SANTA ANA : School Officials to Monitor Prop. 146

On Election Day, officials of the Santa Ana Unified School District will be paying close attention to the fate of Proposition 146, an $800-million statewide school construction bond measure that could give the district some much-needed financial help to build new schools.

Last week, the district’s school board unanimously passed a resolution in support of the measure and later complained about the lack of attention the proposition has received.

“It’s ridiculous that the way a proposition gets passed has to do with the amount of money in the campaign war chest,” school board President Audrey Yamagata-Noji said. “We don’t have another viable funding measure, and passage of this proposition is critical for us in this community.”

Only about $35,000 has been available to run the statewide campaign for the proposition, said Peter Birdsall, campaign manager of the Sacramento-based “Yes on 146” campaign.

“It’s a very low figure to deal with,” Birdsall said. “That amount is only a little more than what it costs to run a 30-second commercial on prime-time television.”

The district, the largest in Orange County with 43 schools, is in the midst of a $225-million school construction program that has schools being built at a rate of about two per year.

The new schools are needed to house a student population that has been growing at a rate of about 1,000 students annually. The district has added hundreds of portable classrooms to school sites and has placed some schools on a year-round calendar to ease overcrowding.