LOCAL ELECTIONS SCHOOL BOARD : A Big Job With Little Pay Awaits 4 : Politics: Candidates for Santa Monica-Malibu district say the work, not the salary, is important.

Wanted: Four hard workers to attend frequent meetings that tend to drag on for hours, formulate educational and administrative policies, handle complaints, visit schools, find money. $240/month.

Serving as a member of the Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District Board of Education is a tough, mostly thankless job, but that hasn’t deterred the six candidates who will be competing for the four open seats in the Nov. 6 election. The lousy pay does not diminish the importance of the job, they say.

Only one candidate, Patricia Hoffman, is an incumbent. Three other openings come because member Robert Holbrook is running for the Santa Monica City Council and because board President Dan Ross and member Della Barrett, citing exhaustion, are not seeking reelection.

“I didn’t know how wearing it would be,” said Barrett, a two-term member, soon after announcing her decision not to run. It takes at least 20 hours a week “to do the job right,” she said.

“While there are some really good moments,” she said, there is also “a lot of blame, not much credit.” The board faces “large problems with small resources, which can be very frustrating and disheartening.”

Ross said that he didn’t have enough time for his family, his law practice and his board duties, but will remain active in the schools.

The candidates take similar positions on many issues, such as the district’s financial woes. School districts in California are funded primarily through the state, based on attendance. Enrollment in Santa Monica-Malibu, now 9,300 students, has declined over the past several years, which has meant less state money. The campuses have been neglected for so long that the board put a $75-million bond measure on the ballot in an effort to raise money to remove asbestos, repair plumbing and heating, modernize classrooms, and bring the buildings up to earthquake safety standards.

All six candidates say that parents, teachers, administrators and the community must lobby in Sacramento for increased financing.

Likewise, all six support the bond measure, Proposition ES, which requires approval by two-thirds of the voters to pass. The $75-million bond issue, if approved, would be the largest ever by a local school district in California, district officials say.

But the school board candidates all agree it is necessary because maintenance has been deferred for so long.

None of them blames the board for the decay. The district simply hasn’t had the money for maintenance since Proposition 13 and a court decision that required equalizing funding among school districts, said candidate Michael Hill.

“If you don’t maintain your buildings over 15, 20 years,” a large sum is necessary to do the work, added candidate Pam Brady. “There is no gravy in that estimate.”

Some of the candidates have forged loose alliances. Hill said he is planning some joint community meetings with Brady and incumbent Hoffman, and possibly with candidate Joanne Leavitt as well. The four have been endorsed by the Committee for a Responsive School Board, a 10-year-old group of parents, teachers and school employees that is affiliated with Santa Monicans for Renters’ Rights. The committee plans to help the four candidates with publicity and fund-raising, committee treasurer Randi Johnson said.

Johnson noted that Brady is the first Republican that the committee has ever backed. “We don’t want to say, ‘You have to be a tenant activist Democrat to get on the school board,’ ” she said.

Brady leads in fund-raising, with $6,043 raised as of Sept. 30, according to campaign finance reports filed by the candidates. Hoffman has raised $1,344 and Hill $1,304. Candidate Brenda Gottfried said she has raised about $650, and Leavitt reported raising $535. The sixth candidate, Thomas Kayn, filed a statement saying he does not intend to raise or spend more than $1,000.

All of the candidates said they will comply with a new Santa Monica law that limits campaign contributions to $500, even though some said they believe they are not bound by that limit. County election officials have advised the school district that since the district is separate from the city, the board candidates are not subject to the city regulation but to the state campaign limits of $1,000.

Here is a brief look at the candidates and their positions on various issues. The candidates are listed in the order in which they will appear on the ballot.

Joanne Leavitt, who describes herself as a “community volunteer,” is a former president of the Santa Monica-Malibu Council PTA. She also has served on several advisory committees to the district and is a former president of the League of Women Voters of Santa Monica/Malibu. She was honored by the board in 1988 for campaigning to pass a school-funding tax.

She says she believes the district can help itself improve its financial position by “better marketing of the schools,” aimed at parents whose children now attend private schools or who are considering private schools.

Of the prospect of assuming the responsibilities of a board member, she says, “It’s not going to be any more meetings than what I do now.”

Michael Hill is the director of a Los Angeles Unified School District program in Venice for high school dropouts, and has a marriage and family counseling practice. His endorsements include those of the Concerned Homeowners of Santa Monica, the Santa Monica-Malibu teachers union and the union that represents non-teaching employees in the district.

Hill recommends that adult education be brought back from Santa Monica College to the high school, saying that would give a sense of continuity to dropouts and would keep the district’s teachers employed. As a teacher, he says that he can “bring (teachers’) concerns to the board.”

He also wants to make students and faculty feel a greater sense of personal responsibility toward education. “Education (should get) back to character-building. You don’t need to know the capital of Bolivia to lead a meaningful life.”

People who live outside the school district but work in Santa Monica are now eligible to enroll their children in Santa Monica schools through the eighth grade. Hill recommends that this eligibility be extended to high school to help increase enrollment.

Patricia Hoffman is the only incumbent in the race. She has been on the board for four years.

She says that one of the district’s biggest successes is its middle schools, where students are taught by teaching teams. If reelected, she says, she will look for ways to build on this success, and will continue working on teacher evaluation.

Hoffman says the enrollment decline has slowed in recent years in part because she and other board members have actively recruited parents.

She has been endorsed by state Sen. Gary Hart and Assemblyman Tom Hayden, the chairmen of the committees on education in their respective legislative chambers, and by unions representing the district’s teachers and non-teaching employees.

She acknowledges that the task of serving on the board can be exhausting, but also likened it to “going back to college, taking a course because it was fun, not because you needed to do this.”

Thomas N. Kayn, a lighting consultant, ran last in a field of six candidates in the 1988 school board elections.

He says that the current board and the other candidates tend to be liberal, while he is “socially a moderate (and) fiscally, I’m restrained.”

In the race two years ago, Kayn criticized the board as being “too liberal.” This time he is stressing his business experience and says he’s concerned about youths who enter the working world with low self-esteem and an “inability to read.”

Kayn has been on the district’s Health Advisory Committee. He has been endorsed by the Concerned Homeowners of Santa Monica.

He contends that the board has “let the academic status of the district decline” to becoming “middle of the road.” He favors increasing the summer school offerings and expanding the school year to reduce the sizes of classes, and believes that the state can be persuaded to finance this, provided more students attend.

In the future, he says, the district should consider a system that allows parents to choose the school their children attend.

Pam Brady is the vice president for education of the 33rd District of the California Congress of Parents, Teachers and Students and regional director for Green Circle, a cultural awareness project of the National Conference of Christians and Jews.

Like Leavitt, she is a former president of the Santa Monica-Malibu Council PTA. Recently, she organized a coalition to oppose limits on school districts’ use of developer fees and on funds to declining enrollment districts. She also helped organize an appeal to the Santa Monica City Council for funds, and the city granted $1.5 million to the district this year.

Brady has been endorsed by the teachers’ and classified employees’ unions and by the Concerned Homeowners of Santa Monica.

She recommends that the district, the city, Malibu and Santa Monica College explore ways to share recreational facilities, purchases of supplies, and transportation and storage sites to reduce costs.

Brenda Gottfried is a mediator and a former teacher in Los Angeles. She trains teachers, administrators and employers on how to reduce prejudice in a program sponsored by the Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith.

She has been endorsed by United Teachers-Los Angeles, which represents teachers in the Los Angeles district.

Gottfried, who is black, notes that she is the only racial minority candidate and says that as a resident of the Pico neighborhood in the southern end of the city, she will try to reduce the gap with the northern schools. At Edison School in her neighborhood, she said, parents have raised about $16,000 for the school, while schools in more affluent neighborhoods have received as much as $55,000 in parental contributions.

“I’m not saying parents have a responsibility to give funds from one school to another, but I would like to see . . . parents buy into and support all of the schools in an equitable manner.”

To help boost district enrollment, Gottfried recommends that successful special programs such as the Spanish immersion program at Edison School be put in each of the schools to attract students.