LOCAL ELECTIONS / BEVERLY HILLS SCHOOLS : Parcel Tax--an Uphill Fight in a City of Wealth

In the city of legendary wealth, the public school system is once again rattling its tin cup.

Beverly Hills parents, teachers and students by the dozens have been knocking on doors throughout the city in recent days urging residents to vote to tax themselves on behalf of the schools in the June 5 election. At stake, they say, are the quality of education in the 4,700-student Beverly Hills Unified School District and, indirectly, property values. If the city’s schools are allowed to decline, they argue, the lure to live there will be lessened.

The tax must be approved by two-thirds of the voters to take effect. Residential and commercial land parcels in the city would be assessed between $250 to $750 annually for the next five years, depending on size and use, to raise about $4.5 million a year for the schools.

The levy has become a major civic cause in Beverly Hills, drawing the active support of celebrities, the Chamber of Commerce and the City Council.

Supporters acknowledge that the school system is not on the verge of collapse. It is, however, in danger of becoming ordinary, says Bernard Nebenzahl, a chairman of the Yes on Schools Committee. The parcel tax, he says, is needed to maintain the “diversity, variety and depth” of the school system, which already has had to rebound from a 13-day teachers’ strike last fall.

Advocates of the tax have staged parades and rallies featuring actors such as Valerie Harper and Corbin Bernsen. They are passing out lawn signs and peddling T-shirts to all who will have them. And they plan to raise and spend as much as they can--$100,000, if possible--to try to sell the tax to voters.

Even so, the campaign for the tax appears to face an uphill battle. Statewide, school tax elections have had only a 37% success rate over the last seven years. Beverly Hills’ last parcel tax attempt, in 1987, was among the failures: 59% of the voters favored the tax, short of the two-thirds majority needed.

Winning approval may be especially tough in Beverly Hills. The city has large contingents of elderly voters and residents with no school-age children--groups that are generally likely to oppose a school tax.

Meanwhile, two groups that in other cities would probably deliver a strong “yes” vote--teachers and parents of school-age children--have little electoral strength.

With housing in Beverly Hills so expensive, all but about 10% of the teachers live outside the district, according to the teachers’ union. And the parents’ clout is diluted because a high percentage are recent immigrants not yet eligible to vote. There are no precise figures for the parents, but school officials say 43% of the students are foreign-born.

An organized anti-tax campaign seems hardly necessary under such circumstances, but a low-key group of opponents, touting familiar themes of tax revolt and back-to-basics in education, has found its message well-received at several recent public forums.

At a debate sponsored by local homeowners’ groups last week, anti-tax campaign leader ShermanKulick drew enthusiastic applause from some elderly residents when he simply stated: “You (would) have to pay the tax even if you don’t have kids in the schools.”

While that argument may give some residents all the reason they need to vote no, Kulick’s group, Beverly Hills Citizens for Cost-Effective Quality Education, is raising additional questions about the school district and its finances.

They note that despite its supposed poverty, the district spends almost $6,000 per student annually, more than any other unified school district in Los Angeles County (the statewide average is about $4,800). They argue that school districts in the county’s other affluent communities, such as San Marino, La Canada and Palos Verdes Peninsula, spend less per student, yet their students score as well as or better than Beverly Hills students on standardized tests.

Conceding that their test scores may be no better than those in these other districts, Beverly Hills officials say their students benefit from a broader menu.

For instance, Beverly Hills has smaller classes and offers more foreign languages and Advanced Placement courses than San Marino or La Canada. In its elementary schools, it offers instruction in art, music and computers by specialists in each field. The high school has a planetarium.

The San Marino school district, which serves the city with the highest average income in the county, spends just $3,700 per student, in part because parcel tax proposals have been defeated twice. Among the school district’s economies are that it has no librarian, no elementary music instruction and only a part-time nurse.

If the parcel tax is rejected in Beverly Hills, administrators say, they will have to cut costs by 10% next year, to about $30 million. It will mean program cuts and the layoff of 48 of the district’s 300 teachers, counselors, librarians and nurses, they estimate.

Among the positions targeted for elimination are the Academic Decathlon coach, two of the district’s three nurses, and all elementary school music teachers and computer specialists. The planetarium is to close. And a proposed 3% pay increase for teachers, negotiated during the teachers’ strike but made contingent on the passage of the parcel tax, would also have to be dropped. The raise proposal is aimed at keeping salaries competitive with Los Angeles schools.

Beverly Hills administrators say their basic financial problem is inadequate state funding. Until the late 1970s, most money for schools came from local property taxes, and wealthy cities such as Beverly Hills could easily raise and spend far more on schools than poor communities.

But that changed. A 1976 state Supreme Court decision required the state to equalize funding among the districts, and in 1978, Proposition 13 limited property taxes. Control of funds shifted from local school boards to Sacramento. Now, about two-thirds of the the average school district’s revenues come from the state, whose allocations are based on enrollment.

Beverly Hills, however, has some revenue sources not available to other districts. The city government pays the district a generous $4.6 million a year for the occasional use of school facilities. A nonprofit foundation organized by parents raises about $350,000 a year. A cluster of oil wells on the Beverly Hills High School campus pumps $276,000 into the district treasury annually.

Still, declining enrollment has cut into state funding, and over the last five years the district has eliminated 50 teachers and administrators, school officials say.

When the 1987 parcel tax failed, the district had some reserves to draw on. But now, Assistant Supt. Sol Levine says, the reserves have dried up and “I don’t see any other way to raise money.”

Tax opponent Kulick says the district simply needs to eliminate frills. Drama, music and other “Mickey Mouse courses,” he contends, simply divert students away from the three Rs.

Responds Levine: “When you visit the Louvre, is art a frill?” When you go to the Music Center and hear a Beethoven symphony, is music a frill?”