ELECTIONS / BURBANK SCHOOL BOARD : Candidates Split on a Remedy for Run-Down Classrooms

Classrooms with leaking roofs, poor lighting and no air conditioning are everyday realities for students in the Burbank Unified School District, and for the two candidates seeking to fill one open seat on the school board, these realities have been the focus of campaign debates and forums.

The candidates--the incumbent Vivian Kaufman, 62, who has served on the board for eight years, and Denise Wilcox, 37, director of a magnet school at Monroe High School--both agree that the schools are in poor shape. But the two have strikingly divergent views on how the district can pay for the much needed renovations and repairs.

“I would immediately apply for the $23 million in state modernization funds that have been available to the district since 1990, and also work with the City Council to obtain redevelopment funds to rebuild,” Wilcox said.

Wilcox argued that the district has continually put off maintaining and repairing school facilities and said the board should have been more “creative and aggressive” in identifying funding sources.

“They’ve just allowed the problem to overwhelm them to the point where they’ve done absolutely nothing,” she said. “We’re almost at the point of no return, especially at Burbank High School.”

But Kaufman blamed the district’s problems on a reduction in funds from the state. The board did all it could to acquire funds, she said.

Kaufman said the district opted not to apply for the modernization funds because it would have had to “put approximately $6 million of developers fees on hold” and it would have had to pay “a few thousand dollars” for an architect.

Fees paid to the district by developers who build in Burbank are normally used to pay for portable classrooms and classroom expenses at Burbank High School, Kaufman said.

But the state’s modernization program requires that a school district match any amount that it receives from the state, she said. To ensure that the district could match the amount, board members would have had to put aside the money received from developers until a decision on the district’s application was made by the state.

“Some schools have been waiting for many years,” Kaufman said. Earlier this year, the city’s Business Review Committee recommended that the district sell Burbank High and use the proceeds, along with other funds, to pay for one large high school. Both candidates soundly reject that idea.

Kaufman said the district could pay for the repair and renovations with “redevelopment money.”

“I also know we need to supplement that with a bond issue,” she said.

Wilcox said she would support a “reduced bond” only after school officials have “exhausted” all other sources for funds from the city and state.

Overcrowding is another key issue of concern in the district.

“When Burbank High School is rebuilt and when Burroughs is modernized, classrooms will be added so that we will be able to accommodate the students,” Kaufman said.

Enrollment projections for Miller Elementary School--which faced the prospect of going to a year-round calendar in 1994 due to overcrowding--have been re-evaluated. School officials expect that it will not have to go year-round next year, Kaufman said.

Wilcox said part of the answer to solving the problem of overcrowding is better communication between the council and the school board.

“Three out of every 10 residential units constructed in Burbank between 1986 to 1991 was built in the Miller school attendance area and no one from the board went before the City Council to say, ‘if you continue to build, the schools are going to be overcrowded,’ ” she said.

There are 13,000 students in kindergarten through 12th grade in the Burbank Unified School District.