by marvin J Ramirez
Marvin J. Ramirez
This is not going to be the first time that community activist Mauricio Vela is calling on the neighborhood for support for his brainchild cause to keep a 25 preschool children in a proposed site at the Bernal Public Library branch.
Vela is asking for support to attend a protest on Wednesday, Feb. 20 at Paul Elementary School to denounce Mayor Newsom’s take back of $425.000, which took three years of meetings, hearings, support card collection, petitions, pickets, e-mails and phone calls, when the Board of Supervisors Budget Committee voted unanimously on June 2007. It then recommended to the full board $500,000 for a new Bernal Preschool, thanks to District 9 Sup. Tom Ammiano.
The main opposition has done everything in their power to negate this effort and rather send the children to another site at a different school.
The Bernal Heights Public Library branch is one of 19 neighborhood libraries slated for renovation over the next five years, under a $106 million modernization program approved by voters in 2000.
Under this program the library will modernize its facility by replacing its electric system to handle more personal laptops, better lighting, a ramp and an elevator to provide easy access to everyone, and strengthen its capacity to withstand an earthquake.
However, the plan leaves out the preschool that has been located in the library for 27 years.
Although both sides of the argument have brought their own architectural plans – one with it and the other without the preschool, advocates for both sides continue pressing on the issue.
Bernal Heights Preschool
The preschool offers a free, half-day program for children ages 3 to 5 years old. It serves poor families that cannot afford to pay for private nursery schools. The preschool, which has been at the library since 1981, is staffed by two teachers and four parent volunteers, opens in mid-August and ends its school year at the end of May.
Vida Sanford, a spokeswoman for Parent Voices, an advocacy group representing the preschool, said the families, most of whom are Latino, have felt left out of the decision-making process, quotes a San Francisco Chronicle’s report.
Mauricio Vela
“We would like to have an open and creative conversation about how the space can be re-envisioned,’’ Sanford said.
“We’ve gotten tons of e-mails and calls — a demonstration of support by large numbers of the Bernal community, which is really quite upset. Bernal is really proud of the preschool. It is a gem in the community. It is a reflection of the synergy that’s taken place because it’s in the library. It’s like a gateway to education,’’ Sanford said.
Why can’t those who oppose the children site at the library feel blessed with the presence of children? After all, by allowing them to remain at the library, we will be fomenting in these future citizens, the good habit of visiting the library, something is being lost now through computer use and school dropout among our youth.
