California voters and the Santa Monica-Malibu community on Tuesday stepped up in support of public education, passing both Prop. 30 and Measure ES by comfortable margins.
Proposition 30 is a measure supported by Gov. Jerry Brown that raises income taxes on wealthy Californians and the sales tax on everyone. Measure ES is a $385 million bond measure that will bring technology and safety measures to aging schools in the Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District.
According to the Secretary of State, Prop. 30 passed with almost 54 percent of the vote statewide, and Measure ES passed by over two-thirds of the vote.
“It was such a relief to wake up to the good results, and hearing about how well-supported Measure ES was,” said Patti Braun, president of the PTA Council.
Proposition 38, a rival measure by education advocate Molly Munger that raised taxes on Californians across the board, did not pass.
The success of Measure ES will lighten the load on the district’s coffers. Officials plan to use the cash to bring much needed safety requirements like fire sprinklers to the 100-year-old campus at Santa Monica High School, and purchase new technologies to assist in the next generation of standardized testing recently adopted statewide.
A previous version of this post appeared in the Santa Monica Daily Press.