Voters in three Marin school districts will be asked to support facilities bond measures in the Nov. 5 election.
The Tamalpais Union High School District is seeking voter approval for a $289 million bond proposal called Measure B, while the Kentfield School District is asking for voter approval of a $48 million bond proposal called Measure E.
In the Petaluma Joint Union High School District, which includes a small number of Marin families, officials are asking voters to approve Measure AA, a $159 million bond proposal.
All three measures would require approval by at least 55% of voters to pass. None would include exemptions for seniors because California law prohibits them for school facilities bond measures.
Supporters of Measure B in the Tam Union district say they have held about 25 public meetings since the original $517 million Measure A bond failed to get the required 55% approval in March. Since then, the bond proposal has been scaled down twice.
“We listened to voters,” Tam Union trustee Emily Uhlhorn said on Thursday. She said the meetings included voters in the Ross Valley, which had the strongest rate of opposition in March.
“The questions people asked and the points raised have helped us home in on the most crucial projects to be covered in Measure B,” Uhlhorn said. “We’re making sure we’re taking care of the most critical needs and being responsive to the community.”
Measure B would levy an annual tax of $17.60 per $100,000 of assessed valuation per property. For a home assessed at $1.1 million, the district median, that would mean a tax of approximately $194 annually.
Supporters said the new bond would cover only the most urgent repairs and upgrades needed for student safety and building stability. That includes such items as roof replacements, air conditioning, disability accommodations and new electrical and plumbing systems.
“The only thing more important than teaching and learning is the safety of our students,” Uhlhorn said. “Our students deserve to be warm, safe and dry.”
The bond also covers two replacement projects at Redwood High School in Larkspur and at Tamalpais High School in Mill Valley. Both of those address building deterioration and also related code and safety concerns. Those include the lack of access at Tam High for disabled students and the lack of space for students to eat meals at Redwood.
If the bond does not pass, the district would still face state mandates to complete many of the repairs or upgrades, officials said. Without a dedicated funding source, the district would need to pull money from its general fund budget, of which 85% normally goes for staff salaries and programs.
That would trigger massive budget cuts, said Tara Taupier, the district superintendent.
“We would have to go from seven periods a day to six,” Taupier said. “That would result in layoffs for teachers.”
One major change in Measure B from the earlier version of the bond in March was that the percentage of the bond funding allocated to Archie Williams High School in San Anselmo was increased from 14% in Measure A to 21% in Measure B. That was after further study revealed urgent needs at Archie Williams that had not been addressed earlier, according to Uhlhorn.
The percentage of spending for Archie Williams is now closer to its proportion of students. It has about 25% of the approximately 4,600 students in the district, Uhlhorn said.
Other schools would receive the following percentages of Measure B proceeds: 41.6% for Tamalpais High School, which has 33.1% of district students; 35.6% for Redwood High School, which has 38.8% of the students; and 1.9% for Tamiscal and San Andreas high schools and the district and community education offices, which have 2.6% of the students.
Advocates who signed a ballot argument in favor of Measure B include Marin superintendent of schools John Carroll; U.S. Rep. Jared Huffman; Marin County Supervisor Stephanie Moulton-Peters; Kevin Hagerty, president of the League of Women Voters of Marin County; former Tam Union trustee Chuck Ford; and district graduate Bitsa Freeman.
Measure B opponent Benedetto Cico, a member of an independent No on B group, said academics should be the district’s focus, not buildings. Cico, a San Anselmo resident and owner of the San Anselmo Inn, said four of his children attended Redwood High School.
“The only thing that matters is the quality of teaching,” he said.
Cico said the district should have covered maintenance items as they came up, instead of postponing repairs until they could be covered in a bond.
“The district keeps hiring more administrators and consultants, instead of good teachers,” Cico said.
Taupier said the district has “invested a lot time and money” to meet “increasing complexities in education in the state.” For example, the high schools have added “teachers on special assignment” who double as deans to handle both classroom instruction and administrative issues such as chronic absenteeism lingering from the pandemic, she said.
Taupier, now in her seventh year as superintendent and her 23rd year in the district, said she was “incredibly proud” of its high level of academic quality and achievement.
Michael Mackintosh, owner of the Marin Town and Country Club in Fairfax, said he opposes Measure B because of its cost. Mackintosh said the bond amount should have been limited to the approximately $80 million in repairs and maintenance that the district has said it absolutely had to do, or risk serious disrepair or running afoul of state regulations.
“Instead, they tacked on another $200 million,” Mackintosh said.
Corbett Elsen, an assistant district superintendent, said it was important to cover the additional work. If not, the district would risk throwing the problems to future school boards, who would then have to seek another bond measure in a short period of time.
In addition to Cico and Mackintosh, other signers of the opposing argument on the ballot were San Anselmo planning commissioner Pascal Sisich and district residents Kathy Flores and Diana Perdue.
Mimi Willard, president of the Marin Coalition of Sensible Taxpayers, said her group is staying neutral on Measure B. The group waged the strongest opposition to Measure A in March, saying the $517 million cost was too big. The group sees the proposal’s reduction as a victory, Willard has said.
In the Kentfield School District, officials are seeking voter approval of a $48 million bond, Measure E, for urgent work on school buildings. The district serves about 1,055 students at Bacich Elementary School and Kent Middle School.
The measure would assess an annual tax of $29 per $100,000 of assessed valuation per property. For a home assessed at about $1.45 million, the district median, that would mean a tax of about $420 per year.
Kentfield residents are also paying for earlier bonds from 2004 and 2014. The resulting tax from the two outstanding bonds combined is $25.70 per $100,000 of assessed value per parcel. For a home at the median value in the district, that is a tax of about $373 annually.
Raquel Rose, the district superintendent, said the Measure E bond would cover repairs or upgrades for items such as leaky roofs, aging plumbing, deteriorating student restrooms, campus fencing, security systems and electrical systems.
“This decision was based on a facility needs analysis, completed in summer 2023, ongoing discussion with our local stakeholders and polling results from our local community,” Rose said.
The ballot argument in favor of Measure E says: “School facility experts, architects, and engineers have identified that Kentfield Schools need basic repairs and maintenance to keep our schools functioning and our students and staff safe.”
Supporters who signed the argument in favor are former Kentfield School District board president and Board of Supervisors candidate Heather McPhail Sridharan; real estate broker and former Kentfield Invest in Kids foundation board member Thomas Poser; former Marin educator of the year Catherine Flores; Marin real estate agent Ross McKenna; and retired Kentfield School District trustee Ann Mathieson.
The ballot argument against Measure E said it is “too much money for way too little,” adding another $96 million in new taxes to pay for the $48 million bond.
“It funds what’s effectively a to-do list of deferred and future maintenance projects,” the argument states.
The opponents also object to “bonds on top of bonds and parcel taxes,” citing the $30 million bond measure in 2014 and the $11.6 million measure in 2004.
“They’re still on your tax bill,” the statement says.
The opponents also say the district’s “2024-25 parcel tax of nearly $1,800 is among California’s highest” and that the district is “fiscally inefficient.”
“For just 1,100 students, there’s a superintendent and a complete administrative staff,” the ballot statement says.
The signatories to the argument are Willard; former Kent Woodlands Property Owners Association president Kathryn Goldsmith; Safe Routes to School adviser Julia Violich; Kent Middle School graduate Joan Bennett; and Greenbrae Management Inc. vice president Reide Baxter.
In the Petaluma Joint Union School District, voters are being asked to approve a $159 million bond measure, Measure AA, for building repairs and to expand career training. It would levy a tax of $30 per $100,000 of assessed valuation per property annually.
According to the ballot argument in favor of Measure AA, the bond would support Petaluma City Schools, which has 7,300 students across 18 schools with over 950,000 square feet of facilities.
“Unfortunately, state codes have crippled school funding,” the argument in favor states.
“Compared to the greater Bay Area, Petaluma City Schools rank near the bottom in per student spending,” it states. “This funding will change that, and demonstrate Petaluma cares about students by providing long overdue upgrades to our schools.
The signers in favor on the ballot include mostly Sonoma County officials and residents and state Assemblyman Damon Connolly, who represents both Marin and Sonoma counties.
No argument against Measure AA was filed, according to the Marin elections office.
