In 2019, voters in the Ann Arbor Public School District authorized a one billion dollar bond issue to finance capital projects throughout the district. Although a billion dollars may be a seemingly unfathomable amount, voters around the country are being asked to finance jumbo bond issues for school districts and community colleges. For example, Long Beach Community College in Long Beach, CA will consider putting a $990M bond request on the ballot there in November 2024.
LBCC would use the money to improve the earthquake readiness of the buildings on their two campuses; update classrooms; improve security; and build affordable student housihttps://wccwatch.org/wp-admin/admin.php?page=youtube-ep-wizard&random=624&TB_iframe=true&width=950&height=800ng. Polling data that a consultant collected showed that such a measure would likely pass during the November 2024 general election.
Community members who participated in the poll expressed enthusiastic support for the community college and its preliminary plans for campus-wide improvements. The only element of the package that prospective voters did not wish to support was additional funding for Veterans Stadium. (LBCC has nearly $90M in unused bond authorizations from previous improvements to LBCC’s sports facilities.
Given the right plan, voters will approve just about anything. The same is true for Washtenaw County voters. Historically speaking, Washtenaw County voters don’t often turn down millage requests.
In short, there’s no reason to avoid the voters (here or anywhere else) when there is a demonstrated need for the taxpayers’ assistance. One result of avoiding the voters for bond requests, which the WCC Board of Trustees has shamefully done for nearly 30 years, is that students disproportionately bear the cost of construction on campus.
Who’s Afraid of a Billion Dollar Bond?
Another result is that capital projects that should get done don’t get done in a timely and cost-effective way. The Morris Lawrence rebuild cost the taxpayers $10.5M more than necessary simply because the administration delayed the work year after year. Only when the building posed a danger to the public did the administration finally move forward with the project.
The WCC Board of Trustees ‘ idea of “respecting the Washtenaw County taxpayer” is to avoid asking them for money. Their go-to alternative is to waste tens of millions more than necessary by delaying maintenance and repairs. Or they let maintenance go to the point of endangering the public.
Asking for a bond issue ensures the public that the campus facility we have literally invested billions into is being taken care of. When the Board of Trustees fails to ask the public for necessary funding, they are failing the public.
The LBCC Board of Trustees is not concerned about asking the taxpayers there for a billion dollars. The WCC Board of Trustees hides behind flimsy excuses for not doing the job that the taxpayers elected them to do, and in the process, ends up misdirecting tens of millions of dollars the taxpayers intended for education to repairing the costly result of administrative inaction.
Photo Credit: Opensource.com, via Flickr
