BY BRADEN CARTWRIGHT
Daily Post Staff Writer
The Palo Alto Unified School District should learn from its defeated parcel tax by having a more active campaign and concrete responses to opposition, a former school board member said yesterday.
“People here want to support education. So if they know that money is going to affect students and teachers in the classroom, they will support it,” said Mandy Lowell, who was on the board from 2000 to 2007.
Learning from the past
The last time a parcel tax failed in Palo Alto was November 2004, when a $521 tax fell less than 1% short of two-thirds approval. Supporters regrouped and passed a $465 tax with 73% support in June 2005.
Lowell said the campaign took a different approach the second time around in 2005.
“We tried to answer many more of the questions instead of just saying,’We’re a good school district and we need more money,'” Lowell said. “We looked at reductions that would have to be made – Are you going to increase class sizes? Are you going to be able to maintain certain programs? – so people could see where the money was going.”
Voters raised and renewed the parcel tax in 2010, 2015 and 2020.
But this year’s campaign for an $800 tax faced unprecedented opposition from former school board members Todd Collins and Ken Dauber. They said the district is in a strong financial position, with declining enrollment and over $100 million in reserves.
Measure B would’ve raised $14.6 million annually for the district and has 60.8% support.
Supporters not giving up
Parent Sarah Cornwell, who organized the “yes” campaign, said volunteers will keep fighting until the funding is secured.
“Our commitment to protecting our schools doesn’t waver,” she said in an email on Tuesday night.
Lowell said the “yes” campaign could put out more lawn signs, solicit more donations, host more community meetings and send out more voting reminders.
“They can make a much more compelling case,” she said. “It’s word of mouth by parents saying to other people in the community, ‘This is really important for us to maintain these programs.'”
To push back on Collins and Dauber, Lowell said not all expenses go down with enrollment. Schools still want drama programs and student newspapers, even with fewer students.
Reserves can be depleted, educators have higher expenses and the district has more students with higher needs than a decade ago, Lowell said.
Be the first to comment