College Sends Letters on Property Tax Plan

Mission College recently mailed letters to about 500 homeowners explaining how the college would use campus improvement funds raised by a controversial new community college district property tax.

The money would be generated by the planned “landscape and lighting assessment district,” under which all homeowners in the Los Angeles Community College District will be assessed $12 per parcel annually.

The new tax was approved Wednesday night by the district’s board of trustees after a lengthy, rancorous public meeting during which a number of homeowners unleashed angry denunciations of the new assessment. Several state legislators also oppose the tax.

William E. Norlund, acting president of Mission, said the letters mailed by the college elicited only a dozen or so responses from area homeowners. Of those who responded, Norlund said, about half approved of the new tax and half were opposed.

A number of new Mission College projects and improvements would be funded with money raised by the assessment, including:

* An $8.3-million recreational/physical education facility to be shared by the college and the community, and an additional $2 million to build extra parking for the facility.

* $3 million toward acquisition of additional acreage to build athletic fields and expand the campus into Los Angeles County land now occupied by El Cariso Golf Course. Some funds for this acquisition are already set aside, and the college is exploring the possibility of a land swap with the county that could add as many as 40 acres to the 22-acre campus.

* More than $1.5 million for construction of a nature trail around the campus and other landscaping improvements.

* About $168,00 for improvement of lighting around walkways, stairwells and parking lots.

* $1.2 million to develop additional parking in the northwest corner of the campus.

* $750,000 for installation of an emergency generator.

* $650,000 to build new soccer fields.

* $235,000 to upgrade tennis courts and baseball fields now maintained by the county in El Cariso Park.