Parcel Tax Information Truth vs Lies

Click on a topic to see the whole discussion.



Proposed Parcel Tax far exceeds schools’ worst case needs.

The $257 parcel tax would raise over $1.7 million based on an actual city parcel count of 6,902 (less exemptions) a WHOPPING 100% increase over and above last year's fundraising record. The school district ran well last year so why the urgent need to double the next year's budget? What justifies a 90% - 100% budget increase in this recessionary economy? In the worst case scenario a PROPOSED 10% cut from Sacramento requires only and $82 parcel tax.

This math is all over the place. Last year the community pulled together $880,000 with approximately 1,000 students to avoid cutting teachers and programs. The "No on E" guys like to pretend the parcel tax is a reaction to Sacramento's cuts, it's not, it's a long term solution that maintains our excellent schools and keeps Hermosa money here in Hermosa. The parcel tax will raise $1.5 million the first year and probably go up about $12 a year ($75,000 total for 6300 parcels) after that. Every year basic costs and salaries increase, as does the need for local support. Then add Sacramento's new cuts and our program and teacher saving needs grow to over $1.7 million. No one is doubling the School Districts budget. That would require a $10,000,000 parcel tax. Clearly the OSP are misrepresenting the math.

Parcel Tax shifts responsibility.

Parents with children having already passed through the HB school system will be double taxed. They paid for budget shortfall during their children's school years and now will pay a 2nd time for someone else's children over the next 5 years! People who's children haven't started school yet will pay now as well as later. Why are the parents of this larger school-age generation asking for the public to subsidize their children's educational cost burden when their children attend HBSD schools?

The budget short fall began with a request in the 2002-2003 school year for a voluntary $200 per child. It is escalating with the continued growing gap between what Hermosa provides and what the State will pay for. Their point would have been more accurately stated as "we didn't have to give much then, and don't want to now."

Parcel Tax is not intended for only a 5 year period.

Once our over-spending school district and school board gets used to the higher funding, they won't be able to live without it. Public taxes will become an entitlement, without true spending controls.

The parcel tax is a legal way for a community to take control and provide for the communities needs without giving 66% to other districts. If California funds our schools as they did in the past, there would be no need to continue the parcel tax. This is not highly likely in the next 5 years.

Fundraising by parents should not stop.

Hermosa's Education Foundation and PTO fundraising efforts have become the backbone of the local community. Private and corporate fund-raising provide direct benefits to the cities' school aged families. A parcel tax would shift the budget shortfall to the public tax base to the benefit of only a minority group. That funding shift, from private donor to public tax method, also diminishes the "needs" argument for continued private and corporate giving. Why would current HBEF leadership throw away years of hard work to establish fund raisers and develop sponsorship relationships with South Bay stalwarts, such as Raytheon, Chevron, Northrop, Sketchers and numerous other private donors.

We agree. They shouldn't and won't stop fundraising. Hermosa will continue to have a HBEF and a PTO that are active in supporting the schools with fundraisers and other classroom extras.

New parent volunteers step forward every year.

Jim Caldwell publicly stated the current HBEF and PTO members are "tired" of fundraising. Every generation of parents has stepped forward and volunteered time and energy to the HB school district, why should that volunteerism stop? Next year's kinder class is the largest in recent memory, why not pass the baton? Why does the financial burden drop away for today's larger parent pool? Most of the development work for current fundraising has already been established by past volunteers and new volunteers can easily step into those roles. Why stop Hermosa's volunteer momentum?

Asking parent volunteers to fundraise for $1,700,000 is not going to work. The monumental efforts over the past 5 years by these dedicated people are to be commended but the model cannot be sustained. The effort to raise this much money, (check the comparison to other districts in the OSP flyer) burns out more volunteers each year than come new to the system.

Taxes should not be levied for non-essential programs.

What school extras are threatened by funding cuts? While poetry is important, so we really need a special 4th grade poetry teacher? Or do we need a dedicated PE teacher for elementary level students? Should we really tax the general public to offer the Spring Musical, Math and Science Olympiad for just a few participating students?

The "special 4th grade poetry teacher" is an artist that comes for 40 hours a year on a $5000 grant from the Hermosa Beach Education Foundation. The "dedicated PE teacher for elementary students" is Mike Schlimmer who is 85% paid for by the Beach Cites Health District. Another whopper is "what ever happened to elementary teachers introducing art, music, and PE to their classes." We don't have any elementary art teachers. What we have is the "Young at Art" program. A fantastic ALL volunteer art program. So all the non-essential programs listed here are not paid for by tax dollars. Actually the programs they list are examples of the people of Hermosa making our schools great by volunteerism. The Orange Sign People know all of this but having based their campaign on "Stop the Waste" are scrambling to find something voters might find objectionable.

Hermosa Schools already out-raise and out-spend other local school districts!

The HBEF raised and HBSD spent an extra $881,000 or $679 per student, for the '07 school budget, far exceeding all other local districts! Why is Hermosa out-raising and outspending PVE ($126⁄student), El Segundo ($156⁄student), MB ($397⁄student) and Redondo ($7.32⁄student) by significant amounts? Maybe HBSD has a spending problem, not a fundraising problem. Why are other districts able to operate with state budget funds and much lower fund-raising dollars? Is Hermosa providing a better education or higher test scores than PV or MB, despite the higher spending? No. Is MB twice as efficient with their funds per student, or is PV 5 times more efficient with similar or better test scores? It appears that they are.

Hermosa parents have been out fundraising everyone with unbelievable time and dedication to our schools, our programs and our children. Hermosa has not been out spending any of our neighbors. This note intentionally confuses fundraising with total spending and conspicuously omits that PV has a parcel tax. It is really simple, to keep the good school we've had, we need a parcel tax. Otherwise we have a school not as good as we used to.

Fear mongering by proponents of the Parcel Tax.

The proponents of the parcel tax threaten to lay off teachers and hope to feed fears of falling property values! The HBSD's two fundamental responsibilities are providing facilities and teachers for a public education, why are they putting the priority for extra activities ahead of teacher's jobs? The HBSD failed to provide sufficient classroom space for a growing school-age population, don't let them threaten to cut teachers as a higher priority over non-essential programs and activities. The Yes on Measure E group's central argument is that adding a public tax will somehow protect property values. If the state cuts the education budget by 10%, don't all residential neighborhoods maintain the same relative standing? City of LA schools already receive more state funding support per student than Hermosa, does that mean that LA City areas are more desirable or have higher property values than Hermosa?

The "No" campaign has a problem. If the public believes that teachers will get fired, they tend to vote for the parcel tax. So they are forced to say that $1.7 million can be cut from the budget without firing teachers. Note they never list how they would save such huge amounts. If the parcel tax does not pass and we have layoffs, the blame will lie entirely at the feet of the Orange Sign People. The district can cut every administrator, superintendent, two principles, assistant principle, business manager and the Technology teacher, the band and music teachers, the PE teachers and still have to cut other teachers out of classrooms by Hermosa losing class size reduction.

Other options to bridge school funding gap.

Why the rush to tax the public? Every other funding option should be thoroughly explored before proposing public taxes. Taxes should be the last choice, not the first. What are the alternative funding options? First, the HBEF must work harder to encourage donations from the 40-60% of parents who do not donate to the schools every year. Secondly, why hasn't HBSD approached the City of Hermosa for more school system support, as Manhattan Beach has successfully done? The City of Hermosa enjoys a direct benefit from high local property values and a well-regarded school system. HBSD needs to learn to cooperate with the City and cease beating the property and public tax horse!

The finance issues of the school district have been looming since the dot-com bust in 2001. We've maintained our programs with some cuts by an ever increasing reliance on fundraising. The "No" campaign like to pretend the parcel tax is a reaction to this year's threatened budget cuts. On the contrary, it's a plan to deal with a problem that went from small to medium to large over the six years. The parcel tax would be a good idea even if there were no budget cuts coming down from Sacramento, as most of the parcel tax money is for a problem already two years old. So there was no rush, we've been looking for funds and examining our options, including combing the district budget for years.

Watch out for another school construction bond in Nov. ‘08!

The HB School Board failed to build sufficient classrooms with the last $13.6 million Measure J Bond. The 2008-09 kindergarten enrollment has increased by 25 new students, likely to rise even higher by next fall. Both schools are impacted. WATCH OUT for another multi-million dollar school construction bond effort to refurbish North School by November if the Parcel Tax passes! The district only needs 55% yes vote to pass a new construction bond, much easier to accomplish than passing a parcel Tax which requires a 67% approval.

If you don't like history, rewrite it. The "No on E" people are the ones who sued the district, costing us $1.6M and wiping two classrooms off the new construction. Then they defeated Measure A which would have refurbished North School. After all that, it's the "school board failed to build sufficient classrooms." Yikes! The solution from the "No" guys on classrooms is to get rid of class size reduction, go back to 30+ kids in kindergarten through third and damage the school system enough that young families don't want to come here. Genius! A paraphrase of the old Vietnam quote comes to mind, "We had to burn down the school to save it."

Sacramento can reduce our funding by the amount of the Parcel Tax.

In the Feb 13th and 27th parcel tax meetings, the school district's attorney, Mr. Robert Anslow, stated the State of California can legally reduce funding to the school district by the amount of additional money raised with a parcel tax. There is no guarantee of a net budget gain if a parcel tax is passed.

Our state assemblyman Ted Lieu came to Hermosa Saturday the 17th to tell us and the press this wasn't true. It is clearly stated twice in the official ballot pamphlet. The minutes of the board meetings are available on the school district website www.hbcsd.org. See Rob Anslow's letter in the May 22 Easy Reader or check out the district website for the official minutes. The money raised by the parcel tax stays in Hermosa and doesn't hurt state funding.

Senior Citizen and disabled exemptions are NOT guaranteed.

Senior exemptions expire yearly, requiring annual re-submission paperwork and School Board review. Absentee owners will not be aware of this issue until it appears on their tax bills.

This is perhaps the worst misrepresentation on the list. Simply put, the election is an opportunity for Hermosa to pass a new law that will allow us to pay for our own schools. If it gets a 67% vote it becomes the law. The exemption is part of the new law and is guaranteed. The parcel tax senior exemption needs to be filed yearly along with Hermosa's other senior exemptions; this is nothing new for seniors. The school board is extending the date to file for this year's exemption to July 15. As for absentee owners this may not be another untruth but simply faulty reasoning. Absentee Owner's don't need to fret over applying for the senior resident exemption because they aren't residents. There are over fifty school districts in California with parcel taxes and most, if not all, have a senior exemption like Hermosa's.