Opposing Tax Campaigns Sport New Looks

This is the third time around in Beverly Hills for a parcel tax measure to raise money for schools. The issue’s familiar. The names of the supporters and opponents are familiar. But the campaigns are looking and sounding different this time.

With just a month to go before the June 4 election, the teachers, parents and other supporters, organized as the Yes on Schools Committee, have collected about $40,000 in contributions. They plan to keep to a budget of about $60,000, which is about what a city council candidate would spend, said committee chairman and City Councilman Robert K. Tanenbaum.

“We have a low budget, basically, we’re just low-key,” he said. “There is no glitz involved in this at all.”

The campaign looks stark compared to a year ago, when the committee spent $157,000 for a proposed tax that fell four votes short of passing. More than 300 volunteers worked phone banks and walked precincts, as they have in this campaign. But the last Yes campaign also had star-studded rallies, T-shirts and about 10 different targeted mailers.

There will be perhaps two mailings this year, Tanenbaum said.

“We wanted to be much more grass-roots this time. Also, it’s evolution. It’s the third time, and we had a lot of people (already) signed up,” he said.

Tanenbaum says the muted tone is not because of criticism about last year’s drive, which was headed by other residents.

Meanwhile, the anti-tax forces, formed into the Citizens for Cost Effective Quality Education, have raised more than $2,000 and expect to spend about $3,000. Last year, they spent about $500.

If approved by two-thirds of the voters, parcels of land in the city would be assessed $250 to $750 a year, depending on their size and use. The tax would bring in about $4.3 million a year for five years. Beverly Hills Unified School District officials project a $1.26 million deficit for the coming school year.

Parcel tax measures failed in Beverly Hills in 1987 and 1990. After last year’s election, the district laid off 41 teachers and dozens of other employees.

“There’s nobody in that district who is not doing the job they had last year, plus somebody else’s,” said high school music teacher Joel Pressman, who is the accompanist in his choir classes, runs the school blood drive and teaches drama.

The June levy would save the schools from further cuts, proponents say.

“We still want to have quality public education, and to do that, you need teachers,” Tanenbaum said.

He also said that the levy should be kept separate from politics. “The only ones who are going to suffer (from the tax’s failure) are the children. I don’t care if you like the Board of Education or don’t like the Board of Education, you like the City Council or don’t . . . but don’t cut off the supplies and education.”

“If you have a political problem with the school board,” Tanenbaum said, “go out in November and run for office.”

Opponents of the tax are again criticizing the district for wasteful spending. But they also promise a “dramatically different” campaign, as leader Sherman Kulick said, including proposals for a freeze on wages and formation of an independent panel of volunteers to investigate every facet of the school system, such as curriculum, staffing, student achievement and finances.

Tanenbaum argued that such steps are unnecessary. The district budget process, school board meetings and the PTA are all open and provide the means for people to participate already, he said. “You’re not talking about a hierarchy or a Kafkaesque bureaucracy that’s impenetrable.”

He charged that the tax opponents have “not been in the schools, not participated in any of the due process that exists. What they wind up doing is devastating the children, not any of their political opponents on the school board.”

The anti-tax forces include a number of senior citizens and residents without children.

Kulick said his group this year is more vocal and organized. He said that, unlike in prior efforts, he has made sure that his side is aired before the Chamber of Commerce, Board of Realtors and other local organizations. A mailer to 3,000 households is planned.

The campaign has more than 100 volunteers, about three times as many as it started with last year.

And they’re more committed, Kulick said. “This is the third time out, and they’ve had it.”