By Jeremy Walsh
A new elementary school in Ridgewood at the site of a former Rite Aid is the right way to go, Community Board 5 decided last week.
The board voted overwhelmingly in favor of the city School Construction Authority’s plan to construct the school there, although Walter Sanchez, chairman of the board’s Land Use and Zoning Committee, admitted they were giving the OK without seeing any site plans, which have not been drawn yet.
The SCA is still negotiating to acquire the property, which is across the street from Grover Cleveland High School.
“We’re giving a recommendation kind of blind in many respects to the plan,” Sanchez said, noting the board’s requests include a 16-foot-wide perimeter roadway to enable school buses to load and unload children without blocking traffic and priority zoning for children in PS 153 and PS 71.
CB 5 Chairman Vincent Arcuri voted against the proposal along with Manny Caruana and Sylvia Nappi.
“Once again, the School Construction Authority and the [city] Department of Education have failed to present the demographics to prove the need of this school and where the students are coming from,” Arcuri said, noting that much of the area has undergone a downzoning in recent years.
Caruana is an outspoken critic of the SCA and Nappi wants to see the old drugstore converted to a supermarket.
But those who showed up at the meeting to speak for PS 153 and PS 71 were pleased with the board’s decision.
“Both schools are at well over 100 percent in capacity and the crowding is affecting or has the ability to affect a lot of services,” said Peter Vercessi, vice president of Community Education Council 24.
Susan Yanez, parent coordinator at PS 153, warned that a recent residential development near BJ’s Wholesale Club on Metropolitan Avenue in Middle Village is in her school’s catchment area.
“If a school isn’t built on that Rite Aid site — and it probably won’t be a supermarket since no supermarket is biting — it’s going to be more housing, which will then add more students to PS 153 and 71,” she said.
CEC 24 President Nick Comaianni had previously expressed concern that the 600-seat school might not be constructed to accommodate students from kindergarten to eighth-grade. SCA Site Manager Chris Persheff said at last week’s CB 5 meeting that the school would be built to that standard.
Reach reporter Jeremy Walsh by e-mail at jewalsh@cnglocal.com or by phone at 718-260-4564.
