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# Santa Monica Madison campus could be elementary again
- URL: https://www.smdp.com/santa-monica-madison-campus-could-be-elementary-again/
- Published: 2002-06-12T15:00:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-23T00:19:48.000Z
- Author: Guest Author
- Tags: Opinion, Malibu, #archive-import

*By Flo Ginsburg*

Editor: Society fluctuates in relatively computable cycles. At some point, this neighborhood will once again be populated with enough school-age children to warrant the re-opening of the Madison School site as an elementary school.

Only 54 years remain on the lease to Santa Monica College. The estimated cost of the proposed theater project is $15 million. Divide by 54 (or 53 or 52, by the time it is built, for years of use left on the lease). The SMCC district will spend $277,778 per year for its use, and then possibly lose it when it is re-claimed by the Santa Monica-Malibu School District, with this lovely capital improvement for which they did not have to pay. Wouldn’t we all accept someone else providing such a grand capital improvement on our property?

SMC only recently paid to re-surface and stripe the current parking lot, install concrete medians, and plant the landscape. According to the proposed diagram, it was a waste of funds, as the parking spaces and landscape will be completely re-figured, requiring a total change in all of the above.

*Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on June 12, 2002.* [Read the original PDF.](https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/smdp%5Fbackissues/061202.pdf?ref=smdp.com)