Tax Foes Sue Orange School District Over Fees : Levy: Forming maintenance assessment districts without a vote violates Prop. 13, a group alleges. Meanwhile, Fullerton school trustees reject such fees.

SANTA ANA —  Throwing the first legal punch in the battle of the school maintenance fees, the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Assn., the state’s most vigorous anti-tax group, filed a lawsuit Tuesday against the Orange Unified School District.

The suit is the first legal challenge against school districts that have formed maintenance assessment districts to levy fees for property owners to pay for repairs and upkeep of school recreational grounds and facilities.

“Our lawsuit is the penicillin for the raging tax assessment epidemic running wild in California,” Joel Fox, president of the Los Angeles-based group, said in a press conference here outside of Orange County Superior Court.

“We filed against Orange Unified because, to our knowledge, it was the first to approve this new burden for taxpayers,” he said. “If the court rules for the taxpayers, we expect this to invalidate assessments by other districts, as well.”

The suit calls for the court to determine whether assessment fees are legal under Proposition 13, which requires that a ballot measure raising property taxes be approved by two-thirds of the voters. It also seeks a court order preventing the district from collecting the fees until the matter is resolved.

In addition to Orange Unified, four districts in the Huntington Beach area operating under a joint authority and the Placentia-Yorba Linda Unified School District have voted to add the fees to the tax bills of property owners.

Several hours after the suit against the Orange district was filed, trustees of the Fullerton Joint Union High School District unanimously voted against forming an assessment district.

Board President Marilyn Buchi said the district canceled a public hearing and voted down the fee after receiving more than 900 phone calls and letters in opposition.

“I came to the conclusion that the loss of public support for public education and the negative feelings to school districts were not worth the $24 a month” from such a fee, Buchi said.

The Jarvis suit was filed on behalf of Roland F. Krueger and Carole Walters, two property owners who live in the assessment district set up by Orange district trustees, who approved the assessment fees last month in a 4-3 vote.

Flanked by state Sen. John R. Lewis (R-Orange) and ardent anti-tax activist Mickey R. Conroy, the GOP candidate in a September runoff for the a67th Assembly District seat, the plaintiffs said they hope that the suit will stop other districts from approving such fees.

Lewis is sponsoring a bill that would require two-thirds voter approval for assessment districts.

“I don’t think four people can dictate to us how much we have to pay in taxes,” Walters said. “It’s horrible.”

Orange Unified Supt. Norman C. Guith said the district researched the legal requirements of the state Lighting and Landscape Act of 1972--which allows public agencies to form maintenance assessment districts without voter approval--before levying the fees.

“We think we complied with every legal aspect in the act of 1972,” Guith said.

Residents in the district will be assessed a $30-a-month fee, expected to raise about $1.6 million a year, starting in their December property tax bills.

Like other financially burdened school districts, Orange Unified had been searching for new money sources since the beginning of the year, when the state deficit threatened to cut millions of dollars from education.

After the district settled on the assessment fee as a new revenue source, opponents denounced the move as a violation of Proposition 13.

“This is a scam,” Conroy said. “These boards are going ahead with these fees without paying attention to what the public wants. I ran on a slate of no more taxes, and the people responded by putting me in the runoff. The people are saying enough is enough.”

The Jarvis suit is expected to be followed by other legal challenges, including one planned by the Huntington Beach/Fountain Valley Board of Realtors, which has vowed to sue the West Orange County Financing Authority, a coalition representing the Westminster, Ocean View, Huntington Beach City, and Huntington Beach Union High school districts.

The coalition unanimously approved a $50-a-year fee early Friday morning to raise $4.3 million annually.