Most Fullerton, California, voters in March will cast a ballot on three school bond measures: two for local districts and one for schools statewide.
Fullerton School District trustees join Fullerton Joint Union High School District and state education leaders in asking voters' permission to issue bonds to raise money to finance needed construction and upgrades.
The Fullerton School District, which oversees educating the city's kindergarten through eighth-grade students, is asking to raise $198 million for projects such as replacing equipment at playgrounds, repairing roofs, putting STEM labs in schools, building gyms at junior high schools and replacing portable classrooms that are reaching the end of their life.
The district will put its measure on the same ballot as the Fullerton Joint Union High School District's $310 million bond request and Proposition 13, California's $15 billion measure for school construction.
But Fullerton School District officials think the timing won't be an issue.
"Educated voters would look at each one and make a separate decision on each one," Trustee Hilda Sugarman said.
The district is asking property owners to pay $30 a year per $100,000 in assessed value on their property taxes to repay the bond.
Voters passed a $50 million bond measure in 2002. The district has done routine fixes to its facilities, but it lacks money to do large projects, Superintendent Bob Pletka said.
Three-fourths of the district's schools are more than 50 years old; officials estimate about $300 million in improvements need to be made to facilities, Pletka said.
"Modern education is requiring expensive things," Sugarman said. "Patching isn't effective anymore."
With the area's growing population, many of the district's schools now teach far more students than they were built for, Pletka said. "Parking lots, libraries, etc., are designed for two-thirds of the students that are in there now."
The measure would even benefit residents who don't have kids in the schools, he said. For instance, bigger parking lots for campuses would prevent congestion from drop-offs and pickups from spilling into nearby streets, he said.
More than 55% of voters need to approve a bond measure for it to pass. The voting will be held along with the state's presidential primary on March 3.
