LAUSD Breaks Ground on New High School – And How They are Paying for It

Tomorrow at 10:00 in the morning, a small groundbreaking ceremony will take place to celebrate the building of a new high school in the Central District of Los Angeles.  This school will eliminate over-crowding and involuntary bussing for the students in the Santee Education Complex.

 

If you’re wondering how the District can pay for a brand new school when it can’t pay teachers, here is another peek into the complexity of how it all works.  The money, which is part of LAUSD’s $12.5 Billion school construction program, comes from Bonds that were voted for in a City election.  It is illegal to use those funds for ANY OTHER purpose, no matter how dire the budget situation becomes.  It seems frustrating, I know. But that’s how the system works in California.

 

Before 2000, new schools hadn’t been built for decades.  The population of children in Los Angeles has greatly exceeded the capacity. So, over the past several years, Bonds were passed by voters that allow tax money to be used to build dozens of new facilities.  Santee Education Complex, for example, serves 3,500 students and runs multi-track years.  The new school will mean that that every child in that district has a seat in their local school.  And one hopes that this will save a little money in the end by reducing the need to drive kids in gasoline-inefficient busses all over town.

 

The new school may or may not impact you, but I thought that this is another good example of the value in understanding the context of spending decisions before getting upset.  The Los Angeles Unified School District is a huge, multi-headed beast and I think that sometimes they assume that the public understands things that we simply don’t.   Who remembers voting for (or even against) those Bond measures?  All we see now is that money is being spent to build new schools when we can’t even pay teachers to teach in them.

 

I’ve heard grumblings on the school yard about the money being spent on new construction. And, I have to admit that I wondered too.  What we didn’t understand is that there are many, many buckets of funding and most of them are tightly legislated so that the money can only be spent in the way it was specifically intended. Period. Fortunately, there are other buckets that are less stringently regulated – which is how Superintendent Cortines was able to push funds to the schools so that they could decided where it should be spent.  Many used the money to buy back some of their teachers.

 

I guess in the end, the good news is that new schools are being built where they are desperately needed.  Since there is nothing else we can do with the money, we should join the celebration.  Stay tuned for more developments.

 

Victoria

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