Using Redevelopment Fund to Renew our School Structures

By Kathryn Rhyu "Kathy" McDonald

Improving school structures using Redevelopment Funds would greatly improve our city's desirability to families, create local jobs, and open housing opportunities in overcrowded attendance areas. This is a good use of redevelopment dollars that has overarching benefits throughout the community.

How about building some new schools? Fremont Unified School District has some of the oldest, most dilapidated school facilities I have seen anywhere in this country. Five years ago, when we first drove my daughter past Horner JH and introduced it as her new school, she thought we were kidding. The 13 year old could not believe that this crumbling, series of cement boxes was actually a school, or that she would be attending such a facility. Let's see if we can use this opportunity to make facilities improvement a reality.

Fremont Unified School District is short of funds. There is again, a discussion of floating a new school bond to improve the facilities because FUSD does not have the funds to build new facilities. There is not enough money in the capital improvement fund, or all the reserves to build even one new school. Yet, most FUSD schools are about 50 years old, and show every month of age. "New construction" in FUSD is a portable plopped on existing school grounds to increase capacity. Every facility has its own challenges including: deteriorating plumbing and electrical systems, crumbling parking and driveways, and antiquated furnishings, to termites, and overcrowding. As noted in previous papers about education, the lack of funding is an age-old problem, but the overcrowding is exacerbated by City policies.

I see the odds of passing such a measure as slim in today's economy, but I see the need as eminent. We need to fix these buildings, perhaps even condemn some and build anew. We should be aware that especially high schools in other cities are on another plane from ours. It is not just that we are in CA, but that we have not invested in our schools as have other cities. Other cities are building what look like modern office structures, and even complexes that rival colleges. * We need new facilities to bring our schools into the 21st Century so that our students can compete with those students.

My thought is not original. Other cities have built schools with their redevelopment funds. Oakland has already made this move, and Mt. View was just in the news for considering the same. There is no provision of redevelopment funding that prohibits this use. This option of using redevelopment to build new schools poses many benefits and simplifications of the school construction funding issue:
1. Redevelopment monies are now abundant

2. Spending Redevelopment funds does not require voter approval (floating a bond against this revenue stream can be done at the will of our elected officials)

3. Major capital improvements like closing campuses with security fencing, cameras, building viable competition pools, theaters, gyms, etc. could be made with a small fraction of the redevelopment monies, if the City so chose to claim a campus as a redevelopment area. However, if FUSD were to make the same improvements, a supermajority of the voting public must agree to pay additional taxes.

4. Land for school projects can be purchased using eminent domain (from FUSD) as the blighted sites they are. The sites can then be cleaned up or improved, and sold back to the FUSD for $1 as has been done for other projects (e.g. Centerville redevelopment project). This would create the revenue schools need to construct new buildings, or even buy furnishings

5. New schools would remove blight from neighborhoods and construction of said schools would create jobs and commerce. These new facilities could even have space for more students leading to increased opportunities for more housing to come to the desired neighborhoods

6. New schools improve the property values in the neighborhood, boosting a neighborhood's general appearance, and delivering a common good for the community

7. Resolves the issue of building state of the art schools to compete with surrounding cities without committing our residents to addition al bond payments or tax burdens

Of all the things we could be doing with the redevelopment fund, building up our schools, and adding cutting edge structures to this magnet to Fremont (schools) is the most productive and positive improvement we could make with at least some of the newly allocated $1.1 BILLION in redevelopment monies. Surely it would be more of a draw for new families than another strip mall. I would argue that it is irresponsible NOT to spend some of the money to build schools in this manner. This one new program will ensure the future of Fremont, and should elicit 100% support of the City Council.

Pick any district for better high school facilities. Examples of vastly better facilities:

Winemere Ranch Middle School, San Ramon, CA http://www.wrms.srvusd.k12.ca.us

Plano Independent School District, Plano, TX: http://www.pisd.edu

California High School, Pleasanton, CA: http://www.calhigh.net

Independence High School, San Jose, CA: http://ih.ca.campusgrid.net/home