APTOS — Barbara Palmer surprised Pajaro Valley school district watchers last week when she chose not to run for a seat on the school board. But the education activist said she’ll still work to create a new school district in the Aptos area.

Though she has fought for splitting the Pajaro Valley Unified School District in bitter public debates, Palmer said the prospect of a bruising election battle convinced her not to run for the vacant Area 6 trustee seat.

And though she could have averted the costly election by withdrawing her name from consideration at a July 28 board meeting, Palmer said she is “horrified” the Pajaro Valley district will spend $25,000 to $30,000 on the November balloting.

“It boiled down to politics, and that’s the most disgusting, despicable thing there is,” Palmer said.

On July 28, school trustees split their vote 3-3 between appointing Palmer or Watsonville insurance agent Rodney Brooks to the seat left vacant by Jamie Marks. Brooks is seen as a secession opponent, although he has said publicly that he would support putting the issue to a vote

He and three other candidates eventually entered the race.

Teacher Sandra Nichols flatly opposes secession, while lawyer Michael Barsi said he awaits a district study of the issue. Teacher Antonio Rivas could not be reached for comment.

Regardless of the election’s outcome, Palmer said, creation of an Aptos district “is inevitable.” The real estate office manager said she already plans meetings with legislators to pursue that goal.

Opponents warn secession would push nearly 800 students out of Aptos schools into crowded Watsonville facilities. Although Aptos students make up 19 percent of the whole, their parents provide 47 percent of the district’s assessed property values, according to a district report.

Splitting the district could cost the Watsonville area $200,000 to $540,000 to house students, plus lost federal funds because of racial segregation.

Minorities — mostly Latinos — make up 73 percent of the students. An Aptos district would be 80 percent white, while a Watsonville district would be 85 percent minority.

State Board of Education members won’t approve a split leading to such a racial divide, Pajaro Valley school board President Willie Yahiro said.

But Palmer said those problems could be solved if there were a will. Creating smaller districts, she said, would improve education for all.

“Education is the salvation,” said Palmer, who lauds public schools she attended in the Central Valley. “This is what made this country great. We educate everyone.”

Years traveling in the Asian Pacific confirmed Palmer’s views of schools as institutions of social formation as well as education. She first volunteered in her children’s classrooms in 1985.

But standardized test scores revealed deep problems in local schools, and California dropped to near the bottom of national rankings. A 1993 local budget crisis obliged deep cuts across the board. Academics and facilities suffered.

Palmer dug into education research and found that students in smaller school districts often score higher on standardized tests. Her findings combined with growing parent frustration as school officials spurned volunteer offers to improve facilities.

One day, her eldest son came home from Aptos High School saying the locker room drain had backed up, gurgling raw sewage onto the floor and shutting down the showers, she said. Palmer recalled the moment as a catalyst.

“People in Aptos had been talking about this for 10 years. Does one large district really work?” Palmer asked. “It wasn’t working, and the proof was the test scores and the facilities that were falling apart.”

The secession fight started with a petition in 1994 to create the Aptos Unified School District, sparking charges of racism that Palmer strongly denies. She points out that many well-off Watsonville families already send their children to private schools.

“It’s not white flight. It’s intellectual flight,” Palmer said. “You raise those test scores and there won’t be any kind of flight.”