So far only one ed-related measure has been cleared for voting, but there are several others in the works, each with a potential to affect the future of LA Unified and school districts across the state.

Already eligible for the ballot is the “Kindergarten Through Community College Public Education Facilities Bond Act of 2016,” which would authorize $9 billion in general obligation bonds, including $3 billion for new construction and $3 billion for modernization of K-12 public school facilities, $1 billion for charter schools and vocational education facilities and $2 billion for California Community Colleges facilities.

As the largest district in the state, LA Unified would receive a significant portion of the bond funds and would have little trouble figuring out what to do with them, as it needs roughly $40 billion to fix and modernize its existing facilities with only $7.8 billion currently available in construction bond authority.

The measure received support today in a statement from the California Chamber of Commerce, which said, “The strength of our economy relies on the strength of our workforce. Strategic, accountable investment from the state, local districts, and the business community is required so that new schools are built to accommodate growth and aging facilities are revitalized to support a 21st Century education.”

Also of importance to LA Unified is a proposition that would make tax increases from Proposition 30 permanent. Prop 30 was a 2012 ballot initiative that raised income taxes on wealthy individuals for seven years and increased state sales taxes for four years. Much of the money has been going to support public education and it is largely responsible for the flush budgets of the last few years that have provided billions in extra dollars for education.

LA Unified is facing huge budget deficits in coming years, according to projections made by Chief Financial Officer Megan Reilly and an outside financial review panel. The extension of Prop 30, known as “The Invest in California’s Children Act,” would not save the district from its financial troubles, according to the panel’s report, but “will only help keep a bad situation from becoming a catastrophe in three-to-five years.”

The measure is still in the signature-gathering stage but faces an uphill battle if it makes the ballot, as a recent poll by the Public Policy Institute of California showed that only 37 percent of voters view extending Prop 30 as “very important.”

More bond money and more budget money are issues unlikely to cause many arguments among state education leaders, but there are other measures in the works that are likely to prove more controversial. One such measure still in the signature-gathering stage is the “Local Control and Accountability in Education Act,” which would increase the length of service required before a teacher may become a permanent employee to five consecutive school years from two.

The measure would also remove state authority over teacher employment laws and give the authority to local school boards, which would be empowered to make decisions over teacher transfers, reassignments, layoffs and re-employment. It would also ban the use of seniority in such decisions. A similar measure that only covers the extension of teacher tenure is also in the signature-gathering stage.

The measure echoes many of the controversial and polarizing issues that are part of the Vergara v. California court ruling of 2014, when a state superior court judge throw out California’s teacher employment laws, ruling them unconstitutional in helping keep subpar teachers working in poor schools. The decision is currently under appeal and if upheld would require the legislature to write new laws. The measure appears to be an effort to get ahead of the appellate court’s ruling.

Another measure also sure to cause controversy is the “The Public Education Restoration Act of 2016,” which would repeal the Charter Schools Act of 1992. With LA Unified having more charter schools than any district in the nation, the measure has enormous implications but faces an uphill battle as statewide polling has shown consistent support among voters for charter schools. The measure is currently under review by state officials.

Yet another controversial measure is referred to by backers as the “Voter Empowerment Act.” Orange County Register staff columnist Teri Sforza has this to say about it: “What it would actually do is a matter of blistering and contradictory rhetoric, which will grow more bombastic as the November 2016 election approaches. Backers say it would require voters to approve guaranteed pension benefits for new workers, as well as benefit increases for current ones. Opponents say it would eviscerate collective bargaining, gut public pensions and obliterate guaranteed retirements across the board.”

The measure is still in the signature-gathering stage.

A state ballot initiative aimed at regulations governing teachers that was headed for the November ballot has been pushed to 2016, according to a report by ABC affiliate KXTV in Sacramento.

The measure was seeking to change the way California school districts lay off teachers by using a teacher’s classroom performance rating, rather than seniority. Matt David, a Republican strategist and the measure’s sponsor, decided to wait until 2016 to bring the measure to the voters because of the high start-up costs associated with new annual teacher evaluations, the KXTV report said.

The fiscal analysis of the initiative, conducted by the independent Legislative Analysts office, showed that the cost of the new annual teacher evaluations could hit $1 billion.

Though the decision may seem like a victory for teacher groups statewide, David isn’t backing down.

“We feel it’s necessary to commission a study that examines the true cost based on other states rather than speculate on hypotheticals like the LAO fiscal analysis,” he told the station.

David’s initiative seeks many of the same objectives as Vergara v. California, the state’s most significant teacher rights case in two decades, which recently concluded the testimony phase in California State Superior Court. The case was brought by nine student plaintiffs who say the current state laws protect ineffective teachers and deny their constitutional right to receive a quality education.

The defendants in the suit —the state and its two biggest teacher unions argued that the regulations are fine as they are and blamed problems with ineffective teachers on poorly-run schools and districts.

Messages seeking comment from David were not immediately returned.

LA School Report has learned that the initiative, called “Stop Child Molesters, Sexual Abusers, and Drug Dealers from Working in California Schools Act,” was submitted to state officials by a Sacramento law firm that specializes in campaign and election law — Bell, McAndrews & Hiltachk, LLP.

The proposed initiative contends that state laws “do not enable school districts to expeditiously and permanently protect innocent students and staff from school employees who perpetrate acts of child molestation, sexual abuse, drug dealing, and other egregious misconduct.”

The measure was filed on Tuesday through a letter to the state Attorney General’s office and it comes just weeks after Gov. Jerry Brown vetoed AB 375, a bill intended to streamline the teacher dismissal process. AB 375, in part, grew out of an earlier bill from Senator Alex Padilla of Los Angeles, which was introduced in the wake of the Miramonte Elementary school sexual abuse scandal but died in the legislature last year.

Unlike AB 375, which was largely a procedural change that covered all infractions, the proposed measure more closely echoes Padilla’s bill, targeting only those accused of “egregious misconduct” relating to sex, drugs and child abuse. The ballot initiative would also differ in several procedural ways, including the removal of a statute of limitation on evidence gathered against an accused employee and the removal of limits on the number of witnesses.

The proposed measure is in the earliest stages. The Attorney General’s office has until Dec. 23 to title and summarize the initiative. After that, proponents have 150 days to circulate a petition throughout the state and collect 504,760 signatures.

In effect, the ballot measure represents an end-around the legislature, which has been caught between public outcry to remove predators and drug dealers from schools more quickly and the powerful teacher unions that have lobbied for a more comprehensive due process protocols. Upon vetoing AB 375, Brown said it was a step in the right direction but inevitably too problematic and “an imperfect solution.” He urged the legislature to try again.

In papers filed with the measure proposal, the law firm cited 10 cases of misconduct in school districts around state to demonstrate the need for such a focused law. The first referred to the Miramonte case, in which it said “a third grade school employee abusing dozens of students ages 6 to 10, including spoon-feeding semen and semen-laced cookies to blindfolded children, over a period of at least five school years.”

The proposed measure argues that school employees engaged in misconduct have “exploited loopholes” in current law “to delay and conceal dismissal proceedings.”

Public approval of the initiative, it concludes, would result in a “constitutional guarantee of students and staff to be safe and secure.”

Fred Glass, a spokesman for the California Federation of Teachers, said he could not comment on the proposed initiative until he learned more about it. Messages left for comment with the California Teachers Association were not returned.

Previous Posts: Gov. Brown’s Veto of AB 375 Leaves Teacher Dismissal Bill Uncertain; Brown Facing Pressure to Veto ‘Flawed’ Teacher Dismissal Bill; Lawmaker Supports Former Opponent’s Teacher Dismissal Bill.