The Price of Education and a Tax Revolt

To enter the gymnasium at Burbank High School, home of the battling Bulldogs, is to enter a time warp. The graceful high arc of the ceiling calls to mind a vintage airplane hangar. The varnished hardwood floor is old but true. “Bird’s-eye maple,” boasts Frank Kallem, the school’s athletic director. “It’s the best floor in the Foothill League.”

It’s a friendly place. “Welcome to the DOGHOUSE,” shout the bold blue letters painted on a wall.

If this is a doghouse, then the rooms down below, away from public view, might be likened to a dog pound. The boys’ locker room is so dark and dingy that coaches call it “The Dungeon.” The lockers are 50 years old, so it’s not surprising that some doors are missing. The roof on a coach’s office nearby leaks badly. “Every time we get a half-inch of rain,” says Bob Shaw, a business teacher and track coach, “we’ve got a new swimming pool in there.”

The good news is that help--a brand-new school, no less--is on the way.

Maybe.

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Come April 12, the voters of Burbank will decide whether public education, under attack from so many quarters, is worth a fresh investment of $100 million. That’s the amount of the bond measure that would enable the Burbank Unified School District, which serves 13,000 students, to rebuild the run-down, 70-year-old Burbank High and modernize several other schools.

For a modest investment--$30 to $70 a year for most homeowners--Burbank will have the facilities it needs to guide its children into the 21st Century. The way it is now, Burbank High doesn’t even have the electrical system it needs to provide proper air conditioning for computers and other high-tech equipment. The way it is now, patching the roof and fixing the plumbing is just throwing good money after bad.

That’s the argument you’ll hear from school board President Elena Hubbell and just about every civic leader in town. Hubbell says she’s optimistic the measure will receive the two-thirds vote it needs for passage.

But, for an optimist, she’s campaigning awfully hard, giving the pitch at Kiwanis meetings and coffee klatches. So far, she’s encouraged but not yet confident.

“I’m feeling this is a do-or-die situation,” says Hubbell. “We don’t have alternatives. We don’t have another source of funding.”

There are several reasons why supporters are worried. They are well aware that some people hold public education, no matter where, in contempt. And there is always a camp of people who just say no to taxes--especially property taxes, the evil at the root of Proposition 13, the epic tax revolt that began in the San Fernando Valley.

Hubbell, for example, could not have felt comforted by a commentary that appeared Tuesday in The Times. In it, Joel Fox, president of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Assn., celebrates Michigan’s recent decision to abandon property tax as the financing mechanism for schools in favor of increased sales and cigarette taxes.

“For residential property owners, the property tax is nothing more than a tax to be paid out of their incomes--but not based on their incomes,” Fox writes. “As home values increase and earning power remains flat, the onerous aspects of the property tax become obvious . . .

“Proposition 13 itself,” he goes on, “is just a step on the evolutionary path of curtailing and perhaps eventually eliminating the property tax.” He goes on to assert that “clearly the trend is toward diminished importance of the property tax. At most, the tax will end as a tax on property-related services.”

Unless you’re a policy wonk, debates over sales versus property taxes can be tedious.

One thing missing from Fox’s argument is something that every homeowner knows: The value of your home is directly related to the quality of your local schools. Doesn’t it make sense, then, that property taxes be used to support schools? An investment in your community is an investment in your own home.

Hubbell thinks so--and not just because she’s the school board president.

She’s also a realtor.

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Walk down the dimly lit hallways of Burbank High and you get the impression of a campus that is thriving despite itself. The rah-rah spirit can be seen in posters painted by students: “Burbank Is Awesome.” “Burbank Power Is All We Need.” “Nothing But Dogs!”

Sure, test scores in the district have slipped. But it’s not like the old days when just about everybody spoke English at home. Now students are as apt to enter school speaking only Spanish or Armenian or Chinese or. . . .

But so what?

If they go to Burbank High, it’s like the sign says: Nothing but dogs.

They just need a new kennel.