Vista Schools Make Plans in Case November Bond Issue Vote Fails

Vista school trustees, preparing for their third try in as many years to ask voters to approve millions of dollars in bonds to construct desperately needed new schools, have begun mapping plans for worst-case scenarios should November’s election fail to muster a two-thirds approval.

The district’s staff was asked to return in October with specific plans on how to implement double sessions, the most viable option, for the district’s 17,000 students. Officials estimate the sessions would be needed in two or three years.

Already, the Vista Unified School District’s 12,000 students in kindergarten through eighth grade will begin year-round schedules starting July 1, which will have the net effect of allowing each campus to handle 25% more students.

The district has been unable to cope with dramatic growth within its boundaries and now relies heavily on portable classrooms to accommodate its student population, which last year grew by 1,800 students. The district is projected to grow by another 20,000 students within the next 15 years--much of that, due to the impact of new houses being built in eastern Oceanside, which is served by the Vista school district.

November’s bond election will seek $63 million for the construction of new schools and the renovation of older, deteriorating ones. A similar, $63-million bond election received the blessing of 59% of the district voters in November, 1988, but still fell short of the requisite two-thirds majority needed for approval. A $38.8-million bond issue was rejected by district voters last November, getting a 62% approval vote.

District officials say that if their third attempt fails, students and teachers will have to brace themselves for the worst: double sessions in which half of the students will attend classes from early morning until early afternoon, and the other half attend school from early afternoon into the early evening.

Trustees Wednesday night also asked the staff to prepare to seek short-term loans to help renovate schools in the most dire physical straits. That suggestion, however, was criticized at the meeting as too expensive and because it might suggest to voters that the district could financially bail itself out without need for the bond election.

The loans, known as certificates of participation, would enable the district to borrow several million dollars from major lenders, and to repay it over a five- to seven-year period with funds generated by developer impact fees.

But teachers and other critics complained that the repayment of the loans would, as one speaker remarked, “mortgage” the district with credit-card financing and could eat into the district’s operating budget, at the expense of instructional programs, teacher salaries and district services, including student busing for all but the physically handicapped.

One trustee, Jim Hagar, suggested that the school district ask the city councils of Vista and Oceanside to impose residential building moratoriums.

“It seems to me if we go to year-round schools and then to double sessions, then we’ve gone too far,” Hagar said in an interview Thursday. “But maybe it won’t have to get to that point. I’d kind of like to know if the city councils say this is a crisis that impacts the entire community, and not just the schools.

“I’m not asking for a building moratorium today or tomorrow, but maybe in two or three years, before we have to impose double sessions,” Hagar said.

But the mayors of both Vista and Oceanside, while saying they are willing to discuss the notion of a building ban, nonetheless said it was unlikely.

“I’m not saying we wouldn’t give it full consideration,” said Oceanside Mayor Larry Bagley, “but I think the horse is already out of the barn.”

Bagley said he expects the explosive residential growth in recent years to cool off on its own.

“People come here because of jobs, not because houses are being built,” Bagley said. “With the cutbacks in the defense industry, that will be felt out here with fewer jobs. Housing isn’t fueling the growth; it’s just reacting to the growth caused by jobs.”

Vista Mayor Gloria McClellan said a building moratorium within her city’s limits would not have much effect on student enrollment. “We’re already 80% built out,” she said. “The problem is coming from outside our city.”

Vista trustees Wednesday night did take one affirmative step that is expected to finance at least one more classroom to house 30 students. Trustees ordered a 2-cent increase on developer fees levied by the district on new house construction, a jump to $1.58 per square foot. The boost brings the district to the maximum allowable impact fee, which itself was increased by the state to $1.58 this month.

Assistant Supt. John Wiggins said the increase is expected to generate an additional $40,000 this year--enough to pay for one portable classroom.

Currently, the district relies on 350 portable classrooms to accommodate students on overcrowded campuses.

“But we’re running out of Band-Aids,” he said.