Las Vegas is back, baby. After getting slammed by the Great Recession, the city today is seeing rising home sales, solid job growth and a record number of visitors in 2014.stru
But the economic rebound has exacerbated the city's severe school overcrowding and left school administrators, lawmakers and parents scrambling.
Giant dump trucks and earth moving machines groan and spray dust just behind Robert Forbuss Elementary, in the desert on the edge of southwest Las Vegas.
They're piling rubble and dirt as if they're constructing a dam for an imagined waterway. But this is not part of normal building. The developer wants these new homes elevated for better views of the Vegas casino strip.
"They're building these crazy houses here. I mean it's just ridiculous," says 70-year-old retired geologist Charlie Hauntz, standing in the school's dusty playground. All the kids call the recess volunteer Grandpa Charlie. His grandkids used to go here. Now he's part of the school's fabric.
[For more of this story, written by Eric Westervelt, go to http://www.npr.org/blogs/ed/20...d-struggling-schools]
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