Proposed school closings in Grosse Pointe

[cramerro]

GP isn't perfect. It's schools are a major draw for families with kids. I grew up in GP, and have lived in Lansing area and western Wayne County - recently moved back for... the schools. It's pretty remarkable, based on many other pretty respectable districts [[Livonia, Birmingham, Southfield, Farmington, Redfords, etc) having had gone through major downsizing, that GP has never had to close a single school up until this point.

The News article that detailed this topic points out that demographics of one of the high schools [[North) is almost 30% African American [[SEMCOG regional average African American is 21.6%)- this isn't simply a district with one segregated elementary school, even if the community as a whole is still mostly white. As a planner I'll also toss in a hearty acknowledgement of the significant red-lining that took place for decades in the GPs in blatant, racially motivated segregation by institutions. There are many other threads that cover that universe of history.

Bottom line here is: people aren't having as many kids. Without the ability to add more houses to the total, even the best districts will see the decline. The GPPSS has gone through a very long process to get to the current state of recommendations, which includes responsible steps to make the district sustainable. If you look at a geographic distribution of elementary schools, I think they will/should close Mason, with Poupard and Ferry pretty evenly spaced to cover the north fifth of the district with still-walkable schools. It's a shame, too - Mason was built pre-depression [[1927) and is amazing from an historic architecture perspective - similar architecture to GP South HS, whereas Ferry and Poupard are 1950s-60s standard brick boxes. They will also probably close one or two schools in the south end of the district, hopefully with a similar approach to trying to maintain reasonable walkable elementary school coverage. They've gone through many iterations of grade-shuffling, specialty schools, etc. Enrollment can't support this many schools. Adjustments must be made.

As someone who has felt the life-long need to dis-prove the stereotypes of the GP community as a racist, snobby, entitled bubble of rich folks, I'd ask that you at least consider what I've said when forming your knee-jerk characterizations of school closings as racially motivated.