JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – Ortega Elementary parents say Duval County Public Schools is moving too fast and skipping its own process as the district pushes to consolidate the school into a rebuilt Venetia Elementary two years ahead of schedule.
The Duval County School Board is set to vote in August on closing Ortega Elementary and consolidating it into Venetia Elementary by 2028. That same meeting will also include a vote to designate the Ortega property as surplus. The timeline was previously set for the 2030-2031 school year.
Parents say district broke its own rules
Erin Stone, PTA president at Ortega Elementary, said the accelerated timeline caught the community off guard.
“It was surprising. And disheartening. Just, you know, I didn’t expect it to all of a sudden happen that fast,” she said.
Her husband Alex Stone, president of Friends of Ortega Elementary, described learning the surplus item had been placed on the district’s July agenda — before a consolidation vote had even taken place — as a “bait and switch.”
“To not follow this process that everyone else has gotten to follow is just basically like we don’t care about you,” Alex Stone said. “So that’s what we feel, betrayed, and feel like all of the effort that we put in for the last two years to try to engage and be cooperative and collaborative is just thrown out the window.”
Stone also said the community feels sidelined in a process that should center students.
“I feel like we’re being discounted as a community,” he said. “I feel like the value of the land matters more than the students’ education.”
Neighbors worry a 1,200-student school will gridlock traffic
Venetia Elementary, located off Timuquana Road, had 343 students enrolled last year. The rebuilt school would be designed to hold 1,200 students — more than three times its current population.
John Pratchios lives less than 600 feet from the school and says drop-off and pick-up traffic is already unmanageable.
“What you’ll have is people sitting 10 minutes stacked up and not being able to leave, get their kids into the line. And if we try to drive out, it’s virtually impossible,” Pratchios said.
He said the math on tripling or quadrupling enrollment simply does not work.
“If you get three to four times more traffic, parents dropping their children off and picking them up — already it does not handle with one-third to one-quarter the amount,” he said.
Pratchios believes even an expanded campus footprint won’t solve the problem.
“Even with the campus moving back further and having a lot more driveway space, there’s just going to be a lot more cars waiting in the driveway trying to turn left and go down Timuquana to get out. A larger quantity of cars is just going to make that 45-minute wait in the afternoons could be an hour,” he said.
He warned the situation could become dangerous.
“It will be a traffic disaster and increase the danger to the kids if any kids are walking home,” Pratchios said.
Questions about educational quality at a mega-elementary
Beyond traffic, Ortega parents say a 1,200-student elementary school raises serious questions about educational quality. Alex Stone pointed to the close-knit culture at Ortega that he says cannot scale.
“The principal knows everybody’s name here at Ortega, every single kid’s name, engages with them positively every single day,” Stone said. “There’s no way a principal can do that with 1,200 students — just no way.”
Stone also said no environmental or traffic studies have been conducted for the Venetia site.
“It’s dangerous. There’s been no environmental study. There’s no traffic study. The traffic’s gonna definitely back up onto Roosevelt. It’s really close to Roosevelt,” he said.
What the district says
Duval County Schools confirmed the timeline shift and provided two statements. Regarding the August vote, the district said:
“The Board will consider final action to close Ortega Elementary and designate the property as surplus at its August Board meeting. The surplus item was rescheduled from the July meeting so it could be considered alongside the school closure item during the same meeting in August. If approved, both actions would take effect in August 2028.”
On community engagement, the district added:
“We are grateful to the Ortega and Venetia school communities for sharing their feedback and concerns throughout this process. There are still important decisions to be discussed and finalized, and we look forward to continued engagement opportunities with our stakeholders.”
Duval County Schools has consolidated several schools over the past few years as part of an effort to address a budget shortfall of more than $100 million.