CAL SMACNA & SMART Promote State Sales of School Facility Bonds at Capitol Rally

SACRAMENTO — On August 23, 2017 CAL SMACNA and SMART took part in a Capitol Building press conference that brought together multiple organizations with the same goal: urge the Legislature and the Governor to increase the speed and size of the school construction bond sales.

Proposition 51 was heavily supported by CAL SMACNA contractors and passed by voters last November despite being openly opposed by Governor Brown. This measure authorized the state to sell $9 billion in school facility bonds to help address the multi-billion-dollar backlog in K-12 construction projects that are waiting on state funding. Almost a year after voters passed Proposition 51, the Governor appears to be dragging his feet in selling the bonds. In fact, of the $9 billion authorized only $400 million is scheduled for bond sales, and this won’t occur until November 2017.

If sold quickly in the next three years, $9 billion in school bonds will have a major impact on the teaching and learning environment for millions of students, building approximately 12,000 new classrooms, repairing or upgrading another 44,000 classrooms, and building up to 1,500 classrooms specifically for Career Technical Education programs.

Click here to learn more about this effort.