The $56.5 million project to build a new Santa Rosa City Schools district office will include a dramatic re-envisioning of facilities for the district’s 18-22 transitions program that serves students with special educational needs who have matriculated out of Santa Rosa high schools.
The program, currently serving about 70 students, is geared to give students tools for independent living and entering the workforce.
An unintended consequence of that development, on the south side of Santa Rosa High School, off Ridgway Avenue, appears to be the demolition of a more than four year-old volunteer-run garden for the transitions students that currently sits in the middle of the district office parking lot.
Christopher Chung / The Press Democrat
Gardener Curtis Short, left, plants a rose with students Peka Logeai and Colin Heinlein in a community work transition class in a garden at Ridgway High School in Santa Rosa on Monday, Jan. 31, 2022. (Christopher Chung / The Press Democrat)
Chad Surmick/The Press Democrat
Kylie Morris, a student in Santa Rosa City Schools 18-22 program with special needs prunes a vine in the programs garden, Wednesday, Dec. 7, 2022. The program is for students who have earned a certificate rather than a diploma, because of their needs but focus on life skills and job readiness. (Chad Surmick/The Press Democrat)
Chad Surmick/The Press Democrat
Uziel Santiago gets a little help from teacher Pat Seddon in the 18-22 program’s garden using a leaf blower, Wednesday, Dec. 7, 2022. The program is for students who have earned a certificate rather than a diploma, because of their needs but focus on life skills and job readiness. (Chad Surmick/The Press Democrat)
Chad Surmick/The Press Democrat
Peka Logaoi, trims tree branches while working in the 18-22 program’s garden, Wednesday, Dec. 7, 2022. The program is for students who have earned a certificate rather than a diploma, because of their needs but focus on life skills and job readiness. (Chad Surmick/The Press Democrat)
Christopher Chung / The Press Democrat
Peka Logeai, left, and Aliyah Pulido separate soil from crab grass during their community work transition class in the garden at Ridgway High School in Santa Rosa on Monday, Jan. 31, 2022. (Christopher Chung / The Press Democrat)
Christopher Chung/ The Press Democrat
Peka Logeai, left, and Aliyah Pulido examine a carrot they dug up during their community work transition class in the garden at Ridgway High School in Santa Rosa on Monday, January 31, 2022. (Christopher Chung/ The Press Democrat)
Chad Surmick/The Press Democrat
Pat Seddon, left, helps Lily Wilkening cut marigolds in the garden of the 18-22 program, Wednesday, Dec. 7, 2022. The program is for students who have earned a certificate rather than a diploma, because of their needs but focus on life skills and job readiness. (Chad Surmick/The Press Democrat)
Christopher Chung / The Press Democrat
Anthony Briseno works on removing a dead tree from a garden at Ridgway High School during a community work transition class in Santa Rosa on Monday, Jan. 31, 2022. (Christopher Chung / The Press Democrat)
Christopher Chung / The Press Democrat
Gardener Patricia Seddon, right, talks with community work transition class students Aliyah Pulido and Pka Logeai at Ridgway High School in Santa Rosa on Monday, Jan. 31, 2022. (Christopher Chung / The Press Democrat)
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Gardener Curtis Short, left, plants a rose with students Peka Logeai and Colin Heinlein in a community work transition class in a garden at Ridgway High School in Santa Rosa on Monday, Jan. 31, 2022. (Christopher Chung / The Press Democrat)
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Since 2022, volunteers, led by certified arborist Curtis Short and his wife, Pat Seddon, have developed a working garden that has been incorporated into the 18-22 curriculum, particularly with teacher Melanie Charter’s students. In addition to trees, flowers and vegetables, the garden features a handmade wooden bench, a wood arbor, a shed and tools as well as a Patrick Amiot sculpture.
While Charter welcomed the new facility for her students and fellow teachers, she said the existing garden — described as an oasis in the middle of a paved space — has proven to be a second classroom. It will be sorely missed, she said.
“It means a lot. It will be revealed over time, once we don’t have it,” she said. “There is just a lot of independence building, a lot of skills for the students, a lot of community building between the students and staff and volunteers, the community supporting our garden and getting us out into the community at the farmers market, selling things that we grew.”
Charter credited Short and Seddon for leading the charge for years to develop the garden and bring in community investment and volunteers to the site.
“There is no way that this could have happened without Curtis and Pat,” she said. “They were the force behind everything. They were so consistent, supportive and inventive.”
The new district office headquarters is part of a $129 million roster of facilities and campus upgrades underway or in the immediate pipeline. Bond funds approved by district voters in 2022 are paying for the work.
Still, Short and others connected with the garden expressed outrage that plans to remove the green space were going forward despite years of work and thousands of dollars of donated funds and equipment. Short argued that district officials did not adequately communicate their plans.
“We have never been informed that our garden was truly destined for removal,” he said, noting that his last official communication over the site’s future was in 2024. “I was never given a time from then that this development is moving forward.”
Short did get notice on March 25, when he was told via email that volunteers should remove items they want to save prior to a mid-April construction start. That is far too little warning for volunteers to have a chance to save many items, backers said.
Erik Oden, executive director of district facilities, maintenance and operation, acknowledged the disappointment, but said the district office replacement project has been widely and publicly discussed and has been in the works for years.
“The volunteers aren’t happy. I don’t blame them, but it’s part of what the 18-22 people wanted,” he said.
Garden backers expressed particular pain over renderings included in the district’s facilities master plan that show the garden will be paved over to make way for a staff parking lot. But Oden countered that site plans have evolved since they were published in 2023. A different architect now leads the project and the exact locations identified in the renderings are not accurate, he said.
A building is slated to be located where the garden exists today, he said.
Plans for a garden area on the new site did not impress Short.
“It was tens of thousands of dollars of community support, from community individuals to build this garden, on top of many skilled professional builders who donated their time,” he said. “I do not think Santa Rosa City Schools is going to put in those resources.”
Supporters have also raised concerns that removal of the garden, as well as a number of bird boxes this past week, is in violation of the California Migratory Bird Protection Act.
Charter, while excited for the program’s upgraded facilities, said she and her students will miss the existing green space.
“It’s going to be really heart-wrenching to lose it,” Charter said. “I don’t know how I’ll feel in the end. It’s really beautiful and it’s such a beautiful spot and it feels sad to me that it wasn’t important enough to try to work around.”
You can reach Staff Writer Kerry Benefield at 707-526-8671 or kerry.benefield@pressdemocrat.com. On Instagram @kerry.benefield.
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