 percent of our student who either carpool or ride the bus and we are, as you can tell from our map, smacked at the middle of Waimea, and we take that responsibility seriously. We think that because of the opportunities presented by our recent acquisition of the pasture land you see there from the Parker School Trust Corporation, we have the opportunity to provide improvements for our own students and also to continue to fulfill our role within the townÓs center. One of the more important aspects, I think actually, of this Use Permit application is our commitment to be part of the Waimea Trails and Greenways project, which would run along the south side of our property, and we are committed to providing a right- of-way to be arranged with the Waimea Trails and Greenways, which would run along the north side of the stream. And this is also, I think itÓs good for the town but itÓs also good for Parker School because it provides our students with a walkway into the school and doesnÓt involve going out on the major streets, and this would then connect up with the Waimea Trails and Greenways throughout the Waimea area. We also fill responsibility to be stewards of the stream. And I think itÓs a riparian classroom for our students, and so we see that as a real advantage to be bordered to the south by the stream. These are difficult economic times for Parker School as with the rest of the country. Our student body comes from families who are generally of modest means. We dropped the population in the school the last couple of years; two years ago we had 300 students; last year we had 275; this year we have 250. Almost 50 percent of our students are on financial aid. WeÓd receive a modest stipend from the Parker School Trust Corporation of whom year, and all of that money goes toward financial aid for our students. Despite the fact that we are going through difficult times we do have a clear sense of our own mission, and that is to provide a quality education for kids who live in the north end of the Big Island. And we are committed to maintaining a rigorous academic environment despite the fact that we are under pressure from the market. WeÓd rather get smaller than change w EXHIBIT A 8