Letter: Citizens pay for poor school plan

Because of the poor location of the new Foothills High School in Henderson, its two current zoning proposals have students traveling up to 13 miles to attend school.

Some of these students live in walking distance of current high schools. Others live 2 1/2 miles from both Green Valley and Silverado high schools. In addition to the distance, students will be traveling on Lake Mead Drive, a road considered to be dangerous by many, especially when being traveled by tardy teenagers.

Adjacent to this new school is a campus of the community college, which concerns many parents whose freshmen daughters will be accessible to college men. The liberty given normally to junior and senior students to continue at their current high school has been extended to current freshman and sophomores.

Under the circumstances, the large majority will opt to stay put, causing Foothills High to unfortunately open with mostly freshman students. Unfortunately, there is no easy solution to the zoning of this school because it should never have been built in its current location.

The district made a mistake by not considering anything beyond donated land in making this decision, nor considering the busing costs which would be incurred.

They are now asking the taxpayers affected by these zones to pay the entire price for their mistake -- a price which I hope does not include the life of one of these students.

The parents in both of these proposed zones should stick together and refuse to send their children to this school.

Jeannie Waters

archive