Escondido Schools Consider Parcel Tax : Education: District officials want to use an obscure 1972 law to raise money to build and maintain recreational facilities.

Hoping to avoid a costly and risky election, the Escondido Union High School District may become the first school district in California to use a 19-year-old law to raise money for recreation by imposing a parcel tax.

Funds generated under the Landscaping and Lighting Facilities Act of 1972 would build and maintain facilities such as baseball diamonds, football fields, basketball courts and a gymnasium.

“Traditionally, cities have been the ones to establish recreational assessment districts, and it’s only recently that school districts have looked upon it as a way to provide better facilities for students,” said Superintendent Jane Gawronski.

Gawronski emphasized the act requires that owners of the taxed parcels must derive a direct benefit from the facilities.

Escondido would become the first school district in California to establish such a parcel tax and many educators are uncertain whether districts are entitled to take advantage of the act.

“I’ve never heard of it,” said Duwayne Brooks, assistant superintendent for school facilities planning for the state Department of Education.

But Gawronski said the parcel tax, which must undergo public hearings before the board can approve it, appeals to the district because it has a better chance of success and would be cheaper than holding general bond or parcel tax election campaigns--the traditional way school districts have raised funds.

Bond or parcel elections require a two-thirds majority vote of the electorate to win approval, but schools have greater discretion over the use of those funds. The landscaping and lighting assessment district only requires approval from the school board and revenue would be restricted for recreational purposes.

“The primary motivation for the assessment is the dilapidated and inadequate state of recreational facilities” at the three high schools, Gawronski said.

School finance experts said turning to the 1972 act for financing isn’t easy.

“This is a tough way to go,” said Daniel Santo of California Financial Services, a Newport Beach-based consulting firm specializing in educational facilities.

Santo said that under the act, school districts must show that the persons being taxed derive benefit from the parks or fields.

“It’s not hard to show the benefits of sewers or curbs or gutters or lighting, but it’s a little harder in terms of a park,” Santo said.

The Escondido district, which has 6,000 students, has hired San Diego-based NBS/Lowry Inc. for $37,000 to conduct a benefits assessment.

School officials plan to implement the tax by June, but are unsure what size tax would be placed on each of the 45,000 parcels in the district. But David Jenkins, assistant superintendent of business services, said it is likely to be “less than $5 a month per parcel.”

School staff is in the process of determining the recreational needs of the community and what improvements are needed, Gawronski said.

“You look at all of the improvements that are needed, and then you cost it out. We don’t want to be greedy. What we want to do is have facilities that the community can be proud of,” Gawronski said.

“When you have a high school with good, well-lit tennis courts, that’s a real plus for the community,” she said.

The Azusa Unified School District last year had considered creating an assessment district under the 1972 act, even going to the point of suing itself in Superior Court to determine whether they could legally create such a district, only to determine that it would be unfeasible.

Azusa Unified superintendent Duane Stiff said they “had taken a wrong approach” to creating the district by “carving out one elementary school attendance area.”

Stiff said that tried on a larger, districtwide scale, creating an assessment district might work.

Use of the act results from a statewide scramble by school districts for new ways to find money amid the current state budget crisis, said Tom Robinson, facility planning director at the San Diego county office of education.

“You always wonder how these things surface, and it’s clear that schools just have not been as aware of this, but now that they are becoming aware, they are serious in using it,” Robinson said.

Already, Escondido Union Elementary School District has made plans to join with the high school district in instituting the recreational facilities tax, and Bonsall Union school district is considering doing likewise.

Jenkins said the funds raised through the tax would supplement the current $400,000 a year the district spends on maintaining and constructing recreational facilities, although the act does allow districts to use the money to supplant those funds.