Quake, Education Bonds Bill Signed : Finances: Wilson seeks voter approval June 7 to borrow $4 billion for temblor repair and new school construction. He also signs two campus measures.

Gov. Pete Wilson on Tuesday asked the voters in the June 7 election to approve almost $4 billion worth of bond-issue borrowing to pay the costs of earthquake rebuilding and finance education construction.

At a ceremony two days short of two months since the devastating Northridge earthquake, Wilson signed legislation committing $1 billion to quake recovery costs and allocating another $1 billion to seismically strengthen endangered highway bridges statewide.

The governor predicted that voters would approve the earthquake bonds, but he refused to discuss alternatives if they lose. Neither the governor nor the Legislature has identified any other source of funds to pay for retrofitting bridges or Northridge quake relief.

“At that point, the state will have to make a different response, but it will not be as good a response,” he told reporters.

Later in the day, the governor signed two other bond issues for education--$1 billion for public school construction and remodeling and $900 million for construction at campuses of community colleges, University of California and the California State university system.

The governor also signed a bill by Sen. Marian Bergeson (R-Newport Beach) that authorizes the suspension of building permit deadlines so that highway retrofitting contracts can be awarded swiftly. Similar emergency procedures were taken to quickly begin repairs on the quake-damaged Santa Monica Freeway in January.

Wilson signed a tax relief bill by Assemblyman Richard Katz (D-Sylmar) that enables individuals who suffered economic damage in the Northridge earthquake to carry forward all their losses on income tax returns for five years.

The addition to the June ballot of the bond issues enacted by the Legislature and signed by the Republican governor will make the total the most expensive yet for one election, $6 billion. Previously, a $2-billion parks and recreation bond measure qualified.

Wilson, who is seeking reelection, insisted on bonds--a long-term form of borrowing--to finance the state’s share of quake costs rather than temporarily increasing the sales tax as Democrats favored.

To make the bond proposal more attractive to voters outside the Los Angeles region, Wilson and legislative leaders added funds to pay for speeded-up retrofitting of quake-threatened highway structures throughout California.

That part of the borrowing plan for a time threatened a North-South fight when the San Francisco Bay Area toll bridges were allotted a majority of the $950 million total. However, in the final bill, the majority of the money was shifted to Southern California, where most of the retrofit work is needed.

As for alternatives should voters reject the earthquake bonds, Assembly Speaker Willie Brown (D-San Francisco), who abandoned his temporary sales tax increase bill in order to reach a compromise with Wilson, said he may have to rekindle the tax proposal.

Democrats previously voiced concern that potentially massive cuts in health and welfare services would be virtually the only option if the bonds failed. Likewise, Republicans and Democrats have warned that if the highway seismic safety funds are defeated, the retrofitting work on hundreds of at-risk bridges could proceed only by appropriating funds committed for regular highway construction projects.

Shortly after the Loma Prieta earthquake in 1989, a temporary quarter-cent sales tax was enacted for recovery purposes. But Wilson said times have changed and taxpayers cannot endure even a temporary increase as the state fights its way out of the recession.

Even though the long-term interest rates of bonds will be costly to taxpayers for the next couple of decades, Wilson defended such financing. “It is a perfectly proper thing for those who will use these same bridges 30 years from now to have the opportunity to help pay for them,” he said.

The most borrowing that state voters have been asked to approve in one year was $10.7 billion, in 1990, when $6.24 billion in new debt was authorized in two elections.

In June of that year, the voters passed all seven bond measures that were on the ballot. The money--$5.14 billion--went for schools, prisons, transportation, housing and earthquake safety.

But voters recoiled in the November election later in 1990, when they were asked to consider another $5.6 billion in bond issues. They rejected a dozen measures and adopted just two, for veterans’ housing and schools. Since then, lawmakers have placed five bond measures on the ballot; three succeeded and two were rejected.

Under the key Northridge bond issue bill by Sen. David A. Roberti (D-Van Nuys), $950 million would be spent for seismic retrofitting of highway bridges statewide, with about 60% allocated to Southern California; $575 million for supplementing federal housing relief for Northridge victims; $265 million for repairing public buildings; $145 million for reconstructing Los Angeles area transportation systems, and $65 million to strengthen public buildings against earthquakes.

About half of the bond money targeted to the Northridge earthquake would provide the state’s match for the nearly $10 billion in emergency aid rushed earlier to California by the Clinton Administration and Congress.

The $1-billion bond issue for public kindergarten through high schools, carried by Sen. Leroy Greene (D-Carmichael), would finance construction and modernization of facilities hard-pressed to accommodate the growing population of schoolchildren. The Wilson Administration has estimated that it would cost $35 billion over the next 10 years to keep pace with the need.

The $900-million bond issue for higher education was carried by Sen. Gary K. Hart (D-Santa Barbara), chairman of the Senate Education Committee. The funds would be targeted for construction and remodeling. The legislative analyst estimates that more than $6.5 billion would be needed over the next five years to meet higher education building demands.

Times staff writer Jerry Gillam contributed to this report.