Fresh from resolving a funding dispute with the city’s school division, the Richmond City Council is entering another education policy debate that could impact where children attend school, potentially reigniting smoldering tensions between officials.
At a news conference Thursday where several city leaders criticized the Richmond School Board for failing to pass a rezoning plan for River City Middle School, which is overcrowded by about 100 students, Councilwoman Ellen Robertson said she wants the city to “mandate” school rezoning across the district if classrooms at any school exceed a certain size.
A year after the School Board voted to wrest control of school construction from the city administration, the controversy over the middle school rezoning is once again raising questions about the independence of the school division’s governing body.
“I charge us to make it a policy that as long as we have capacity within the school system, that no …