By Anna Pier
In deliberations lasting less than a minute, on January 27 four trustees of the Sonoma Valley Unified School Board voted unanimously to offer the MacArthur Park Charter School (MPCS) placement at the current site of Prestwood School for the academic year 2026-27.
Despite President Bell’s written affirmation the morning of January 27 that “staff is finalizing our facilities analysis to ensure that the District provides MacArthur Park with ‘reasonably equivalent’ facilities,” there was no mention of any staff analysis at this Special Session. Bell’s statement was a reply to the question of what the trustees would be using to guide their decision. The only Agenda item for the Open Session was Facilities for MPCS. When called on by President Bell, Acting Superintendent Rena Seifts put the entire issue onto the trustees, stating simply “We are asking the Board to direct staff where to put MPCS.”
There was no public comment in the room, but at least one person who wished to offer comment by Zoom, attempted to raise her hand online but was unable.
The Board discussion consisted of Trustee Landry stating that she was “curious if the Board has any ideas other than Prestwood?” President Bell immediately answered that he saw two options, Adele Harrison and Prestwood. He then asserted, without supporting information, that it would require “significant capital expenditure” to upgrade bathrooms for Kindergarten at the former middle school site; and he noted that Creekside is at that site.
Creekside Alternative High School has an enrollment of around 55 students, and is newly housed at that site since August 2025.
CA Education Code Section 47614 (Proposition 39) requires that a District provide facilities “reasonably equivalent” to those of other students in the District.
Trustee Anne Ching was not present for the vote. The four trustees who made the decision are David Bell, Gerardo Guzman, Catarina Landry and Jason Lehman. None of these four was elected in a competitive race. Also, they have no institutional memory regarding the two other charter schools’ facilities.
They did not acknowledge that Sonoma Charter School was provided the site of the former alternative high school, Agua Caliente School, requiring additional classrooms in the form of portables, and upgrades for K and elementary nor that Woodland Star Charter School, after two years under the charter of another District, and with a K-8 enrollment of 180, was offered as “equivalent facilities” a small lot alongside Altimira Middle School, consisting entirely of portables, with no multipurpose room. The site was also lacking adequate playground and had no playing fields.
That site, just south of Altimira, could accommodate the new charter school with no upgrades.
These are facts that the District could have provided these inexperienced trustees. The Board of Trustees appeared to completely ignore the extensive staff report prepared for them at the time of the consideration for approval of MPCS’s petition. Staff advised that the petition’s curriculum proposal was incomplete; and there were inadequacies such as only $57K budgeted for Special Education; and recommended the Board delay approval until all of these issues were addressed by the charter school petitioners.
The petitioners requested the site, and the new charter school’s name, MacArthur Park, indicates where it would be located.
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