Arguing against a ballot measure is always difficult, especially when it comes to schools. Immediately you must face the argument “why don’t you support our children? Why are you so miserly?”
But this measure will raise our property taxes significantly – $600/year per $1mil valuation of our homes. And many homeowners in Culver City are on a fixed income – this extra $1000+ year tab won’t be easy to swallow. Unlike a sales tax, there is no avoiding this. Those of us footing the bill should expect an accounting of how that money will be spent.
And right away we see issues in the language of the bond. The money will be spent on needed repairs. Not a brand new building or an overarching vision to renovate the campus. Shouldn’t repairs be part of the general budget? Yes, they should.
So why are they asking for a bond to do needed repairs? The answer is we have a school board that just isn’t very good at managing money. They haven’t had a controller since March 2023, and have had issues staffing a number of other officers.
One thing they’re not missing is their new assistant superintendent of DEI, along with a staff and office, or consultants at New Earth which apparently got most of the Measure K Parcel tax, passed in 2018. The school board stonewalled the oversight committee. When residents asked for some transparency, New Earth sent them cease and desist orders – with emails apparently provided by the assistant superintendent. People suspect that’s why the assistant superintendent is currently on leave.
When you look at who’s funding the passage of this bond, it gets worse. $25,000 donated by TELACU construction and $10,000 by PJHM architects. TELACU came under scrutiny in 2014 for its pay to play tactics in Centinela Valley school district. They are actively campaigning for the very bond measure they stand to profit from. Some would consider it the standard kind of horse trading that goes on in elections. It doesn’t make it any less repugnant to a small town based on small donations. And it’s hypocritical given that the same people accused Hackman of buying out the city by donating $5000 to us.
We get it. Our city has expenses. Sometimes, those expenses reach beyond the general budget, and the city needs to ask us to pitch in a bit extra to maintain or upgrade services.
We just don’t think they’re into this bond for the benefit of the kids.
Given what we’ve seen – of this school board’s history, of their stated intentions for this bond measure, and of our ability to audit what they spend it on – this bond measure does not pass that scrutiny. Vote NO on this one. Our homes are not the school board’s ATM every time they come up short.