As the debate for Irvine’s fifth High School continues to rage, it’s been fun watching the proponents of Site A, near the Musick Jail slated for expansion, and Site B, within the Great Park, have this battle of FUD on the other’s choice. FUD, of course, an acronym for “Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt.” For Site A, its proximity to Musick is enough for me to believe the site is unacceptable and others point to Site A’s proximity to a capped dump which may or may not have toxic waste. Those against Site B suggest that 24 buried canisters that stored who-knows-what makes Site B unacceptable. There’s lots of booga booga on both sides.
Who do you believe?
Dr. Harvey Liss, one of Irvine’s progressive gems, is never shy about sharing his opinion on anything. While he’s been a big supporter of Irvine’s progressive city council members for years, he was a vocal critic of the proposed El Toro airport, he’s spoken out on behalf of the city’s LBGT community, and is as pro-education as they come.
Harvey is a PhD. He has just released an extensive environmental analysis of the proposed new Irvine High School #5 Site A near the Musick Jail and you can read it in full here. Harvey did this for free, using documents and research from the Department of the Navy, the Irvine Unified School District, and other publicly available documents to write a huge report.
Now critics of Site B will point to Harvey’s relationship with and support of Agran and Krom to paint the report as biased. And when that argument is made, well these people really don’t know Harvey that well. Harvey doesn’t take orders or directions from anyone. He sees this argument about where to place the new school as one where residents and voters need the truth. So he set out to find it.
Harvey’s report is exhaustive and long. But its hard to argue with the facts. Scientific facts are true whether you believe them or not.