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Zoning Procedures

Please take a moment to review the departmental procedure that will be used in determining the attendance boundaries for the Citrus County School District.

Planning and Growth Management

Department

   Sandra “Sam” Himmel, Superintendent of Schools

 Chuck Dixon, AICP, Director

352-746-3960

                                                  District Student Services Center

                                                     2575 S. Panther Pride Drive, Lecanto FL 34461

In response to provisions in 2005 FL Senate Bill 360 we have created a streamlined approach to evaluating the capacity conditions at each school on an annual basis.  This data is used to make decisions regarding new facilities, additional student stations at existing facilities, and attendance boundary changes.

All Florida school districts are required to have a Comprehensive Plan by 2008.  In addition, school districts must review new residential development proposals and determine if adequate facilities are in place, or will be in place, to meet the demands that the resultant new dwelling units will produce.  This is called “concurrency” (as it pertains to school facilities).

I.e., An adequate number of student stations must be in place to meet the demands of new residential development concurrently with the impact from such development.

When the School District issues a favorable concurrency determination to a developer, we are obligated to have student stations in place to serve the students who may live in the homes at the time the homes are occupied.  In order to do this we must look to our Comprehensive Plan and the Facilities Work Program to determine if new construction will by used to address the particular growth issue or if an attendance boundary change is necessary.

Each year we will look at the capacity status of all the schools in the District and evaluate the conditions in light of the Comprehensive Plan as well as development orders that are coming on line.  At this time attendance boundary changes may be initiated if warranted by any condition that may be causing capacity issues at one or more school. 

Attendance boundary changes allow for flexibility in shifting students to schools where capacity exists and away from schools that are over capacity.  This promotes a more efficient use of school space and a better learning environment for students.

The following is an overview of six guidelines we use for changing school attendance boundaries:

1.      The attendance map will be drawn using only the required objective statutory criteria.

2.      The School Board will have oversight of the process by seeing the proposed amendments both prior to any input received and after the public stakeholder input.  In addition, the School Board will have the option to hold additional public meetings if it is not satisfied that adequate input has been received in the amendment process.

3.      The parent input process will be a process modeled after the Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT).  This process will provide an individualized as opposed to group input process.  This approach will afford maximum access by people and will enable parents and community members to meet one-on-one with staff for the purpose of gaining knowledge, asking questions and providing recommendations.

4.      Comment cards and/or a transcription device can be used to record the input received from the stakeholders and a summary of this record would then be forwarded to the School Board along with the recommendation of District staff responsible for overseeing the mapping process.

5.      At the public hearing for adoption the School Board will receive a staff report provided by the Planning Department to outline the process that was followed to redraw the attendance boundaries and to summarize the input that was received from individuals who submitted formal input.

6.      A recommendation will be made by Planning Department and the School Board will then vote to accept the recommendation and adopt the attendance boundary map as proposed or send it back for a specific reason.  If it is not adopted it could go back to a previous step in the process etc.

This process is modeled after similar processes used in other school districts and it is designed to afford maximum public input.  It also allows for expedited review to address concurrency issues if warranted by a surge in student population in a particular part of the County.

If you have questions about current attendance boundaries you can view them at the following web page link:

http://www.citrus.k12.fl.us/pgm/DistrictMaps.htm

You can also access the VersaTrans System, which allows for more specific information based on a street address.  The VersaTrans Link is located at:

http://www.citrus.k12.fl.us/pgm/Zoned_School.htm

In high growth areas sometimes it is necessary to make adjustments to school attendance boundaries more often to ensure that classroom space is being used efficiently.  This promotes a better learning environment for students and better working conditions for school staff.  We will always try to look at growth issues comprehensively and seek to minimize the frequency of attendance boundary changes.