Voters in western Montecito on Tuesday rejected a ballot measure aimed at replacing aging facilities in the Cold Spring Elementary School District, according to the unofficial results.
It was the second time the ballot measure failed to pass in as many years.
Measure R needed 55 percent approval to pass, but this time around wasn’t even able to muster 50 percent: 500 voters said yes, and 506 said no. The proposal would have generated $8.75 million.
Located at 2243 Sycamore Canyon Road, Cold Spring School is not only a small district, it’s a small school, and — like nearly all schools on the South Coast — it’s getting smaller. In one year, enrollment has shrunk to 185 students from about 200. In 2000-01, the school enrolled about 240 students.
Meanwhile, the school’s test scores are through the roof. In 2007, Cold Spring scored a 962 out of 1,000 on its academic performance index — the highest of the roughly 100 public schools in Santa Barbara County.
The district makes up the western third of Montecito.
Measure R would have replaced four portable trailers with real classrooms, and built new restrooms. The current restrooms arrived with the construction of the school, in 1927, school officials said.
At $19.70 per $100,000 in assessed home value, the proposed 31-year tax would have amounted to about $120 a year for the average homeowner, officials said.
The last time the district passed a bond measure was in 1996, when voters passed the $3 million Measure O, allowing the district to build five classrooms and a music room, as well as renovate the auditorium.
As was the case in 2006, Measure R’s vocal opponent was David Strauss, the retired owner of a Los Angeles clothing store.
Strauss, who moved to Montecito eight years ago, argued there is no need for a shrinking school district to ask for so much money — especially given its rosy financial condition.
The Cold Spring school board, which works with an annual budget of about $3 million, has stored up a surplus reserve of about $450,000, he said.
In 2006, a similar effort called Measure K failed with only 51 percent of the vote. That measure was asking for $14.5 million.
