For Hiring Teachers : Conejo Board OKs Election on Tax Hike

Conejo Valley Unified School District board members voted 3 to 2 Thursday to hold a special June election on imposing a $77 per parcel property tax to fund reductions in the size of classes.

The money raised by the tax would go toward hiring 82 more teachers for the Ventura County district, which serves 17,800 students in Thousand Oaks, Westlake Village and Newbury Park.

The goal would be to reduce the district’s pupil-teacher ratio from 32-1 to 28-1, said school board member Ellyn Wilkins, a proponent of the tax increase.

In Effect for 4 Years

The flat tax would be levied for four years on the 36,000 parcels in the district beginning July 1 and would raise about $277,000 per year.

Under the resolution passed late Thursday night, there could be no increases in the tax over the four-year period.

To win approval in the June 4 election, the ballot measure must be approved by two-thirds of the voters in the district.

Before passage of Proposition 13, California’s 1978 tax limitation initiative, school boards were free to set and raise their own property tax rates, and the issue was rarely submitted to voters. In the wake of Proposition 13’s requirement that voters approve such levies, 17 California school districts have put tax increases on the ballot. In only five cases have voters approved them.

The Conejo Valley district’s student-teacher ratio, one of the highest in the state among districts of similar size, has long been a source of concern to school board members. In recent years, the problem has worsened because of declining enrollment, causing the state to cut back on enrollment-based funding and making it more difficult to replace teachers lost through retirement.

A citizens’ committee, which polled district residents on the issue and made the tax-increase proposal to the Conejo Valley school board, requested that the tax be set at $98 per parcel, raising enough money to hire about 100 teachers and lower the pupil-teacher ratio by four.

But new district calculations on teacher deployment indicated that the same class-size reduction could be achieved by hiring 75 to 80 teachers. Thus, the amount of the tax per parcel could also be lowered, said Wilkins, who assisted the volunteer committee.

Politically, “that was a pleasant revelation,” Wilkins said. “We live in a very conservative community, which does just does not like to be taxed.”

Board President Dolores Didio said the proposal would pass if supporters made it clear to voters that the tax would be temporary, would go for a specific purpose and would have an oversight committee monitoring its use.

Emily Avey, president of the Unified Assn. of Conejo Teachers, which represents teachers in collective bargaining, said her group supports the tax proposal.

“It helps improve the quality by reducing the quantity,” she said.

No organized opposition has surfaced yet, but Thousand Oaks Mayor Larry Horner said he has spoken to several residents who are upset that the board would consider a tax to reduce class sizes when several schools have recently been closed because of low enrollment. Horner said he is opposed to the tax, although the City Council has not taken a position.

Steve Rubenstein, president and chief executive officer of the Conejo Valley Chamber of Commerce, said his group has not taken a position, opting instead to wait for an indication of how much money the district will glean from the 1985-86 state budget and the upcoming state lottery.

If the tax went into effect, approximately half of the teachers that could be funded by it would be hired for the September start of classes, said Bill Seaver, assistant superintendent of personnel. That would give the district time to locate quality instructors, he said. The remaining tax money would be banked.

In the second year, the rest of the authorized teachers would be hired. If, at the end of four years, the tax were not renewed by another election and no additional funds from the state general fund or lottery fund were available, the newly hired teachers would be integrated into the district as other teachers retired.

This method would avoid mass layoffs, Seaver said. However, in that event, it is possible that the district would return to current pupil-teacher ratios.