SRJC to put $410 million bond before voters

Santa Rosa Junior College officials will ask voters to support a $410 million bond measure for facility and technology upgrades, including the construction of new math and science buildings.

The college trustees voted unanimously Tuesday to place the bond measure on the Nov. 4 ballot.

“It is the time,” trustee Rick Call said at a meeting where faculty, staff and students urged the board to take action to support a bond election. “If we wait, it’s just going to be more costly, and who knows what the future holds?”

The board of trustees’ action took place 12 years after voters approved a $251 million bond measure that paid for projects including a four-story library and media center, a culinary arts center and an expansion of the Petaluma campus.

If voters approve the bond measure this November - it needs over 55 percent support to win - the average cost to property owners would be $67 annually.

A voter survey performed for the 100-year-old college in March found three-quarters of likely voters would support the measure.

“The community seems willing and able to accept this,” said communications instructor Hal Sanford. “It’s simply minimal compared to the benefits that will be reaped by our SRJC students.”

As outlined in a presentation by SRJC President Frank Chong, the bond revenues are intended, at a cost of $300 million, to replace or renovate 16 buildings including the 59-year-old mathematics and science buildings; Barnett Hall, which houses laboratories and classrooms; and the college’s public safety training center’s advanced lab and classroom.

Those particular projects were some that the college had hoped to undertake using the 2002 bond.

“We’re looking at unfinished business,” Chong said.

“I was hired 25 years ago and there has been no significant expansion,” mathematics instructor Dan Munton said, noting that the number of students taught in his department per semester has increased since 2003 from 4,400 to more than 5,900.

Wholesale technology upgrades totaling $60 million are also projected, from $15 million for infrastructure for a new information technology network to $18 million in computer laboratories and classrooms.

While the list of targeted projects - ranging from Shone Farm classrooms to a renovation of the Burbank Auditorium - was lengthy, “none of this is set in stone,” Chong said.

“It’s really going to change” over time, he said. “Because the lifetime of a bond is 20 to 30 years out.”

As an example, the projects envisioned now include expanded space for veterans affairs. That wasn’t foreseen in the 2002 bond, but since then, two long wars have swelled the number of veterans enrolled at the college.

The price of outdated facilities is substantial, said Munton: “When students are unable to get a seat in a required class that delays transfers and degree and certificate completion.”

The closest thing to criticism - and it was more of a cautionary remark - came from Dorothy Battenfeld, a Montgomery High School teacher who is a candidate for the board of trustees.

Battenfeld, whose four sons attended SRJC, said she supports the bonds but that, “There has to be transparency, public input and strong accountability for where and how the bond money will be spent.”

She said the bond oversight committee that would be created “is not enough,” and urged the board to make more information about the bond and proposed spending easily accessible to the public.

You can reach Staff Writer Jeremy Hay at 521-5212 or jeremy.hay@press democrat.com.