Cast your vote for Prop H spending priorities

Over on the sfschools group I've opened a poll that lets you vote your favorite proposals for new spending under Prop H. This year the amount of money available under Prop H is increasing, as it has every year since Prop H was approved. Under the rules of Prop H most of the new money is allocated to specific areas. But the so call "third third" is less encumbered and has been allocated to a variety of programs such as Peer Resources, Translation services, Academic coaches, Wellness centers, Violence prevention, Learning support professionals, etc.

The Prop H CAC has sent their recommendations for new spending to the BOE for a vote at the next BOE meeting on January 17th. In the poll I've listed many of the proposals that came before the committee, along with estimates of their cost. Unfortunately you'll have to be a member of the SfSchools list with a valid Yahoo! ID in order to vote. (And the blogger.com tool I use to publish this blog does not, as far as I know, support polls!)

Here are the choices in my poll:

• Green schoolyards (non-bond schools) $250,000
• Grants writer $90,000
• MS Bike Racks $15,000
• MUNI passes for homeless youth $120,000
• Teacher technology program $2,600,000
• School fiber connectivity $750,000
• Point-of-sale system for cafeterias $250,000
• Salad bar expansion $130,000 (not $262,500 shown in the poll)
• Teacher support and recruitment $546,000
• Program development project $250,000
• MUNI passes for MS and HS students $2,000,000
• Innovation seed funding $500,000
• Sustainability / Green schools initiative $100,000
• LEP Parent outreach coordinator $100,000
• PSAT / SAT preparation $174,000
• Whiteboards $500,000
• GATE $88,100
• Pre-K-3 literacy initiative $450,000
• Equitable Education for MS $640,000
• Culturally responsive initiative $250,000

While the poll is a fun way to express your priorities, I put it together to put the issue of the salad bar expansion in context. There is roughly $5M in new "third third" funds available this year. The pressure to commandeer this money to help defray the looming budget will be enormous. Yet the salad bar expansion and the POS system for the cafeteria are modest sums. They are not ongoing expenses, and they figure to increase revenues from the cafeterias and pay for themselves.

Yet the Prop H CAC did not include the salad bar expansion in its recommendations to the BOE.

Let's hope the BOE corrects this mistake.

Meanwhile, go vote now!