School-Tax Rejection Stifles Vows to Hire More Conejo Teachers

Following the resounding defeat by voters of a proposed special tax to reduce class sizes in Thousand Oaks public schools, key school board members Wednesday began backing away from their longstanding pledge to hire more teachers.

Conejo Unified School District trustees who had supported Measure K said it was so overwhelmingly rejected by voters Tuesday that they no longer viewed smaller classes as the district’s top priority.

In one of the sharpest setbacks since school districts in California began proposing such taxes to voters in 1978, Conejo Valley residents voted against imposing a $77-per-parcel tax by a 76% margin.

To pass, two-thirds of those voting would have had to favor the measure.

Turnout Higher Than Expected

The size of the turnout, 26% of the 56,883 eligible voters, added to the impact of the defeat. Ventura County election officials had predicted a 15% turnout, about average for elections in Thousand Oaks.

There were no other issues or contests on the ballot Tuesday.

“We lost, but we seem to have broken the back of apathy in this community,” said board member Ellyn Wilkins, a leading Measure K supporter. “We’ve found an issue that will bring the voters out.”

At the last school board election, in November, 1983, less than 15% of voters participated. In 1981, the turnout was 10%.

School board President Dolores Didio said voters were “very emphatic; they are not willing to spend the money to reduce class sizes.”

Diminished Priority

Schools Supt. Thomas Boysen predicted the board would continue to seek ways to reduce class sizes. but following Measure K’s overwhelming defeat, “there’s no prospect of immediate relief,” he said.

Wilkins said reducing class size “will no longer be the top priority in the district. Although I still consider it an important goal, we can’t put this kind of time and money into something that does not have the support we thought it had.”

Both sides conceded during the campaign that class sizes in the Conejo Valley were among the largest in the state for districts of similar size.

But opponents questioned whether reducing class sizes would necessarily lead to better student performance.

Parochial Schools Cited

They cited parochial schools with classes that average 40 students in which achievement-test scores outpace are higher than at Thousand Oaks schools.

The estimated $2.77 million a year that would have been raised was earmarked for hiring 82 new teachers for the 17,800-student district.

The goal would have been to lower the student-teacher ratio from 32-to-1 to 28-to-1.

Before passage of Proposition 13, school boards were able to raise their property tax rates without voter approval.

However, the 1978 tax-cutting initiative imposed a requirement on governments that all tax increases be approved by two-thirds of those voting.

Seen as ‘Sneak Tax’

As of November, 17 school districts had submitted tax increases for voter approval. Only five were approved, although all but a handful won majority support.

Nathaniel Glickman, leader of the No on K Committee, said the measure lost because of the community’s traditional opposition to higher taxes and because voters viewed Measure K as a “sneak tax” that the board was seeking to get through at a special election when a light turnout could be expected.

He also said that voters opposed it because it was an “unfair tax that would have hurt small-property owners.”

Foes charged that Measure K was a political “payoff” to the local teachers’ union from the three trustees who voted to place it on the ballot.

Board members Didio, Wilkins and Priscilla Schroeder, the three Measure K supporters, have close ties to the Unified Assn. of Conejo Teachers.

Agreement Denied

The association, which represents teachers in collective bargaining, vigorously supported Measure K.

The three trustees, who usually vote as a group on the board, repeatedly denied there was any agreement with the teachers’ group, which provided key support in 1983 to help Wilkins and Didio win board seats.

In Wilkins’ view, all of the attacks by opponents had little effect on the outcome.

“I don’t think it mattered that much what they said or what we said,” she said. “The voters are against more taxes. Period.”

Light Financial Backing

Besides board members Lori Kissinger and Gary Pederson, opponents included the Conejo Valley Chamber of Commerce and the Ventura County Taxpayers Assn.

Although the turnout Tuesday was higher than unexpected, the campaigns for and against the measure drew only light financial backing.

Records on file with the county indicate that, as of May 23, supporters of Measure K had raised $4,541, while opponents had collected only $782.