☆ Opinion: Upcoming school tax measures excessive, unnecessary, misguided
Image by Martin Cathrae
Pat Waite of Citizens for Fiscal Responsibility says decreased population, fleeing young families, and our county’s already chart-topping tax rates make the wave of school bond propositions coming at us this November a bad idea. An Opp Now exclusive.
Santa Clara County voters face a deluge of school measures on their November ballots. On top of the state’s Proposition 2 school bond, which will ultimately cost residents over $17 billion, there are a total of seventeen: eight bond proposals and nine parcel tax measures.
If passed, the bond measures will cost taxpayers nearly $170 million annually, ultimately raising over $5 billion for principal, interest, and fee payments.
The parcel taxes will ding taxpayers over $25 million per year and amount to over $179 million in additional taxes. School districts propose taking an additional 2.5% of Santa Clara County households' income, even though residents already suffer the pain of California’s exorbitant taxes, exacerbated by the high inflation of the past few years.
This flood of proposed funding is unnecessary. K-12 enrollment in Santa Clara County declined 15% over the past ten years. The bulk of it (11 points) occurred over the past five, as people decamped Santa Clara County for destinations more conducive to raising their young families. This demographic is not coming back, primarily because we are unlikely ever to see enough housing built to create a pricing environment that attracts young families back to the county. Compounding this, the birth rate among the area’s remaining young adults has cratered; we are not going to grow our way out of the decline anytime soon.
Before spending more money for a seriously reduced school-aged population, districts should perform zero-based budgeting exercises to squeeze out every unnecessary cost. Additionally, districts need to endure the pain of closing schools to reduce the overhead of delivering education. Neither exercise is pleasant, but it is the fiscally responsible approach to our problem.
If your school district has turned a blind eye to the imperative of fiscal responsibility, Citizens for Fiscal Responsibility encourages you to send a message that they need to do so by voting no on their ballot measures.
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