Advocates for moving a bond initiative forward to the electorate that would improve the infrastructure of Culver City schools will have a second opportunity to address their school district’s governing body on the matter on Feb. 25 at El Rincòn Elementary School at 7 p.m.
The Culver City Unified Board of Education will vote on the facilities enhancement plan that night and if passed a date will be scheduled for a ballot measure this year.
District laboratories, classrooms and buildings have not seen widespread improvements in decades and supporters of a bond initiative are eager to see it approved and put before Culver City voters.
Last year, members of the board who wanted to have a measure on the November ballot were thwarted when three of their colleagues chose not to vote to move the measure forward without additional data.
Since then, there have been multiple workshops on the potential initiative and two new members have joined the board.
Board President Laura Chardiet prefers that the bond go on the June ballot instead of November if it passes.
“We anticipated having it on the ballot last year, so we’re already behind schedule,” Chardiet, one of the board’s most ardent supporters of the bond measure, said. “If we do it in November, it could be competing with other initiatives from the state and we want to avoid that.”
Political experts have already predicted that there will be an avalanche of bond measures in the fall with some that could be related to schools.
Jewett Walker, a political consultant who has worked on statewide and local bond initiatives, said more people vote in November elections but hav-ing the measure on the ballot in June lessens the financial burden of the school bond’s supporters.
“In June, the marketing universe is smaller,” Walker said. “You have fewer people to persuade than you would in November.”
Chardiet says she and her board colleagues know that getting the school improvements bond passed is only the beginning. The difficult work lies in convincing the public to tax themselves in order to fund new construction, bandwidth enhancement, restroom repair and other infrastructure needs. “If it passes, we would begin building a coalition of stakeholders to educate the public about the bond and why we need it,” said the board president.
If approved for June, the election would be on the third of the month. Homeowners would be taxed approximately an additional $150 annually. School bonds require 55 percent of the vote for passage.