Irvine Group Joins School Initiative Effort : Measure Would Assure Districts a Percentage of State’s Budget

Irvine parents and teachers have launched an effort to help put a proposed statewide school-funding initiative on the November ballot.

The proposed initiative, sponsored by the California Teachers Assn., would guarantee each school and community college district a percentage of the state’s annual budget. Schools presently get whatever the Legislature and the governor agree on each year. Because there are often disagreements and political fights involving the funding, the amount for schools varies from year to year.

The measure to change the money allocation is called the School Funding for Instructional Improvement and Accountability Initiative. The measure will require 595,485 signatures of registered voters to qualify for the Nov. 8 ballot, according to the California secretary of state’s office.

Parents and teachers in Irvine hope to provide 9,000 of the needed signatures to get the initiative on the ballot.

“We’re part of a statewide effort, and we think the people of Irvine will again be showing how much they support education,” said Patricia Machesky, communications officer for the Irvine Unified School District. “I was among those working to get signatures this past weekend, and it was very encouraging.

“Often as soon as I would say, ‘This will help education,’ someone would respond, ‘Absolutely, I’m for it.’ I think we’re going to reach our quota.”

Pat Salceda, a parent of two Irvine schoolchildren, is the chair of the Irvine Legislative Action Network coordinating the signature-gathering. She said that Irvine residents tend to support educational causes. “We got 5,450 signatures a few months ago to help put the initiative on the June ballot that will change the Gann spending limit,” Salceda said.

Getting that initiative--a change in how in the Gann limit is applied to statewide spending--is an also a goal of educational groups this year.

But as a second step, education leaders have said the state must have “a rational budget policy” for its schools. Thus the California Teachers Assn. started work for a second initiative--the funding proposal for the November ballot.

The funding initiative has three elements:

- It would guarantee “that schools will receive either the same percentage of funds as they received in the 1986-87 school year or the same funds as the prior year, plus adjustments for enrollment increases and cost-of-living increases.”

- It would “provide a mechanism for returning funds to California schools that are generated beyond the constitutionally established Gann Limitation, up to a maximum of 4% per year.” This change to the Gann limit would be in addition to the June proposal, which is geared chiefly to how the Gann limit is calculated.

- It would require that the extra 4% for schools “only be spent in five areas: class-size reduction, academic achievement programs, instructional supplies and support services, student support services, and improvement of instructional technique.”

Machesky said that although the proposal is sometimes called “the class-size-reduction initiative,” she and other petition workers downplay that angle. “It will take a long time for class-size reduction to come about,” said Machesky. “The most important part of the initiative is the (provision for) stable funding” for schools and community colleges.