The response was overwhelmingly in favor of letting the seals remain at the Children's Pool Beach.
Prior to the March 1999 City Council vote on the proposed
dredging, a 4th-grade student at Torrey Pines Elementary decided that if the
issue was over use of the Children's Pool, the children of La Jolla
at least should be consulted in the process. She gave 5-minute presentations
to the classrooms at Torrey Pines and to school assemblies at Bird Rock
Elementary and La Jolla Elementary, and then distributed ballots like the one
below to the students.
It should be noted that at that time, the issue seemed to be cast as
"seals stay or go"; the children voted essentially on whether, given only that
choice, they would rather use Children's Pool Beach for swimming or for
seal-watching. When you add the results of this vote to the thousands of signatures on pro-seal petitions collected elsewhere, the conclusion is clear: for the majority of La Jolla's children, letting the seals stay is the first priority if a choice must be made.
