Proposed District Secession Fans Racial Flames

By Lynn Schnaiberg

Officially, what some residents of Aptos, Calif., are attempting to do in the sprawling Pajaro Valley school district is called "reorganization." But many critics are calling it white flight.

Some 6,000 residents, about a third of the 18,000 registered voters in the largely middle-class communities of Aptos, Corralitos, and La Selva Beach have signed on to an effort to break away from the Pajaro Valley district, which stretches south into neighboring Monterey County. The roughly 17,500-student district is Santa Cruz County's largest and fastest growing, with Hispanic students making up most of that growth.

The biggest area that the breakup would leave behind is Watsonville, home to 33,000 residents and the district's administration. In recent years, the city has drawn more migrant workers from Mexico to harvest strawberries in area farms. But along with that growth, the area has lost many higher-paying jobs as...