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The city of Mountain View and Mountain View Whisman School District both appear unwilling to budge in a standoff over how to split millions of dollars in tax revenue, with a deal still elusive as the City Council and school board head off for summer break.
At issue is money from the Shoreline Regional Park Community, a special tax district in north Mountain View that diverts property taxes into a special fund to maintain and improve the area.
Ongoing debates and disagreements between the city and school district have frustrated both sides, creating uncertainty in a partnership that provides local funding to schools.
The city acts as stewards of the Shoreline tax district money, and has agreed for nearly 20 years to share some of it with the Mountain View Whisman and Mountain View Los Altos Union High School districts, though less than they would receive if the tax district didn’t exist.
The most recent agreement is just days from expiring at the end of June. The city has indicated that without a signed deal, it will not continue sharing tax revenue.
The school districts are typically paid in December. Last year, Mountain View Whisman received about $6.5 million and MVLA got $4.2 million, according to a city report.
MVLA and the city have both agreed to a three-year extension, but Mountain View Whisman isn’t on board, instead putting forth its own one-year deal.
At a meeting on Tuesday, June 25, the City Council voted unanimously to direct city staff to sign a two-party agreement with MVLA in the event that Mountain View Whisman doesn’t sign the three-year extension.
In a report to the City Council, staff said they only learned earlier this month that Mountain View Whisman didn’t plan to sign the three-year agreement, despite the city first sending the draft in November, and that it was a request from the school district that prompted the city to create the three-year extension in the first place.
The school district has said that it had asked for a letter assuring continued funding for budgeting purposes, not a formal extension, and that it expected changes to the formal agreement to be worked out by an ad hoc committee of elected officials. That committee met once in December, and the school district blames the lack of follow-up meetings on the city.
The city has said that no one raised concerns about the three-year agreement at the December meeting, and that the lack of further meetings was due to scheduling issues. As for the letter request, the city said that a signed contract is needed to allocate funding. At this point, the city staff have said it doesn’t believe the ad hoc committee should continue.
“Given the decision by MVWSD to deny its own request, and the disregard for the Shoreline Community staff time expended on the District’s behalf, staff believes it is not productive to proceed with the Ad Hoc Committee at this juncture,” the city staff report said.
City spokesperson Lenka Wright told the Voice that the city “still plans to engage in constructive dialogue regarding a longer-term agreement,” but has yet to determine the timing and nature of these negotiations.
There are also disagreements about the substance of the district’s proposal. The city objects to terms that would prohibit the Shoreline tax district from issuing bonds, arguing that they could be necessary to maintain the area and build required infrastructure.
The school district argues that the city is willing to put bonds ahead of students, and that it is now canceling the ad hoc committee after only one meeting.
“In short, the City recommended an Ad Hoc Committee, convened it once and then dissolved it,” a recent district letter to the City Council said. “City staff declared no imminent plan to issue bonds, then reiterated its right to do so and asked the school districts to agree to subordinate student funding to the bond repayment.”
Still perplexed by this statement in the staff report:
“In addition, it is not in the SRPC’s and the Mountain View community’s best interest to continue Ad Hoc Committee discussions on this matter while an election season is under way.”
so much continued secrecy about that special tax district…
There’s no secrecy about the district, which doesn’t need to share any of its revenue with the school district. So far there are almost no kids up in its area. The time to evaluate sharing would be when that area has resident kids increasing the enrollment in the school district. Meanwhile it’s just a bit of gift that they get property tax revenue shared from that special district.
The values on the properties in the district would not be so high were it not for the revenue being redirected back to making the locale better. The dump up there needed to be closed and the establishment of the regional park is a big draw to Google picking that area for continued development. There are going to be future costs associated with seal level rise as well, and there are already costs for the city to clean up Stevens Creek as it flows through there to the Bay due to high levels of E Coli.
mvwsd is shrinking. This year average per grade K-2 was 299 compared to grades 3-5 average of 349 and 6-8 average of 433. As the older kids graduate there are fewer per age of younger kids coming up.
Let’s be clear -@SBR and @LongResident. Most of us (residents and taxpayers) probably think Shoreline (mostly Google corporation) should pay the same percentage of General Property TAX to public education as the rest of the property in Mountain View.
The Same Percentage? Or nearly The Same Percentage? Or is Your Opinion that the guaranteed AMOUNT should be what it was in the 1970’s, with no inflation or no increase accounting for the commercial build-out since the 1970’s?
Laura Blakely did help push/negotiate Share Shoreline a decade ago. BUT that always had fatal design elements (for the MVWSD). It was five-years-at-a-time. It depended entirely on the ‘good intentions’ of just a majority of any City Council in any year. It also depends on a reasonable ‘negotiating’ Superintendent and a sensible Board majority.
So, it seems to me that there is no longer ‘a sensible Board majority’ (only departing Trustee Chiang voted NAY to the Superintendent’s changed ‘negotiating’ plan) and that the MVWSD Superintendent, who the Board oversees, is no longer ‘a reasonable negotiator’!
Blakely and Berman supported the Superintendent by their Board vote, you get to decide on Trusteeship of Blakely and Berman by your vote in Nov.
(shades of the School Fields/Parklands “contentious dispute”) conclusion: https://www.mv-voice.com/city-politics/2024/01/26/city-council-approves-school-fields-deal-reaching-agreement-following-contentious-dispute-with-school-district/
City fed up with Superintendent Rudolph and Board:
https://www.mv-voice.com/news/2023/09/13/mountain-view-city-council-ends-six-decade-school-fields-partnership-gives-district-final-offer-for-new-agreement/
With probable enrollment drop in MVWSD they are trying to lock in a high fee on the Shoreline Park area because they will look like fat cats in 3 more years. There are costs to the city if not a special district in maintaining that old garbage dump area as a park, open space and an office park with improved property values due to the investments in the area–investments the city can’t really afford by itself. The school districts don’t deserve a share at the expense of maintaining the landfill area against rising sea tide. The bottom line is that they are incredibly well funded with a monstrous reserve demonstrating how much more than have taken in that what they have spent on education.