College Trustees OK Voter Survey for Tax Hike : Education: The proposed levy would raise about $18 million annually for nine campuses. Foes say it violates the spirit of Proposition 13.

LOS ANGELES —  Trustees of the Los Angeles Community College District took the first step Wednesday to seek an annual tax on about 1 million properties in the county, under an obscure state law that bypasses the requirement that voters approve tax increases.

After a heated debate, the Board of Trustees voted 4 to 2 to survey the district’s voters on their opinion of an annual charge on virtually every property in the 882-square-mile district. Under one proposal, the tax would be about $8 per single-family home and more than $30 for multifamily and commercial parcels.

Supporters said the tax would raise millions to add extra classes and spruce up the largely dilapidated campuses in the nine-school, 97,200-student district. Foes, however, argued that the plan violates the tax-limiting spirit of Proposition 13 by bypassing voters.

“This is a defining moment. Take a gut stand. Do the right thing,” said Board President David Lopez-Lee, who wrote the proposal, during a two-hour debate.

Trustee Lindsay Conner opposed the measure, saying, “When government violates the law, it loses the trust of the people. You can’t just say we need it, we’ll take it.”

The district, which covers most of metropolitan Los Angeles, is the largest community college system in the United States, stretching from Sylmar to San Pedro. The proposed district-wide tax would affect about 45% of the 2.24-million parcels in Los Angeles County.

Under the board’s vote, the district also plans to spend up to $30,000 to conduct a telephone poll of voters to determine what level of tax, if any, they would be willing to accept. Board members said they probably would not proceed with any tax that did not garner the approval of a majority of those polled.

If the measure gains final approval, officials said Los Angeles would become the first community college district in California to levy such a charge under the state’s obscure 1972 Landscaping and Lighting Act, one of the few remaining mechanisms to tax property without voter approval.

Critics contend this is an improper use of the provision.

If enough voters approve the poll, district officials plan to hire a consultant to begin preparing the legal documents required to institute the tax, and will have to schedule two public hearings on the proposal before it could be brought back to the board for a final vote.

Although the final amounts could change, the proposal presented to the board Wednesday calls for annual levies of $8 per single-family home, $32 per commercial tract and $34.32 for apartment and condominium parcels. At that rate, the plan would raise an estimated $18 million per year.

With that money, district officials said they would be able to add hundreds of extra classes and finance up to $127 million in bonds to pay for a range of campus facility upgrades, mostly involving parking, lighting, landscaping and recreational projects--all eligible under the law.

Under a preliminary projects list, Pierce College in Woodland Hills would get the most money--$28 million--followed by Los Angeles Trade-Tech ($23 million); East Los Angeles College ($22.2 million); Southwest College ($18.9 million), and Mission College in Sylmar ($15 million).

Money from this type of tax, however, cannot be directly spent to hire teachers or build classrooms. But district officials said they still can employ it to add new classes by using it to replace general fund money now spent on outdoor maintenance, freeing that money to be used for classes.

To the dismay of tax foes, the California Supreme Court opened the door to such measures by ruling in 1992 that landscaping and lighting act levies are not covered by the provision of Proposition 13 that requires two-thirds voter approval for so-called special taxes.

Even so, critics charged that the board’s action violates the spirit of the 1978 tax-cutting measure by bypassing voters. The last time the district tried going to the voters in 1991, a $200-million facilities bond measure narrowly failed to gain the two-thirds approval.