The San Marino Unified School District’s citizen Facilities Advisory Committee is shown during a meeting held last summer.
As property owners within the San Marino Unified School District eye paying off the bond note for the district’s last construction initiative, they will have to consider whether to ultimately extend the payments for another several decades in exchange for wide-ranging updates to school infrastructure in the shorter term.
On March 3, the question to voters will be whether to fund up to $200 million in bond sales — plus interest — through approximately 2058, with the expectation that most (if not all) of 97 recommended facilities or maintenance projects would be accomplished with the borrowed money. As with the ongoing bond repayments, residents would be annually taxed $60 for every $100,000 of assessed property value. The measure must receive 55% of the vote to pass.
Proponents and opponents of the bond, named Measure S, have fractioned into two campaign committees and are steadfast in what is best for the school and community, with each intending to wrangle the necessary votes ahead of March 3.
Proponents see the measure’s passage as the most effective way for the SMUSD to tackle years of deferred maintenance and bring aged facilities and utilities to a contemporary level.
“It’s important to emphasize that education comes from quality programs, quality teachers and quality facilities,” said Mike Killackey, a member of the pro-bond Measure S Campaign Committee, in a phone interview. “Those are all necessary components to a quality education, and that’s why you see districts all over California doing what is necessary for their students. The state of California is not going to fund these critical needs, and it’s up to our community to do this for our children.”
Meanwhile, the project’s opponents claim those pushing the bond have “misplaced priorities,” according to Margaret Loh, a member of Friends of San Marino Education, a group that opposes the bond.
“The SMUSD has no definitive master plan for facilities improvements,” Loh said. “The last time the district had a master plan was in 1996. Normally, districts asking for so much have a well-thought-out plan so voters know what they will be paying for.”
She added that proponents have merely provided a “wish list with no specific priorities on order of completion.”
Loh also cited the SMUSD’s operating deficit of $2.8 million, a figure confirmed by Superintendent Jeff Wilson, and the district’s recent pattern of deficit spending.
“But until this year they had actual cash to offset it,” Loh said. “The district no longer has any savings.”
Shannon Snaer, also affiliated with the Friends of San Marino Education, contended that SMUSD needs to invest in curriculum rather than buildings to reverse a trend of declining enrollment. The group believes that passage of Measure S would diminish the chances of community approval of future parcel tax increases that they believe are needed for investments in the district’s educational programs. Friends of San Marino Education has suggested a smaller bond, to be possibly augmented by a new or increased parcel tax that can be spent on teachers and staff members.
“We fully support a [smaller] $100 million bond,” said Snaer. “This would cover deferred maintenance, security, replacement of portables and all of the [Facilities Advisory Committee’s] priority one items that the ‘yes’ side rightly points out as real needs — with $20 million to spare. But the $100 million of savings created by a smaller bond could be used to reinvest in the curriculum, teacher training and smaller class sizes. The difference between a small bond and a large one is about 20 teachers per year, for nearly four decades.”
As with every voter-approved bond loan in California, passage of Measure S would include a significant regulatory framework. A steering committee would be formed to coordinate planning among architects, contractors, district officials and school staff members with regard to project planning and phasing. Borrowed money must be spent within three years of the bonds’ issuance, so four or five phases of sales would likely be planned. A citizens oversight committee must be appointed and seated within 60 days of a measure’s passage, and serves as a public forum holding the district accountable for spending money as dictated by the election.
“They’re there to ensure that the funds are spent in a proper manner and aligned with the purposes of the school board and schools,” said Alison Moller, also representing the pro-bond committee. “In terms of the performing arts complex [proposed for San Marino High School and often discussed], that is certainly not the district’s No. 1 priority right now.”
The general list of project ideas was developed last year by the school board-appointed Facilities Advisory Committee, which examined ideas that were likely to benefit the district in some capacity and assigned them priority levels. Virtually all of the top-priority items, for example, consisted of deferred maintenance. Although the FAC used a 2015 facilities needs assessment (which was updated in 2017) as part of its research, some members of the public have criticized the lack of a facilities master plan.
“This is a very good opportunity for the school district to make repairs and upgrades to the facilities without increasing our current tax rate,” Moller said. “One of the bigger criticisms is that we don’t have a plan, but we did have our Facilities Advisory Committee that included engineers and architects and people familiar with public financing who came up with a pretty detailed list. Furthermore, we don’t have the funds to develop a facilities master plan unless we pass Measure S.”
“There are too many unanswered questions,” said Loh. “What projects is the district committed to doing and in what order? How will these projects contribute to the academic excellence of our children’s education? Currently, these questions cannot be answered. Approving bond money prior to establishing a strategic educational plan and marrying that to a Facilities Master Plan does not give the community confidence that the tax dollars will be put to the highest and best use. It is simply fiscally irresponsible and imprudent.”
This won’t be the first bond rodeo for Superintendent Jeff Wilson, who helped oversee a similar $218 million construction bond while at Arcadia Unified School District. (Wilson was an assistant superintendent there when SMUSD hired him last spring.) In an interview, Wilson — who is prohibited by law from campaigning — said he spoke from experience in cautioning against the notion that a district should strive for a bond only after developing a strict plan.
“[In facilities needs assessments], there was a recognition that those costs were fluid, at best,” Wilson said. “When we were in Arcadia, even as tightly as we thought we had those plans together, a hurricane hit in Florida and suddenly every piece of plywood in America was heading for Florida. The cost of plywood went through the roof. I remember there was an issue with steel and China even back then that impacted our budget as well. You can assign costs to the best of your ability, but until you actually get to the phasing of the project where you’re actually going out for bid, there’s so many factors that can come into play with that.”
Wilson said that he felt that the district approached the bond from a needs perspective and that its actions, should the bond be approved, will be guided by those needs. Those priority one needs are, he said, “necessary to keep our doors open,” for example. The potential projects further down the list could see heavy modification, if they are even built at all.
“In fact, Arcadia right now got to the end of their project with $30 million of unsold bonds at their fingertips, should their steering committee ever decide they want to do something else,” he added. “You never actually have to sell those bonds. All the $200 million does is create the capacity to do work up to that number.”
Addressing the factual merits of some arguments in the community, Wilson emphasized that the district would not leave programming by the wayside should a construction bond be approved. As he and other officials routinely remind people, more than 80% of the district’s limited general fund sources are tied up in personnel costs and there is limited — if any — extra to use on maintenance, much less on new projects.
Wilson added that he agreed that the district has shown a good-faith effort on keeping quality classrooms and programs by successfully soliciting two parcel taxes that fund more than three dozen teachers and support staff.
It’s “simply an untrue statement” that Measure S puts buildings over programming, Wilson said, “This is not a mutually exclusive idea. In fact, I would argue that the sooner we can get the facilities part behind us — and actually be getting into developing learning spaces that are adaptable, that provide the kind of space we need to produce these 21st century learners — the better off we’re going to be. It’s not that the education is stopping and waiting right now for buildings to be built. That’s happening concurrently, and there’s plenty of good stuff happening there right now as well.”
When the school board approved putting Measure S before voters, Wilson had presented three options to the panel, including the $200 million option. The others were potential $99 million and $168 million measures, and the superintendent said he wanted to make it clear that he does not prefer one over the other.
“I’ve never in public or anywhere else had a preference for one or the other, because the way I’ve always put it is, ‘You tell me what we’re doing and we’ll open the doors and do the best job possible educating all of our kids to the best of our abilities,’ and that’s always been my approach,” he said. “I am 100% in support of the direction of our board of education and their decision to move ahead. I’m completely in support of that.”
Moller asserted that newer facilities and infrastructure would yield savings in ongoing maintenance and, simply, the cost of running a building. Replacing outdated parts is an expensive task and new technology often uses substantially less energy to begin with.
“Our ongoing maintenance expenses are increased greatly because of our aging facilities,” she said. “We’ve got lighting that is not energy efficient. We’ve got air conditioners that are 20 years old just chugging away and sucking up electricity. It’s just becoming more expensive to run our facilities on this infrastructure.”
Killackey added that Measure S has the support of all PTAs, the San Marino Teachers Association, the local California School Employees Association, the San Marino Schools Foundation and PTAffiliates.
“Every educational organization that is focused on the education of our children supports this,” he said.
Opponents of Measure S challenge even that assertion.
“The ‘Yes on S’ campaign is citing endorsement from the teachers, PTAs and San Marino Schools Foundation,” said Loh. “Most of these votes were far from unanimous. I believe the teachers’ vote was 9-7, and was only of the executive board of the union. Other than the Schools Foundation, where debate was rigorous and the vote was not close to unanimous, these votes were rushed through by members of the Yes on S campaign, without any serious debate or entertainment of an opposing view. These claims need to be challenged with real research about what the endorsements really represent, and what they do not represent.”
Wilson made a point to acknowledge the sincerity of each camp in the bond debate.
“I understand why people are concerned. You’re talking about a legacy here. You’re talking about a lifetime,” Wilson said.
Editor’s note: Representatives from the committees supporting and opposing Measure S will have guest columns in next week’s edition of the San Marino Tribune.
