L.A. Voters Pass $5.3B Bond Measure for Community Colleges
Credit: Al Seib / Los Angeles Times / Getty Images- The bond measure, known as Measure LA, passed with 61.4% approval.
- It will allow $5.3 billion to be used toward renovations for the Los Angeles Community College District, which comprises nine colleges.
- Funds would be raised by increasing property taxes for residents for several decades.
Los Angeles voters approved a bond measure Nov. 8 that provided a big boost to the county’s nine community colleges.
Measure LA allows the Los Angeles Community College District (LACCD) to issue a $5.3 billion bond, financed by a new property tax, to improve infrastructure and job training facilities across the district, according to Voter’s Edge California, a nonpartisan online guide to California elections.
It passed with 61.4% approval, easily topping the 55% “yes” votes required to pass.
To pay for the measure, property owners would have to pay $25 per $100,000 of assessed value over the next 40 years, generating an estimated $345 million per year. However, the Los Angeles Times reported that the average homeowner can expect their yearly property taxes to increase by $88 to $157.
The Los Angeles College Faculty Guild AFT 1521, which represents full-time and adjunct faculty across the LACCD, and IBEW Local Union 11, which represents workers in the electrical construction industry in Los Angeles, both endorsed the measure, according to Voter’s Edge.