LOCAL ELECTIONS / MEASURE P : School District’s Allies Push Hard for Tax Increase

Armed with a pencil in her right hand, a telephone in her left and a professionally prepared script in front of her, Kathy Corbett spent a recent evening trying to raise money for her two children’s elementary school.

Although Corbett, 37, has volunteered to help Los Naranjos School before, this was no bake sale. The goal here was $1.4 million a year.

Working an evening shift last Wednesday with about 15 other parents, teachers, administrators and a school board member, Corbett was part of a well-orchestrated local campaign which has been working daily to lobby for the June 4 passage of Measure P, a proposed $35-a-year Irvine property tax increase that would raise money for the Irvine Unified School District.

The Measure P campaign not only is using scores of trained volunteers but has hired a professional campaign-consulting firm which specializes in school tax measures.

The law prohibits the school district from campaigning with public funds, so the lobbying for Measure P is being done by a separate campaign group, Partnership in Irvine Education, formed by school board members, parents and community members.

Although the district and the campaign committee are separate, the two are running the campaign arm in arm.

For instance, the school district sent voter-registration forms home with students last month to encourage parents to register in time for the election. Later, the district sent home material that would allow parents to vote by mail.

Each time, the forms have been followed by telephone calls from Partnership in Irvine Education volunteers, urging parents to fill out and return the forms to school the next day. The volunteers use a school district-supplied telephone list and offer to answer any questions about Measure P.

Each campaign volunteer uses a script prepared by the political consultant to keep the message clear and consistent.

Corbett’s job last week was to place follow-up calls about the absentee-ballot forms.

“I’m getting a mixed reaction,” Corbett said after one call. “Some of them are listening to my spiel and some of them have said, ‘We’ve already gotten our ballots and we’re going to vote.’ But others have been pretty noncommittal,” she said. “At least I haven’t run into anybody who’s angry.”

Mary Crowley, who has two daughters at Sierra Vista Middle School and who teaches English at Irvine High School, sat in a cubicle three desks away and used a computer-generated list of Irvine voters who have no children in school. As she made each call, she would circle whether the voter supports, opposes or was undecided on Measure P.

“Some people say, ‘We pay enough taxes,’ ” Crowley said. “But my main problem tonight has just been ignorance of the issue and the (financial) state of schools.”

The coordinated, all-out effort to pass Measure P is prompted by a potential $3.3-million budget shortfall next school year if state funding comes in as low as some have predicted. The school board voted unanimously Jan. 29 to place the $1.4-million-a year tax on the ballot to make up for some of the lost funding.

The tax, an extra $35 per parcel on property tax bills, would expire after four years and would require the school board to vote each year on whether to levy the tax. Residents who are 65 or older could apply for an exemption.

School board members said in January that they would place the tax on the ballot only if they all promised to work hard on the campaign.

After failing to get a similar school tax passed in 1983, “I said I would never be involved with a parcel tax again if we couldn’t win,” said Mary Ellen Hadley, the school board member leading the campaign.

Besides the telephone bank, the campaign committee has sent out two mass mailers and plans a huge door-to-door campaign on Sunday, two days before the election.

All this campaigning has not come cheaply. As of May 18, Partnership in Irvine Education has raised $29,855 and spent $18,913, mostly on the mailings and the consultant, San Ramon, Calif.-based Price Research. The consultant is directing the campaign’s tactics.

The Los Alamitos School District used Price Research last year in its successful campaign to pass a property tax measure that raised $13 million to repair aging schools. School districts using Price Research’s advice boast an 87% success rate in getting tax measures approved, according to the company.

Still, passing Measure P will be a challenge. It requires a two-thirds majority to pass.

“Parcel taxes usually lose or win by a very slim, slim margin,” said Kent Price, president of Price Research. “We won one up in Redding not too long ago by 27 votes. We’ve lost a couple by less than 100. . . . The reality is that raising taxes in any part of the state is a difficult thing to do.”

In 1989, voters in the Westminster and Capistrano Unified school districts rejected new taxes for schools.

Although no organized opposition has formed against Measure P, Irvine resident David G. Epstein said he would be happy if the tax fails by a huge margin.

“I’m not convinced the public school system we have is being run economically or efficiently, and sinking more money into it won’t change anything,” said Epstein, 48, an Irvine attorney and author of the ballot argument opposing Measure P.

“They’ve been crying for more money ever since I’ve been conscious of the issue,” Epstein said.

Hadley, though, said that without more money, cuts in classroom programs will be necessary next year. The school district has already cut $2.4 million from its current school year’s budget.

When the polls close next month, she said, she hopes all the campaign workers will be rewarded for their work.

“I hope by June 4th at 8:30 I’m a happy woman,” she said.

Measure P

* Requires approval from two-thirds of the voters.

* Would add $35 to annual property tax bills.

* Would raise about $1.4 million a year for a maximum of four years.

* Would require school board to decide each year whether to charge the tax.

* Would require that money raised be spent only for science instruction, library programs and to update skills of classroom teachers.

* Would allow persons aged 65 or older to apply for exemption from the tax.