Letter to the Editor:
Have you been inside a Burbank school lately? Was the air conditioning out of order? Was the roof leaking? Were the door locks broken? Did the school have inadequate security cameras? As Burbank teachers, these are problems we encounter every day. We’re proud of the education we provide to Burbank students, but it’s time those students get the facilities they deserve. That’s why we partnered with parents and community leaders to support Measure ABC, a continuation of the depleted Measure S – and why we want you to vote yes on Measure ABC in November.
Almost every educator in Burbank can tell you about the impact of our school’s aging facilities. We are the front line in our schools alongside our classified and administrative colleagues, teaching and supporting students from Transitional Kindergarten to Adult School. Every day, we come to work in Burbank Unified facilities, many of which are over sixty years old. Because of this, our classrooms, roofs, plumbing systems, electrical systems, HVAC systems, and grounds are in need of serious repair and modernization. Our facilities’ age shows even more as we face historic rainfall and heat waves. Some of our buildings have outdated and failing air conditioning systems, leaving these buildings and the students and staff who learn and teach in them more vulnerable to our warming climate. Some schools faced power outages and loss of AC in recent heat waves, allowing classrooms to reach over 90 degrees by 10:00 a.m. Similarly, we have seen the impacts of last year’s historic rains on deteriorating roofs, drains, and sewer systems. At some of our schools, rain brought leaky roofs that patching could simply not withstand. Our dedicated maintenance and operation staff work hard to minimize disruption to our students, but no amount of hard work can compensate for infrastructure that has outlived its usable life.
Measure ABC will allow our school district to continue addressing the root causes of these problems rather than only providing short-term solutions to students and educators.
We have seen our schools’ improvements and progress with our community’s last infrastructural investment, Measure S, in 2013. We also recognize the work left to do in rehabilitating and modernizing our schools. Measure ABC will contribute $458 million that can only be spent on repairing and updating Burbank educational facilities. It will also allow us to access $40 million from the state budget that we can bring back to the district to further support these needed repairs. Measure ABC is essentially a continuation of Measure S and will have oversight from an independent and citizen-led committee. As educators, we know better than anyone that if Measure ABC does not pass, our district will be faced with difficult choices as facility repairs compete with essential programs for our students in the general fund budget. Our students deserve the best education possible, and they should not have to be the victims of tough decisions between facilities upgrades and vital educational needs.
As educators, our top priority is our students, so we ask every community member to think of Measure ABC as not just an investment in infrastructure but also an investment in our students’ success. The research is clear: when students have access to comfortable, adequately climate-controlled classrooms and better air quality, they show up to class more regularly and they perform better on exams. While it may appear to be common sense, we want to be clear to every voter in our community: clean, safe, and modernized school buildings are crucial to providing our students the high-quality education every Burbank student deserves.
