INITIATIVE CAMPAIGN // School `choice' battle
comes to malls
DATE 03/15/92
NEWSPAPER THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
SECTION METRO
EDITION MORNING
PAGE B01
STORY LENGTH 40 INCHES
HEADLINE INITIATIVE CAMPAIGN // School `choice' battle
comes to malls
BYLINE/CREDIT Dan Froomkin:The Orange County Register
SUBJECT TERMS CA:SCHOOLS:EDUCATION:ELECTIONS:LEGISLATION
Strolling through the MainPlace mall Saturday morning, on her way
from Bullock's to the May Co., Mary Burgeson got caught in the middle
of a statewide political battle.
Spotting a man collecting signatures to get initiatives on the
November ballot, Burgeson headed for his table. On the table sat a
petition for a "parental-choice" initiative, and a sign advertising
"More $$$ For Our Schools."
But before Burgeson could get there, she was nabbed by Suzanne
Vaugine, a fourth-grade teacher at Taft Elementary School in
Orange, carrying fliers calling the initiative a rip-off.
When Burgeson, a Garden Grove mother of two public-school
students, heard that the initiative would provide tax money for
parents to send their children to private school, she got angry.
"The general public shouldn't pay for that," Burgeson said. And
she decided not to sign.
But Vaugine's next target was not so easily swayed.
"It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out we've got
serious problems with the public schools," Scott McReynolds snapped
at Vaugine. McReynolds, who lives in Orange, said he plans to send
his two children to private schools.
"If this'll shake up the system," he said, "it may be a good
thing."
Similar scenes are being played out every day in malls and
parking lots across Orange County, as shoppers find themselves
fought over by rival groups asking them to take a stand on the
future of California's schools.
The state is no stranger to massive campaigns for and against
ballot initiatives. But in an unprecedented move, the powerful
California Teachers Association and its allies are trying to
prevent an explosive school-voucher initiative from ever getting on
the ballot.
The foot soldiers in this campaign line up in front of Orange
County's Target stores and Price Clubs, on college quads and at
swap meets.
On one side are signature gatherers -- most of them paid by the
name, some of them volunteers -- trying to collect the 615,000
signatures needed to put the initiative on the November ballot.
Their deadline, April 17, is fast approaching.
On the other side are teachers -- along with some parents --
trying to head off would-be signers, telling them that they are
better off keeping the initiative from the entire electorate.
Supporters of the initiative are outraged at the behavior of
their opponents, which they say has included harassment of
signature gatherers.
"It just opens a whole new frontier of negative campaigning,"
said David Harmer, attorney for the Excellence through Choice in
Education League. The league, primarily made up of conservative
business leaders, wrote the initiative.
"Here we are dealing with these dockworker tactics instead of
debating the merits of the initiative," Harmer said.
Kevin Teasley, the league's vice chairman, said the teachers
have slowed paid signature gathering across the state. But he also
said their actions have enraged some members of the public enough
to volunteer to gather signatures themselves.
"It's not solely on support of the initiative, it's more so on
shouldn't people have the right to vote on the issue," Teasley
said. "The CTA doesn't even want people to have the right to vote
on it."
But Shirley Guy, political consultant for the state teachers'
association in Orange County, said the blocking campaign is
completely legitimate.
"We feel that it's just as democratic to keep it off the ballot
as it is to go through the process of voting on it in November,"
she said.
Ed Woodsen, president of the Anaheim Secondary Teachers
Association, said teachers are adamant that the initiative be
nipped in the bud.
"The initiative has been very cleverly worded with catch phrases
and emotionally laden terms," he said. "It purports itself to be
something it's not -- a choice initiative. It's a voucher proposal."
Many educators realize that "choice" could be a hard thing to
fight against in a general election.
"If this thing were honestly worded," Woodsen said, "we could
probably wait and fight them at the polls."
Both sides agree that if the initiative gets on the ballot and
wins voter approval, it would radically transform California's
educational system.
The destiny of the state's schools, now guided by state laws and
elected officials, would instead be determined by the free market.
Complex school-financing laws that guarantee minimal levels of
state support for education essentially would be gutted.
The initiative has three major components: It would give parents
who send their children to private school an annual $2,500
taxpayer-funded scholarship per child; it would allow parents to
choose any public school they want, if the schools have room after
taking local students; and it would lower state funding guarantees
for public education by two to four times the amount of each
scholarship granted.
Supporters say the resulting new order would allow all parents
to find good schools for their children at less cost to the state's
taxpayers.
Opponents say it would funnel money to rich, private-school
parents while leaving the public schools in ruins.
Teasley, of the choice league, said signature gathering started
in early January and so far has netted about half the needed
615,000 names.
"Despite the CTA's effort to kill us, it's doing very well," he
said.
Some union officials dispute that. For instance, Jim Harlan,
executive director of West Orange County United Teachers, said his
union's efforts in the Huntington Beach area have cut into
signature gathering dramatically.
Harlan said that, at one time or another, as many as 300
teachers in his union have come up to the tables where people are
gathering signatures and passed out anti-initiative fliers.
"When people receive the flier, read the flier, we find
basically that they don't sign the petition," Harlan said.
He also said some union members struck deals with signature
gatherers -- who generally solicit signatures on a variety of
initiatives -- agreeing to go away if the gatherers stopped hawking
the voucher initiative.
Teasley said the league remains optimistic. "We're confident
we're going to be on the ballot," he said.
Teachers say they are confident that they will kill the
initiative now -- and if not now, later.
"This is our lives," Harlan said. "If this thing passes, public
education will no longer be as it is."