College district will seek bond
Deirdre Newman
The Coast Community College District on Wednesday unanimously
approved placing a $370-million bond on the November ballot after a
resounding show of support from various community members.
It will now be up to voters to decide whether they want to pay
about $16.76 more per $100,000 assessed home valuation to fund a host
of facility improvements at the three district campuses.
Twenty-three speakers representing business, academia and the
general community waxed poetic about the benefits the bond could
bring to the individual colleges, the district and the community at
large.
The board “has a sacred obligation to young people to give them
marketable skills and help them get to higher education,” said Sidney
Stokes, an alumni of the district.
By placing the bond on the ballot, district officials hope to take
advantage of a proposition passed in 2000 that requires 55% of the
vote for bonds used for school-related facility improvements. The
proposition also requires that a citizens oversight committee be
established and that no funds from the bonds be spent on
administrator salaries.
The bond would fund repairs, technology upgrades and safety
improvements such as a new learning resource center and library to
replace the vacant, seismically unsafe facility at Orange Coast
College. The financial breakdown includes $200 million for upgrades
at Orange Coast College; $96 million for Golden West College; $66.2
million for Coastline Community College; and $8.6 million for other
improvements, such as replacing temporary district buildings with
permanent structures.
This is the first time in more than three decades the district is
considering a bond to fund needed improvements at all three colleges.
The trustees echoed the community’s sentiment that approving the bond
is imperative for the future.
“What we’re doing is going to be for the people who aren’t even
born yet,” trustee Paul Berger said. “Because this is our chance to
make sure 25 years from now that we still have a viable community
college district.”
The idea was first floated in March, when the district sent out a
preliminary survey to explore voter interest.
While the original bond amount was $344 million, the district says
it now requires $370 million to fully cover its bases, said Erin
Cohn, the district’s spokeswoman. The total funding need is actually
$470 million, but the district has identified $100 million from other
funding sources over the next 10 to 15 years that would not have to
be included in the bond, Cohn noted.
Over the past few months, district staffers and consultants have
been busy crunching numbers and making contact with community members
to further gauge their level of support. Although the exact amount of
the potential bond was not disclosed to the community, the response
has been favorable, Cohn said.
In November, the bond will compete for attention with a massive
statewide bond of $13 billion for facility improvements for campuses
from the elementary to community college levels. But the district is
eligible for only a little more than $1 million of the November
statewide bond and another $12-billion bond that will be on the March
2004 ballot.
* DEIRDRE NEWMAN covers education. She may be reached at (949)
574-4221 or by e-mail at deirdre.newman@latimes.com.
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