Malibu City Council votes yes for separate school district in split with Santa Monica
The Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District is closer to splitting in two as the Malibu City Council voted to approve a proposed separation plan on Monday night.
The decision follows the Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District Board of Education's unanimous vote last week to break the nearly 70-year-old district in two.
Now, state approval is needed before the Malibu Unified School District and the Santa Monica Unified School District become their own entities.
Malibu Mayor Marianne Riggins says it's the right decision and the right time to have a Malibu Unified School District, as local control has been sought after for decades.
"This has been the end of a long negotiated time period between the district and the City of Malibu in order to create the Malibu Unified School District," Riggins said.
In 2015, the Malibu City Council formally pursued an independent district, and in 2016, the Malibu Unification Negotiations Committee was formed to implement a formal separation plan for SMMUSD.
After a decade of on-and-off negotiations, the official vote of approval came this week.
Supporters for an independent Malibu district have long argued that the needs of Santa Monica students overshadow the much smaller Malibu student body within the SMMUSD.
Malibu supporters say their rural community has unique needs, affected by natural disasters such as wildfires, and a smaller school system would lead to smaller class sizes.
"We think that having local control will allow us to make more nimble decisions, for our students and our families to respond to what's important to them," Riggins said.
Santa Monica officials had argued that the split would harm their schools, leaving them in financial distress. The separation agreements reached between the two parties provide a structure for dividing resources, assets, and liabilities to ensure fiscal health and educational success for both districts.
One part of the plan includes a Property Tax Revenue Agreement. Riggins explained it's a way to ensure that Santa Monica's students will be guaranteed funding as the transition is underway, so there won't be a sudden break in the amount of funds for both Santa Monica and Malibu students.
Both Santa Monica and Malibu will work together to secure special legislation and state approvals needed to complete the separation.
"It's still going to take some time," Riggins said. "We do need to work at the state level, there may be things that at the county level that we are going to encounter, so this is the first time that something like this has happened, so we are kind of laying some new groundwork."
