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Parents and survivors urge Gilroy and school district to update safety plans after bullying, transport complaints
Summary
Three public commentators urged the city and Gilroy Unified to update school safety plans, improve inclusion and respond to bullying, particularly incidents affecting students with disabilities and racially-based harassment.
Three members of the public used the meeting's public-comment period to describe personal experiences with bullying, harassment and special-education transportation conditions and to ask the city and district to update school safety plans.
Andrea Hightower read a statement from her daughter, Ariela Batshaw Hightower, who said she graduated from Gilroy High School and has struggled to trust after being interviewed by the FBI about the 2019 Gilroy Garlic Festival shooter. The written statement said the speaker was "shocked to hear that safety plans have not been upgraded since 2019" and described disability-based harassment that went unaddressed by school administrators.
Anna Mendoza, speaking as a parent, described a series of incidents in which her son was physically threatened and bullied, and she said district responses were inadequate. Mendoza said her son was arrested at home after bringing a BB gun to school following repeated harassment and was later released; she said school reports and video requests had not produced promised evidence. She asked the board and council to "please help us. Help us update the safety plan," and said previous drafts of a safety plan had been "thrown in the trash."
Heather Beard, who identified herself as a nearby resident, also spoke about park access and community use of fields adjacent to El Roble Park and El Roble School, asking for compromises to allow non-school-community use outside school hours.
Ending: Speakers asked both the city and the district to develop more proactive, inclusive prevention and safety plans and to engage parents and students in updates; trustees and council members noted the requests and said staff-level follow-up would be possible.
