College Board to Trim List of Spending Proposals

Chastened by hostile public reaction to its tax proposal, the Los Angeles Community College District board will meet Tuesday to begin whittling down a $390-million wish list that the district will present to voters for approval this fall.

Projects that probably will be deleted from the proposed spending plan include a $6.9-million equestrian complex at Pierce College in the San Fernando Valley and a $2-million proposal to install state-of-the-art scoreboards at Southwest College in South Los Angeles, according to a district source.

Tuesday’s session will be the first meeting since trustees voted Friday to suspend a controversial tax on all district homeowners. Instead, voters will decide the issue in the November election.

The trustees must choose which proposals they will ask voters to fund under the ballot measure, which would be used for landscaping, lighting and recreational improvements. Last week, the nine campuses cut their original wish list to $390 million, according to the source who saw the list. But the ballot measure would raise just $205 million, requiring further cutting.

The trustees on Saturday received copies of a revised list from each campus.

The top priority at Los Angeles Mission College is a $5.3-million proposal for a new recreational and physical education facility. At Los Angeles City College, which submitted a $97-million revised list, administrators propose spending nearly $1 million on landscaping, according to the source.

Whittling down the wish list is merely the latest step in a lengthy process to find funds for the district’s largely dilapidated campuses.

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Last month, the board voted 4 to 3 to begin taxing virtually every property in the 882-square-mile college district by invoking an obscure state law that does not require public approval for such levies. The tax, which was scheduled to take effect in November, would have imposed a $12 annual fee on each homeowner.

The plan triggered fierce opposition from residents, about 30,000 of whom filed written protests. Some critics began preparing a recall campaign.

The trustees responded Friday during a special meeting by voting 5-0 to scrap the tax. As a result, the 1.86 million registered voters in the district will decide Nov. 5 whether to tax themselves.

Trustee Lindsay Conner, a member of the board minority that had demanded an election from the outset, said Sunday that he will reserve his decision on whether to support the ballot measure until he knows how the money will be used.

“Until the board comes up with a pared-down list of projects that will be funded, it’s not possible for me to make an overall judgment,” Conner said. “We’ve got a long way to go.”

The top priority at Pierce College is $1.9 million in new lighting for the campus, while the lowest priority is a $23-million proposal to increase seating at Shepard Stadium to give it a capacity of 15,000. Landscaping leads the list of needs for Los Angeles City College, while a $54-million proposal for a new park is the lowest priority.