***Thank you to the more than 900 of you who signed our petition! In the wee hours of the night on Monday July 11th, the City Council decided NOT to sell Cubberley in response to community concerns but to instead work closely with the Palo Alto Unified School District on the site's future. This will be a long and difficult process but this is the right time to start these very important discussions. You can read more about the meeting at:http://www.paloaltoonline.com/news/show_story.php?id=21777**

Do not sell or long-term lease the city’s Cubberley Community Center property to Foothill DeAnza Community College. We the undersigned ask the Palo Alto City Council not to write a letter of interest to sell or lease long-term the city-owned eight acres of the 35-acre Cubberley Community Center site to Foothill DeAnza Community College. Recognizing that the PAUSD Board of Education has stated they do not support a sale or long-term lease of the site because they expect the district will have need of all 35 acres for future middle school and/or high school growth, we also ask the City of Palo Alto and Palo Alto Unified School District to work together, as was done twenty years ago, to identify a mutually acceptable financial strategy to preserve this site in its entirety for current local community service use and future use as a public middle and/or high school. Cubberley Community Center is a successful and vital hub for local music and arts programs that serve hundreds of local residents. There is no alternative site for most of these programs in Palo Alto. The city’s Cubberley property is home to child care programs that serve 350 children and their families. It provides affordable space in a walkable, bikable central location where these types of services can flourish and enrich our community. In addition, it provides flexible conference and community meeting space, a small non-profit Chinese library and reading room, and tennis courts. The city’s long-term strategy to maintain Cubberley as a vital community resource has succeeded beyond expectations. While Foothill DeAnza College is a fine institution, the city’s 8-acre Cubberley property does not provide adequate space to accommodate Foothill’s required 700-1,200 parking spaces plus the required buildings for their Phase 1 and Phase 2 build out plans. (The entire Cubberley campus currently has 750 parking spaces.) Selling to Foothill would result in the devastating loss of these services and the flexibility to use this site to accommodate future public school enrollment growth. Please do not abandon our city’s long-term visionary strategy for this important community resource. Selling Cubberley in this moment, when the city is being pushed toward infill development that will increase demand for community services and school capacity, would be unwise. We ask Council not to sell Cubberley.