County Administrator Dr. Erika Torres continues to misrepresent the truth to Inglewood residents and taxpayers about the pending closure of an elementary school in Morningside Park. During a meeting on a pending school closure, it is believed either the principal or the district ended the meeting while a community member was speaking.
Warren Lane Elementary School is scheduled to close in June, and the district claims to have no idea what they are going to do with the property. Roughly 60 people were on the meeting, with many residents stating the district failed to notify them a decision was made to close the property.
“I have put this information in my newsletter that went out Friday,” said Torres. Here is the link to her Mar. 4 newsletter that made no mention of today’s 4pm meeting.
Residents were vocal about school bonds being levearged against their property taxes, to repair the schools, meanwhile the district is planning to close them.
“This is the last school in the 90305 zip code and you are playing games with the residents,” said Cindy Giardinia. “We’ve passed multiple bond measures on our property to pay for these schools.”
The last bond that was passed, did so under peculiar circumstances, that could be violations of Government and Election Codes. A complaint was filed with the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s office, who closed it within four days of receiving it.
An expose by LosCerritosNews.net looked at all of the money pouring into the “Pass Measure I” campaign, that came from outside city limits. The article also questioned whether the county administrator had the authority to call for a special election, that is typically the board’s job.

1. Can a county administrator call for a school bond instead of the local board?
“There are questions whether the law allows a County Administrator, instead of the Board, to sign off on Resolutions to implement a local tax measure authorizing the issuance of bonds, in this case, a huge bond.
California Elections Code Section 13100-13121, which govern ballot labels, has the word “local” in the citation seventeen times.
Section 13119(d)(1) says “For purposes of this Section (all of 13100), the following terms have the following meanings: Local governing body means the governing body of a city, county, city and county (thank you San Francisco), including a charter city or charter county, or district, including a school district.”
2. Did the ballot measure violate Election Code?
“the ballot label does not comply with Education Code section 15272; absent are the words “appoint a citizens’… committee” and “conduct annual audits”?
Election Code section 13119 provides for the exact statement “Shall the measure be adopted?” at the end of the label
IUSD’s Ballot Label violated the Election Code.”
The city of Inglewood pulled this same stunt last week when residents called into the council meeting to ask about the City’s finances, and participate in a scheduled public hearing related to federal funds from HUD.
“We hear all the time about updates on the Forum or SoFi Stadium, but I live down the street from a school and don’t know it’s closing?” asked a resident during the school closure meeting.
The District Attorney’s office left the door open for a civil lawsuit to be filed to challenge the legalities of the bond, and possibly prevent the school closure for failure to follow.
A representative from Rep. Maxine Waters office was on the call, as was a commissioner of George Dotson, however, residents were vocal that calls to his office are not returned and neither are their emails.
Here is a letter you can send to your local representatives about the County Administrator bamboozling residents out of their property taxes, to “fix” schools, that LA County Office of Education appears to have no intention of fixing.
Attn:
As a resident of Inglewood, I am incredibly concerned to learn of the planned closing of Warren Lane Elementary School. What’s more, I was disappointed to discover that no real actions were taken to involve the local community members (residents, students and parents of students) in the decision to close the campus.
With the successful passing of Measure I, residents expected elected officials to follow through with funding upgrades to classrooms, adding new technologies, incorporating vocational education, upgrading facilities and equipment, and repairing infrastructure – not shut our schools down. The details of these promises and more were outlined in the August 3, 2020 Special Virtual Board Meeting. The following is from the meeting agenda:
“Schools in Inglewood have less funding than schools in some other nearby communities. This measure will help fix this social justice problem by providing cleaner, safer, healthier and up-to-date schools, retaining and attracting quality teachers and providing 21st Century education to our young people so they have access to the tools they need to be prepared for college and to compete for jobs.”
With $240M guaranteed through Measure I, funds from LAWA and an additional $5M+ funding provided to the IUSD by the CA Department of Education, the thought of closing another one of our public schools is inconceivable.
I urge you to please take a closer look at the resources available to improve this neighborhood school rather than shut it down. Families in Morningside Park depend on local schools like Warren Lane to provide quality education to children and expect our local officials to make our education system a top priority.
Thank you for taking the time to read this email. I look forward to your response.
Here are the emails below of who you can voice your concerns to.
Inglewood Unified School District Board of Education
- Margaret Evans, M.A. – Board President – [email protected]
- Carliss McGhee, Ph.D. – Board Vice President – [email protected]
- Naomi S. Hammonds – Board Member (Area 1) – [email protected]
Inglewood Unified School District Admins
- Erika Torres Ed.D., MSW – County Administrator – [email protected]
- Raphael Guzman – Chief Business Official – [email protected]
- Bernadette Lucas, Ed.D. – [email protected]
- Noberto J. Perez – Chief Operating Officer – [email protected]
- Ufema Hosea – Executive Director of Elementary – [email protected]
- Joanna Clifton – Director of Early Education – [email protected]
- Dr. Dawnyell Goolsby – Exec. Dir. Of Federal & State Programs – [email protected]
- Leonardo Lopez – Exec Dir. Of Secondary Services – [email protected]
- Mike Orona – Deputy Chief Maintenance & Operations Officer – [email protected]
- Tiffany Egan – Director of Human Resources & Risk Management – [email protected]
- Jannette Gomez – Sr. Exec. Dir. Of Fiscal Services – [email protected]
City of Inglewood
- Mayor Butts – [email protected]
- George Dotson – [email protected]
- Dionne Faulk – [email protected]
Senate
- Senator Steven Bradford, District 35 – [email protected]
Congress
- Congresswoman Maxine Waters – https://waters.house.gov/contact/email (enter your zip code here to access her contact us page)
State Superintendent of Public Instruction
- Tony Thurmond – [email protected]
- Included because the CA dept of Educ. Provided IUSD a grant of $5M+ https://www.cde.ca.gov/fg/fo/profile.asp?id=5506&recID=5506
- Perhaps it wouldn’t hurt to also email these administrators:
- Categorical Allocations and Audit Resolution Office, [email protected]
- Categorical Allocations and Audit Resolution Office, [email protected]
- Media: c[email protected]
- Perhaps it wouldn’t hurt to also email these administrators:
- Included because the CA dept of Educ. Provided IUSD a grant of $5M+ https://www.cde.ca.gov/fg/fo/profile.asp?id=5506&recID=5506
9 Comments
The linked article below is from KPCC 2014. It spotlights the deplorable conditions at IUSD. As you can see, nothing changed from 1998 up to 2014.
https://archive.kpcc.org/news/2014/12/18/48758/inglewood-unified-filth-exposed-wires-roaches-stil/
At the end of the day, schools are a business with a budget. With that, I will leave you with one of the best business quotes my Economics professor gave me, “When a business is failing (IUSD) the first thing to go is the maintenance”. Just like a failing business, IUSD has to close some schools in order keep the remaining ones in working conditions.
Thank you 2 urban girls for bringing the potential closing to our attention – clearly administration has NO regard for this community.
Unfortunately for many years there have been many in positions of power who have fostered the mistakenly belief that the buildings are the problem with Inglewood schools rather than deal with their employment mistakes.
There seems to be a disconnect that the districts failures are not of the brick and mortar rather the human adults we have had making decisions impacting children’s lives from the district office.
It is humans in places of power (Superintendents, Human Resources, and School Board members) who have failed to hire qualified individuals who have a passion for educating and instead the choice has been to hire friends and family simply to make certain those adults received a regular paycheck.
Instead of finding those who encourage students to learn and set positive examples with moral integrity many on payroll disregarded their responsibilities knowing they would never be fired.
If proper hiring had occurred and termination for non-performance of duties-or- inappropriate actions …there would be no reason for parents to take their students to other schools!
A functional Human Resources Department would have dealt with the complaints of any employee dating students, employees providing /permitting/ smoking weed with students and the unsanitary bathrooms by terminating those doing what they should not, hiring sufficient numbers of janitors,or terminating those once hired who failed to meet expectations. Yes, terminating! Everyone from Superintendent to Janitors should be accountable for their performance especially around kids!
Unfortunately several of us have witnessed the unthinkable promoting rather than terminating those who did wrong often at the request of Board members !!!!!! “Ms Pee-Bucket” and “Mr kick the girl to the curb and move on tho the next one” – to intentionally not name (but strongly indicate) a few.
No matter how shiny and new the facilities are, it is the faculty and staff that teach (or don’t). And every bathroom should AT ALL TIMES be CLEAN yes that means flushed, scrubbed, mopped, Sanitary!
Let’s SAVE OUR STUDENTS and KEEP OUR SCHOOLS
Let’s IMPROVE THE QUALITY OF EDUCATION inside the fences and walls we own.
Hear Hear!!!
As a 42yr resident, ING High graduate (1998) and volunteer of IUSD (2001) I say burn it down and start from scratch. None of my family members that still reside in Inglewood send their children to IUSD. It was a mess in 1998 & 2001. Nothing but nepotism and miss treatment of children. We were literally treated like prisoners, called losers and OPENLY smoked weed with the staff.
The only teacher with any integrity was Dr Sanders, and he was openly hated by the administration.
So why do you keep giving them more money to fix the schools?
Because, not all Inglewood residents are as fortunate as me and my wife. Consolidating schools and uplifting/renovating the exiting ones makes BUSINESS sense. I want ALL children to have a good Education whether their parents can afford it or not. TOO many times I witnessed nepotism trump all.
One of the Janitors(Ex Con) was openly dating a student. But he was someone’s cousin.
We had no lockers or rest rooms, I had to walk/drive home to use the facilities. When I complained I was told to SHUT UP and GO TO CLASS.
I want an IUSD were every child has a locker, ipad and access to clean restrooms.
Thank you for sharing why you are so bitter!
No student should have been called names or discouraged from learning by any IUSD employee.
Family connections should NEVER provide okay-ness to openly break the law, age of consent is 18, and smoking anything (especially a then illegal substance) on campus should have swiftly earned those employees terminations and law enforcement attention for the child molestation.
Your comments show us how important it is for parents / and community to be involved rather than kept unaware.
If parents had spoken to regular school board meeting attendees they may have learned how to bring focus on the child molestation. Unfortunately far too many parents think being dismissed by the school board is the end of their options, while some are embarrassed to share for fear of retaliation or being called names themselves.
While IUSD employees definitely earned your anger please try to remember the buildings were not responsible for the very impactful wrong doing of humans and changing the walls would not make the abusers treat students differently.
It is the unprofessional humans that need to go.
Clean and Sanitary like teaching is accomplished with commitment to doing one’s job with honor.
The principle was Dr Crowe.
I personally witnessed him punching and kicking students during INGs race riots. Yes, this school was such a prison that we had RACE RIOTS every Cinco De Mayo and MLK Day.
Your INGLEWOOD HIGH experience of 24 years ago was obviously dreadful and should remind every teacher how significant their words and influence is !!
Indeed a few words can either set the tone for a lifetime of disappointment and/or anger or inspire a student to achieve world renown.
Perhaps it is that feeling of mistreatment that the rest of us should keep in perspective.
As far as we know employees dating students was not the norm especially at the elementary school which is the focus of the board meeting where residents were not allowed to express their feeling regarding the sale of school district AKA LOCAL RESIDENT property.
IUSD should be paying close attention: this one young man has put out there for the world and hopefully administrators everywhere to understand WHY at least one families experience has resulted in several students a generation later are attending non IUSD schools……this is why there is Declining Enrollment.
Did you really need to hire a full time person to figure this out?
He explained it in a few sentences – mistreatment, name calling, disregard for the law. We can sum it up with one little important word ….DISRESPECT!!!
Yep same thing Erica Torres did by limiting comments !
Apparently little Ms E’s disrespectful attitude is so contagious-even those who called asking how to listen to the meeting were treated to a substandard misnomered “public service” response from an employee who somehow got the message it is okay to be ungracious, rude and dismissive to a concerned tax paying resident.
Shall we Grade this administration:
Example Setting = Sorely needs improvement
Transparency = Lacks differentiation from opaqueness
Listening Skills = Completely Non-existent
Overall Confidence in ability to enhance Inglewood Educational Experience = Significantly displays lack of needed skill sets.
Concluding Remarks : Strongly recommend immediate separation