YES ON PROP. 39 FIX CLASSROOMS, FIX THE WAY SCHOOLS SPEND MONEY

By JoAnne (Spear) Brynjestad

Prop.39 will fix the way our schools spend money and fix our schools. If passed, Prop 39 will implement strict provisions that hold administrators directly accountable for the spending of local school bond funds. These accountability requirements will help ensure that every penny of voter-approved school bonds is spent directly on building and repairing classrooms - and not on administration or bureaucracy.

Overhaul School Bond Spending to Eliminate Waste and Mismanagement:

• Strictly forbid the use of local school bond funding for bureaucracy or administrative salaries.
• Require school districts to provide voters with a specific list of school construction projects to be financed by a proposed bond.
• Require school districts to commission 2 independent audits - financial and performance - annually throughout the life of the bond.

• Passage of Prop 39 would require local school bonds to be passed by a tough 55% super-majority vote.
• Passage of Prop 39 would prohibit these votes except during regularly scheduled elections.
• Passage of Prop 39 would place a strict cap limiting the amount property taxes can be raised as a result of a local school bond. This cap would be less than $100 per year for the average homeowner.

• California has more students per classroom than any other state except Utah.
• Over the next 10 years, California will need to build an additional 20,000 classrooms and 544 new schools.
• Many districts are forced to convert cafeterias, libraries, gymnasiums, trailers, and teacher's lounges in order to provide space for incoming students.
• More than 50% of California public schools are more than 30 years old. Alpine has schools that fall in this catagory.
• More than half of California's schools lack adequate electrical power for computers.
• California ranks dead last in students per instructional computer.