My position on parcel taxes

By Mark Olbert

The San Carlos community is entitled to evaluate the costs and benefits of enhancing the current K thru 8 program with additional funding. If elected, I will work to give the community that opportunity.

Many parents wonder why we would even consider a parcel tax when we agreed to a bond measure, funded by local property taxes, just a few years ago. Keep in mind that the bond measure paid for various construction projects. It did not increase the pool of funds available to enhance the District curricula by hiring new teachers to offer new programs, deal with the more intense competition for teachers among districts, hire additional staff to provide help to "at risk" children, etc.

Like anyone else, though, I am not in favor of spending money on anything where I don't understand what I'm buying. Because the Board has not tended to engage the community on the relationship between funding and the nature and quality of the educational program, few people in San Carlos are in a position where they would know what a parcel tax would buy them.

If elected, I would work with the Board to initiate just such a dialog with the community. This would be a timely exercise, given the Strategic Planning effort that the superintendent has recently begun.

Personally, I believe that a modest parcel tax would make an enormous difference in the District's educational program. We could add back many if not most of the "extras" that we enjoyed in our own youth, and which were sacrificed over the years as revenues declined, such as:

• More comprehensive education in music and the arts
• Expanded physical education programs
• More intensive assistance for "at risk" readers and writers
• Expanded science and technology programs.