A new property tax would reinstate laid-off employees of the SMMUSD. But critics say tax is unfair.
By Page Getz/Special to The Malibu Times
The pink slips may be out, but the white flags aren’t up yet.
Facing $13.8 million in state funding cuts, the Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District is seeking additional revenue through Measure S, a $225 parcel tax.
The only item appearing on the June 3 ballot, Measure S would require a two-thirds vote to pass and would generate $6.2 million annually for the next six years.
In March, 207 employees of the district were issued pink slips including 91 teachers between Malibu and Santa Monica schools as well as instrumental music instructors, athletic support staff and elementary school nurses.
The layoffs would shift the ratio of teachers to students from 30 students per teacher at Malibu High to 37 students per teacher. The ratio in middle schools would increase from 30 students per teacher to 35 per teacher.
If Measure S passes, 66 full-time teaching positions would be reinstated and it would prevent the elimination of programs including elementary school instrumental music programs, said Kathy Wisnicki, co-chairwoman of Yes on Measure S and mother of two students in the district. Wisnicki was also on the district advisory committee that proposed Measure S.
California schools receive only $4,900 per pupil from state allocated money, while the national average is about $7,500 per pupil, Wisnicki said.
“We’re already well below the national average as far as what the state gives us for funding public education,” Wisnicki said. “It was our goal to try to get at least up to the national average and now with these cuts we’re even farther behind then we were to begin with.”
A member of the PTA’s district council, Wisnicki said a district advisory committee put Measure S together after the failure of Measure EE, a similar tax proposal which received 64 percent of the needed 67 percent vote in Santa Monica, but only 54 percent of the vote in Malibu.
In order to accommodate public concern that a parcel tax would burden senior residents, the proposed parcel tax in Measure S added a senior exemption to any homeowner over 65 that owns and lives in their homes, provided they request an exemption form and send it to the county. That exemption, Wisnicki said, would be at the discretion of the school district and would be available to any homeowner that applied.
While Measure EE would have been administered over the span of 12 years and have cost $300 with an added cost of living adjustment, Measure S would reduce the tax to $225 for only six years with no cost of living adjustment.
Critics of Measure S contend that a flat parcel tax would unfairly burden homeowners.
One opponent, Mathew Millen, a Santa Monica resident, owns a small four-unit apartment building that he said should not have to pay the same tax as a larger building that could have a hundred tenants.
“With a flat tax, a luxury hotel or apartment building with a lot of tenants would have to pay the same for the whole building as one homeowner,” Millen said. “What’s $225 to a hotel, where what you might pay for only one room for a night that would pay their share of the tax for the entire year?”
Millen said he would not be opposed to a parcel tax if it was more equitable, or if it was based on square footage.
“Flat taxes are fundamentally unfair,” Millen said. “If every parcel is taxed equally, then a big business, or a hotel in Santa Monica, would be taxed the same as an empty lot in Malibu.”
An alternative tax proposal based on square footage was considered, but Wisnicki said it was rejected when the committee determined that 80 percent of Malibu residents would pay more, if taxes were determined by square footage.
Other revenue sources are still being explored through grant writing and through the cities, to compensate for the remaining $7.6 million in cuts, Superintendent John Deasy said.
The district receives approximately $3 million from Santa Monica and $35,000 from the City of Malibu, but they are in the process of negotiating a possible increase in contributions, Deasy said.
With expectations that the governor will announce more cuts May 14, Deasy said it is imperative that the community vote, because the state deficit is only getting worse.
“This is just a critical measure,” Deasy said. “What’s happened in California has had a catastrophic affect on California schools.
“We’re not hearing a lot of opposition, but the main issue is that it’s a single item election, so the chances are there’s going to be a lower voter turnout,” Deasy said.