By Lauren McSherry

The Los Altos Hills City Council spent $97,067 on its yearlong lawsuit against the Los Altos School District. The council dropped the suit last week.

The town sued the district, claiming the district needed a conditional use permit to operate private preschools at the former Bullis-Purissima Elementary School site, zoned for only public, not private, education. The district asserted that it did not have to comply with local zoning ordinances, according to state educational code.

When the district said earlier this year it would operate extended-day kindergarten classes at the Bullis site for the 2005-2006 school year, the announcement changed the grounds of the lawsuit, according to city officials.

“We decided to drop the lawsuit because the original conditions that precipitated the lawsuit have changed,” Mayor Breene Kerr said. “The district is operating a public school there and in general the private school type of operations never materialized or were prevented from locating in the facility by our lawsuit.”

Two private preschools occupied the Bullis site for the 2004-2005 school year, according to Superintendent Tim Justus.

“The council achieved its objectives,” Kerr said. “(The Bullis site) should be used for public education. That was the bottom line of our lawsuit. The district abandoned plans they had to bring in private operators.”

Kerr added, “We could have continued prosecuting our lawsuit. We might have won a temporary victory, but we felt there wasn’t anything to be accomplished, and we felt there were benefits on both sides to dropping the lawsuit.”

He spoke optimistically of the possibility of reopening a public school in the Hills. “It’s a very different picture than when we filed the lawsuit,” he said. “The extended-day kindergarten is operating, there’s talk of a magnet school. That was not the situation when we filed the lawsuit.”

Los Altos Hills lost its last remaining public school in 2003 when the district board voted to close Bullis elementary. The closure set off a battle between the city council and the district over public education issues.

Redistricting resurfaces

In other Los Altos Hills news, the public education committee is expected to request money from the city council tomorrow to hire an attorney to examine options for redistricting.

Hills elementary school students are split between Palo Alto Unified School District and Los Altos School District. Hills high school students attend either Gunn or Los Altos High. It is unclear how a shift in student attendance and tax dollars would affect local school districts.

“There is a general feeling that we ought to know what the facts are, how our residents would be affected and what the ramifications are in terms of the current flow of students to school,” Councilman Craig Jones said. “The council is not endorsing redistricting, and even if the council approves the allocation, it is no indication that the council has decided to endorse redistricting.”