At the March 15 meeting of the Fremont Union High School District's board of trustees, word quickly spread that AT&T/Cingular Wireless had withdrawn its proposal to place cell phone antennas on the Monta Vista campus.

A public hearing on the issue, previously scheduled for the meeting, was canceled.

However, even with the cell tower a moot issue and the public hearing canceled, several parents still took to the microphone to criticize the district for even considering the proposal.

"[The withdrawal] is a welcome event to all involved, but all the parties are losers," said parent Dennis Yau. "We had to spend time and effort on this issue, and we should have spent that energy on our families."

Yau and other parents also said the district should pass a policy banning commercial deals on school campuses that are not educationally related despite possible economic benefits. "We want to prevent this from happening again in the future," Yau said.

The main criticism leveled at the board was that the district had erred in not communicating better with Monta Vista parents, especially by not letting them know earlier about the possible contract. Parents said AT&T had been planning the Monta Vista towers for a 1¹/2 years..

Cupertino's planning commission had approved the proposal before it even went to the school board. And the board's first discussion of the issue was supposed to take place on March 1.

That discussion was pulled from the March 1 meeting's agenda to allow for an AT&T representative to attend the next meeting and address parent concerns. The representative spoke at a forum for Monta Vista parents on March 8, where the public rancor over the proposal became obvious.

That rancor led to a number of parent-driven campaigns to prevent the approval of the cell phone towers, and board members indicated that they had heard from many of those parents via email.

But several board members also expressed concern over rumors that had spread about the cell antenna issue.

Board trustee Avie Katz said he had heard a rumor that he was actively promoting approval of the cell antennas, which he said wasn't true. Trustee Nancy Newton said she'd heard that the Asian American Parent Association was planning a boycott of the Fremont Union foundation's upcoming crab feed because of perceived personal agendas on the board.

"I saw that there were a lot of misunderstandings, and I think this shows the extent to which the rumors have spread," Newton said. Board members said they had never approved a contract with AT&T, which is what many in the community were saying.

All agreed that the situation proved that there is a broken link in the communication chain between the board and parents. Newton requested contact information for the Monta Vista group present at the meeting, and Homestead parent George Hamma approached the microphone to suggest that all the high schools send a PTSA representative to the board meetings as Homestead does.

"There's an email list with the agendas for the board meetings, and anyone can sign up," Hamma said.