Poll shows support for parcel tax

By Jeff Hudson | Enterprise staff writer

The Davis school board began shaping a renewal of the school district's instructional parcel tax on Thursday night.

The board voted to have staff prepare the language of a ballot measure - still a 'rough draft,' as trustee Gina Daleiden described it - which will be on the agenda for discussion when the board next meets on Jan. 6. The board likely will hold a special meeting on or around Jan. 13, at which point trustees would vote on whether to move forward and place the tax renewal before voters in a special election.

On Thursday night, staff was directed to prepare ballot language with the following parameters in mind:

• The school board wants to ask voters to approve the parcel tax in a special vote-by-mail election 'on a date to be determined before June 30, 2011, hopefully in May,' as new school board president Richard Harris, who sworn in Thursday night, put it.
• The instructional parcel tax would have a six-year time span, up from the four-year period that has been the pattern in the past.
• The proposed amount discussed, but not finalized by the trustees on Thursday night, would be $495 per single-family home per year. That includes a continuance of the existing tax of $320 per single-family home per year - under Measures Q and W, which expire in 2012 - plus an additional $175, which will only partially compensate for the multiple reductions in funding that the district receives from the state.

The $175 increase is designed to fund 'core programs' by generating enough revenue to equal the funds raised last spring by the nonprofit Davis Schools Foundation, plus the amount of budget savings realized by reductions agreed to by district employees.

The parcel tax discussion occurs as California school districts are bracing for new budget cuts expected to be unveiled Jan. 10, when Gov.-elect Jerry Brown presents his state budget proposal. Brown said earlier this week that the state deficit is worse than he had expected - about $28 billion rather than $25 billion - and warned that further cuts in education funding are inevitable.

This article originally appeared in the Davis Enterprise on December 17, 2010. The complete story is available to subscribers at http://www.davisenterprise.com.