MIRAMAR--Questions about the traffic impact of a larger building for Somerset Charter School prompted the City Commission to delay a review of the proposed site plans.

The school serves 75 students at a small building within the Vizcaya neighborhood, near Flamingo Road and Somerset Boulevard. It wants to build a facility with room for 800 students and use the current building for either a pre-kindergarten or kindergarten.

More than 30 parents attended a recent commission meeting to show support for the school. City staff had recommended approval of the expansion, assuming the school would not need its current facility once the new one was built.

The empty building could have been left to the neighborhood's homeowner association for use as a clubhouse.

The first traffic plan did not account for the charter school retaining both locations. That forced the commission to delay a decision, pending a new traffic study.

"It has nothing to do with trying to delay your charter school," Mayor Lori Moseley told the crowd.

Ruth Jacoby, principal at Somerset Charter School, said that because state money was used to build the current school, it is not allowed to give the building to the homeowner association.

"I can't just let it go," she said. "We're still investigating what we are allowed to do."

With 32 classrooms, a playing field and a play lot on 3.26 acres, the new school could serve 800 students from pre-kindergarten through eighth grade, Jacoby said.
The City Commission is expected to review the new site plan April 21.

(source) Sun Sentinel (Milton D. Carrero Galarza) 4-04-04