A parent council on the Upper West Side has voted in favor of a controversial school rezoning plan with racial undertones. NY1's Lindsey Christ filed the following report.

The vote was 9 in favor, 1 against. But don't let the final tally fool you. The audience of parents, teachers and property owners was very divided.

At issue is a major rezoning that will affect 11 schools spanning the entire Upper West Side, from 59th Street up to 116th Street. 

"There is no proposal that's going to be 100 percent perfect, and there are people that are going to be upset with any proposal. But I think it helps us integrate the community better," said Susannah Blum, a teacher at PS 191. 

"It's very upsetting," said parent Elyse Riley. "We chose the community that we live in. We moved into our community in 2009. We can see the school that we're no longer going to be able to go to from his bedroom window."

The debate on this issue has gone on for more than a year. The final plan includes moving several schools and redrawing the zone lines for several others, all in a bid to reduce overcrowding and alleviate the deeply entrenched racial segregation between different schools in the neighborhood. 

"We need to be really smart and really tactful about how we integrate our schools and how we bring people closer together," said Dennis Morgan, a Community Education Council member. "The fact that we've been segregated for this long is really unfathomable."

Those opposed to the plan cite a variety of reasons. Some say it will make certain schools even more crowded. Others say the Department of Education's data, including population projections, is off.

The one panel member who voted against the plan agrees with many of those concerns. 

"There's no long-term planning going on here," said Noah E. Gotbaum, a Community Education Council member. "Yes, we could have easily desegregated this district without messing it up." 

Two schools are at the center of the plan: PS 199, where test scores are high and the students are mostly white and well-off, and PS 191, where test scores are low and students are mostly black and Hispanic and from low-income families. The rezoning seeks to drive down some of the overcrowding while making both schools more diverse.