South Pas: Measure S Organizers Declaring a Victory

Special to Pasadena Now from BILL GLAZIER, South Pasadena Review Editor

Early indications are South Pasadena residents have voted to renew a parcel tax in support of public education in the city as Measure S was leading by a substantial margin 4,442 to 1,614 shortly after 8 p.m.Tuesday night.

A joyous celebration was held at Griffins of Kinsale, a new Irish pub in the 1000 block of Mission Street in town, where proponents gathered as news of the mail-in election was proving to be successful.

A key consultant for the Yes on S campaign told Brad Hudson, who headed up the parcel tax renewal effort which included about 200 volunteers, that a victory was assured. The votes are still coming in, but Hudson said the group of supporters “feel fabulous,’ adding that “This is a very wonderful night for us. I think everyone recognizes that South Pasadena schools are one of the pillars of the community along with our great neighborhood restaurants and the businesses we see here on Mission Street and the great homes we have in town.”

Banking on slick mailers, calls to voters and volunteers going door-to-door, “Yes on S” committee members pushed on voters the notion that a $386 special tax on parcels in the city was necessary in protecting the quality of the city’s five schools to maintain the high value of South Pasadena homes and prevent further cuts on education at the state level.

Yes on S committee members contend the state has sliced $18 million from the South Pasadena Unified School District (SPUSD) since 2008.

“The State is failing our schools and kids,” read a line in Measure S campaign literature.

Had it not passed, SPUSD Superintendent Joel Shapiro said the school district would be facing a $2 million shortfall and many district employees, including teachers, would be losing their job.

Now that it has passed, Yes on S committee members say there will be no layoffs and music, visual and performing arts programs will stay intact. Funding will remain in South Pasadena to support the district’s high quality of education.

Opponents of the measure, like South Pasadena resident Kathy Bence, say the Yes campaign was a “well-oiled machine” designed to extract maximum tax dollars from unsuspecting citizens.

“The opposition attempts a grassroots resistance based on facts, while the supporters of S only provide a fuzzy narrative about caring for children, believing in education, and helping our property values,” Bence wrote in a letter to the editor of the South Pasadena Review. “No on S folks have relied on their own efforts and the limited funds that friends could scrape together for ads in the Review. All they have going for them is the truth: we want well-educated children and well-run schools, not overpaid administrators. There comes a point when, like the city of Bell, property values aren’t helped by increasing taxes.”

Those opposing the tax argued that the school district has plenty of money in reserve, that administrators are over paid and get raises while teachers do not. Opponents also said the district receives financial assistance from the South Pasadena Educational Foundation (SPEF), the fundraising arm for the school district, and through PTA fundraisers schools hold and parents support during the school year.

South Pasadena resident Harry Gerst, who has worked in the public school system for 32 years as a former teacher, principal, administrative coordinator, and director of the Los Angeles Unified School District’s School Accountability Office, has been one of the most outspoken residents opposing the tax.

“Their (Yes on S) campaign is being financed by SPEF, the PTA, and the District, using funds donated by people who thought they were contributing to the betterment of their children’s education, not to a political campaign,” he wrote in a letter to the editor in the Review. “The opposition has nothing – except facts. Facts that demonstrate the school district has not been a good steward of the public trust, and has spent our hard-earned money unwisely. We’re taxed enough in this town, and it’s time for greater accountability on how those funds are spent.”

Measure S required a two-thirds (2/3) vote for passage. The current parcel tax ends in June of this year while the new one will be extended for five years.