Los Angeles wins approval of $7 billion bond

Measure Q, the $7 billion bond that would benefit theLos Angeles Unified School District and local charter schools, has won approval. It received 69 percent of the vote. Measure Q will pay for construction and remodeling of old schools that have not yet been upgraded in the district's 11-year construction program. The measure also provides $450 million for local charter schools. To read The Los Angeles Daily News article, click here. FROM OCTOBER 2008: The case for the Los Angeles Unified School District's $7 billion Measure Q, the largest local school bond in California history, goes something like this: Now that the district has built dozens of new campuses, it needs and deserves more dollars to fix up the old ones. Criticism of the bond focuses on the district's skyrocketing building costs, disagreements over priorities and the haste behind the measure, whose price tag more than doubled in the final days before the school board decided in July to place it on the ballot. It is the district's fifth school bond in 11 years. To read The Los Angeles Times article, click here.

FROM JULY 2008: Amid concerns that voters may hesitate to approve a fifth multibillion-dollar school construction bond in a decade, Los Angeles Unified officials and Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa have crafted a proposal to woo the public with promises to fund charter schools and small learning communities. Villaraigosa and district leaders say a portion of the planned bond request would be dedicated to developing charter schools and breaking up behemoth public schools into independent, mini-campuses. The mayor and district leaders would not say how much money would be sought - or how it would be spent. (Los Angeles Daily News)