Re “Bond Measure Supporters Will Get Another Chance”
[img]1686|right|Laura Chardiet||no_popup[/img]Her voice, typically, was much sunnier than the weather this morning when School Board President Laura Chardiet spoke of exhuming the much-wanted bond measure from the depths of its chilly, dark grave.
After last evening’s meeting with a full roster of bond measure professional mavens and about a dozen community members, where next month’s telephone poll of 500 voters was bandied about, Ms. Chardiet said that “we are learning from our mistakes last time around.”
The first attempt to bring a bond measure before Culver City voters was intercepted and defeated last July 1, to the shocked disbelief of enthusiastic proponents Kathy Paspalis and Ms. Chardiet. They had no idea that Nancy Goldberg and the now-departed twosome of Karlo Silbiger and Dr. Patricia Siever harbored grave doubts about a bond viability and were prepared to shut it down.
Ms. Chardiet has not forgotten that distressful evening.
Know your Board colleagues and what they are thinking, is a message that frequently has been replayed in Ms. Chardiet’s mind the last 5½ months.
“We learned two lessons that night,” she said. “We need to be more intentional with the community, and we need to make sure that the School Board agrees on the cost of a poll and the cost of creating a bond resolution.”
Are there precautions that can be taken to help the telephone survey come out favorably?
“I don’t know if we can do that,” Ms. Chardiet said. “We can make sure everyone agrees on the process for setting up the poll. One of the primary conversations last night was, Do we want the poll to ascertain whether a June ballot of November ballot would be better.
“The Board agrees we want the bond on the ballot in June. Our election consultants and people in the audience said we should still look into whether November would be better, just to have the information as we go forward.”
June or November remains an open question, and will be on the survey list of questions.
Ms. Chardiet is partial to placing the bond measure on the June ballot because “we feel a sense of urgency to fulfill the health and safety needs of our facilities. The sooner we pass a bond, the sooner we can begin making repairs.”
Does Ms. Chardiet favor a $40 million bond or a $60 million bond, the two numbers most often mentioned.
“I have a preference for what will pass,” said the School Board president after her first full meeting.
