Population Changes Put School Districts in Costly Space Bind

Orange County faces a paradox: School enrollment is at once shrinking and growing too fast.

Although most of the county’s 28 school districts are losing students, Santa Ana, Tustin and the Laguna Niguel-Mission Viejo area are experiencing rapid growth or are expected to soon.

For all schools, the changes mean financial trouble. Districts that lose students lose money. Districts with population booms must build new schools.

Since money for new schools isn’t forthcoming, growth districts have been plagued with increasingly overcrowded classrooms with as many as 36 students per teacher.

The search for solutions has prompted legislative battles in Sacramento. And it has prompted a new and controversial idea for a way to fund new schools: bill the builders of new homes.

The Saddleback Valley Unified School District, for example, jolted developers last month when it announced a get-tough policy that would increase building fees as much as 500% to pay for new schools.

Picketing Threatened

Parents and school board members at a meeting said flatly they wanted no more homes in the sprawling Mission Viejo area unless developers could promise new schools. One parent said she and others would picket building sites and warn prospective buyers of the school shortage.

Builders at the meeting expressed shock and anger. “Battle lines are being drawn,” one builder said.

But members of school boards said they had no choice. “In the past, schools have been built by the state or by local school bond issues,” said Dr. Gore J. Gilbert, a Saddleback Valley Unified trustee. “Since that’s not possible any longer, it’s incumbent on us to find other ways to build schools for new development that is coming in.”

The passage of Proposition 13 in 1978, by limiting property taxes, ended the use of the tax to underwrite local school-construction bonds. Because the state had to assume most of the cost of operating schools after 1978, less money was left in the state treasury to build new ones.

The squeeze on the state budget also has meant less money for school districts losing students. Districts losing several hundred students in a year would have to lay off scores of teachers, perhaps prematurely, if state aid could not cushion the loss.

Gov. George Deukmejian in recent years has allowed school funding that doesn’t fully penalize a school district’s loss of enrollment. But he has threatened to return to a formula based strictly on attendance, a possibility worrying some Orange County schools.

Deukmejian also has vetoed bills that would have provided more state money for school construction, a source of concern to Orange County’s growing districts.

Applications before the state for new schools already total $884 million, including $43 million from Orange County.

A bill by Sen. Marian Bergeson (R-Newport Beach) would put an $800-million bond issue on the November ballot for school construction. The bill (SB 1133), has passed the Senate and is pending in the Assembly.

The statewide shortage of new schools has forced California to put more children into existing classrooms. According to a recent report by the California Commission on the Teaching Profession, “California’s classrooms are so overcrowded that the state ranks 50th in the nation in its student-teacher ratio, and the situation in many communities is getting worse.”

The report stated that although the average ratio of teachers to students nationwide is 18 to 1, in California it is 26 to 1.

But in some Orange County school districts, overcrowding considerably exceeds the state average. Santa Ana Unified averages 31 students per teacher, said Diane Thomas, public information officer.

One of the few Orange County school districts with a relatively low teacher-to-student ratio of 26 to 1 is the Newport-Mesa Unified School District. That district has been losing students for 15 years. Ironically, the financially painful loss of students enabled the district to reduce class sizes.

Overcrowding Gets Worse

Overcrowding worsens in Santa Ana every year. As the city’s population grows, largely through legal and illegal immigration of people from Mexico and Asia, the district grows by about 1,100 students a year, said Edward S. Krass, Santa Ana schools superintendent.

“We’re already building a new high school. It’s scheduled to open in September, 1988,” Krass said. “We’re going to need at least six new elementary schools by 1990.”

In recent years, the school board has accused the city government of failing to help ease the burden of overcrowded schools. But last year, in a surprise move, the city said it would give the district $8 million for construction. The move came after City Council members deplored talk on the school board about seeking a building freeze or developer fees.

In the Irvine Unified School District, the overcrowding problem triggered a protest by English teachers this month at a school board meeting. With up to 35 students per English class, the teachers said, they could not devote the time they needed to grade written assignments.

Irvine officials said they want to reduce class sizes. “It makes me angry,” said Dean Waldfogel, Irvine assistant superintendent of schools. “California can do better.”

Two south Orange County school districts already have imposed fees on developers to help pay for schools. They are Saddleback Valley Unified and Capistrano Unified, both of which cover vast areas that include prime acreage where developers are planning large new subdivisions.

“We have up to 40 developers who want to build in our district,” said Peter A. Hartman, Saddleback Unified’s superintendent of schools.

The district now negotiates fees with each developer. But Hartman said that top fees could go as high as $6,000 or $7,000 per residential unit.

Builders complained that the policy puts the school-financing burden on them, rather than on the state. “Letters sent to us (about the need for new school construction money) really were missent and should have gone to the Legislature,” one builder said.

Declining Enrollment

But while districts like Saddleback Valley, Irvine and Santa Ana try to cope with overcrowding, the great majority of school districts in Orange County face declining enrollment. For Orange Unified, Fountain Valley, Huntington Beach City Elementary and others, the problem has been which schools to close--not where to build new schools.

A survey of the 28 school districts in the county showed that 18 have closed one or more schools since 1980 because of declining enrollment. In a few of those, enrollment has leveled off and no more closings are forecast. And some districts, predominantly in northeastern Orange County, have neither gained nor lost in the past six years.

In some districts, called “graying areas,” the loss of students occurs because residents remain in the same homes after the children are grown--a trend that became firmer after the passage of Proposition 13. Graying areas also lack vacant land for new subdivisions and for new, younger families.

In Fountain Valley, for example, which has little vacant land, the elementary school district has closed six schools and laid off 145 teachers and other employees in the last seven years.

The Tustin Unified School District, also a graying area, has closed nine schools since 1978. But school officials anticipate a jump back into the growth column with the prospect of a huge new subdivision in east Tustin.

Like Saddleback Valley Unified, Tustin Unified School District’s school board recently said it wants guarantees of funding for new schools before it would give its blessing to the Irvine Co. subdivision, which eventually would house about 9,000 residents.

The Irvine Co. is the owner of all the land proposed for development and is thus in a better position to guarantee school construction, Tustin Unified officials pointed out. A state law, called “Mello-Roos financing,” allows a developer to have an entire subdivision as a special taxing district, with the money earmarked for school construction.

School officials say, however, that Mello-Roos is not feasible in small-development projects or ones where land is not totally owned by one developer.

The solution for most school growth problems--as well as declining enrollment problems--is still in Sacramento, Orange County education officials say. They add that as Orange County’s twin-sided dilemma continues, the need for permanent state remedies is more critical than ever.

SCHOOL ENROLLMENT IN ORANGE COUNTY Anaheim Union High School District overlaps Centralia, Cypress, Savanna, Magnolia and Anaheim City elementary school districts. It has closed three junior highs.

Fullerton Joint Union High School District overlaps La Habra, Buena Park, Yorba Linda, a small part of Lowell Joint (not shown on map) and Fullerton elementary school districts. The high school district has closed no schools since 1980.

Huntington Beach Union High School District overlaps Fountain Valley, Huntington Beach City, Ocean View and Westminster elementary school districts. It has closed no schools since 1980.

Average Class Size K-12 Nationwide . . . 18 Statewide . . . 26 Santa Ana Unified . . . 31 Newport Mesa* . . . 26 *District has had declining enrollment for last 15 years.