District, Malibu Make Progress In School Separation Negotiations

MALIBU, CA – Negotiations to create an independent Malibu school district are progressing, city officials announced this week.

The city and the Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District have finished a draft of one of three key deliverables as part of the plan to separate Malibu and Santa Monica students and create two distinct school districts – Malibu Unified and Santa Monica Unified.

Here’s a summary of the updates Malibu Deputy City Attorney Christine Wood gave to the City Council on Monday:

•Officials have drafted a tentative revenue sharing agreement.

•They’ve outlined an operational agreement, which will detail what assistance Malibu will need from Santa Monica’s school district.

•They anticipate starting work in the coming weeks on a joint powers agreement, which will create a third-party public agency to aid in the transition.

“There has been progress since November,” Wood said. “I think the theme is it’s not progress happening as fast as we would like, but it is progress nonetheless.”

The negotiations are guided by a framework that both sides agreed to in November. At that time, officials said they could submit their proposal to the county by May. It would then go on to the California Board of Education and reach voters’ ballots in March 2024.

The most ambitious estimate for the creation of the two districts is July 1, 2024 – though it’s expected to take longer.

Officials will meet at a mediation session on March 21, Wood said.

Both city councils met in closed sessions this week to discuss district matters, at the Santa Monica Council meeting on Tuesday council members voted 4-3 to join the school district in an appeal against the Los Angeles County Committee.

Previously, the Santa Monica City Council voted to oppose a petition to require school trustees to be elected by district, rather than at large as required by the City Charter. This would ensure that people elected to the school board would have ties to either Santa Monica or Malibu.