Please stop gambling with our children's education, Nelson and Caldonato! Not to mention costing the district in some future court battle! $50,000 only goes so far, and it won't be enough for something like this. Pass this tax first, and then fight the good fight for a different tax in the future. Please listen to the parents--our schools need this funding.

The current parcel tax adds about $500 to the funding per student. But other sources are generally rising to easily make that up.

For example, in his proposed budget for next year, Governor Brown added nearly $400 per ADA in school funding PERMANENTLY. In addition, he proposes a one-time payment that will add $4000 per ADA in the 2016-2017 school year.

What are they going to do without that Parcel Tax money? Oh wait, the current Parcel Tax doesn't expire until AFTER the 2016-2017 school year. They'll have that money too.

I won't be voting to approve a parcel tax at any level until these two board members are gone. Our money is being wasted, and our children taking a back seat to these two men's personal agendas.

I find it disturbing Coladonato and Nelson hired their own attorney. They are not interested in sharing different views and considering other perspectives. They are only interested in shouting down anyone who disagrees with them, and they won't hesitate to use their personal wealth and lawyer friends as a megaphone. That's nice for them, but in doing so they fail to honor their role as a voice for students and the community. As trustees, their authority comes from the collective decision of the board. If they want to act as individuals, they should resign. The sooner they are off the board, the better.

I agree.with those who want to get rid of Nelson and Coladonato. I have actively campaigned for past parcel taxes in the past. This time, I will not vote for one until those two men are off the Board. We need more people to speak out and say this. There is no trust in the board as long as those two are on it.

I did a Google Search and found that both Coladonato and his lawyer Shane Balloun went to Cornell. I don't find it surprising that they'd agree on a legal opinion that is different from what looks to be settle law in the State of California. Balloun lives in Washington, but worked at Google, presumably with Coladonato. The whole thing smells rotten.

Nelson is up for re-election this year. Let's make sure he doesn't win back his seat. Goodness sakes, enough is enough.

@Coincidence, you stopped checking up on Mr. Balloun too quickly. He's pretty much a brand new lawyer (graduated law school a few years ago), who apparently specializes in maritime law. His website promotes what aspects of law he does, and I don't see tax law among them. But, if you need some good advice on, what, piracy laws? he's your man.

The Voice and the rest of the school board need to do a little more research on this guy. The Coladonato connection is crystal clear, and it obviates any credibility from his brief in my book.

Since I was not satisfied with the depth of analysis of the Board's counsel, I hired a good lawyer (State bar of 5 western states) who had been a Mountain View resident and had the trust of Greg C. If the Board acts to make the very short letters from it's counsel Public Documents, you will see the issue.
My community includes as stakeholders all residents of the District, and not just the loud "Fed up" people.
The issue of the Barikas decision involves the tax raising abilities of at least 11 other school districts, not just MVWSD. The California School Board Association's Educational Legal Alliance was not able to successfully defend our interests in "uniform" tax.

Kevin's article is factually wrong! "Differently" is absolutely not what is wanted! (!!) What is wanted is "uniformity." A tax that is based without classification on all property at a "uniform" tax rate + uniform flat tax. A tax that absolutely does not distinguish or classify between "commercial" and "residential" or on the size or continuity with other parcels of the same owner.
It would be more than "a risky move" to apply a property tax "differently" Kevin! It would be both clearly against the court's decision in Barikas AND against Balloun's letter from counsel.
Steven Nelson is an elected Trustee of the MVWSD, his opinion

Thanks for confirming the Coladonato-Balloun connection. Makes the opinion even more suspect. By the way, it's Borikas. Also, have you heard of a thing called the Brown Act that prohibits the board from conducting business outside of board meetings? I think the district attorney might have an opinion that you talking to the voice and making comments on these articles is a violation. Hope you still have money left for the fine that you will paying.

@ @steven Nelson


. Also, have you heard of a thing called the Brown Act that prohibits the board from conducting business outside of board meetings?

Read the Brown act. You need three to conduct business.

wonder if Nelson is unaware that most of the states his attorney is licensed in are under the Universal Bar Exam (UBE)- so, this is not a big selling point for the guy. Also, he specializes in something not relevant.

Oh, he's also (based on his public writings and affiliations) an activist libertarian. Like Calodonato. How odd.

How hard is it to get an attorney to write an opinion that supports your position? Not very.

The article clearly states the position of Nelson and coladonato. All you need is for one more member to read the article and they know how they know their one vote can effect my the outcome. Bingo - Brown act violation. Why don't you call the DA if you would like to verify?

It is clear that Nelson and Coladonato need to be voted out of office for the board to return to some semblance of sanity.

Complaining on the mv-voice comments section is one thing; organizing and informing voters in time for the next election is another. I hope people here can channel their frustration into action.

@Voter of Sylvan Park
you wrote:
"I won't be voting to approve a parcel tax at any level until these two board members are gone." (meaning Nelson and Coladonato I assume)

The 2016 November election only offers voters a choice on 3 current trustees, NOT including Coladonato. However, the voters can change things by sending a strong message to the Board this November about their overall performance.

The real question is:
Will the voters tell the Board members their behavior is unacceptable by removing 1 or 2 of them,
OR
Will the voters tell current and future families to get lost, shut up, move away or switch to private schools and just give up on our public schools?

We can afford to wait until AFTER the 2016 November election to decide on a Parcel Tax since the current Parcel Tax runs until AFTER the 2016-2017 school year is over. Let's do that.

"Our money is being wasted, and our children taking a back seat to these two men's personal agendas."

You got to admit one point, BOTH of these politicians clearly stated their agendas in their campaign for election to the Board. Perhaps the single-mindedness of those agendas (and what they each were willing to do to achieve those agendas) took people by surprise?

The voters COULD have and SHOULD have understood whom they were voting for in 2012 and how Nelson would behave as a Trustee. For 2014, I guess it's fair to assume voters did not realize the combined results when they voted that year.

Let's hope Nelson and Coladonato stick to their guns on the Parcel Tax and delay it until after the November election. Then we'll know what the voters think of our Board and then we vote on a new Parcel Tax.

And families will know if they need to give up on MVWSD.

It sounds like Steve Nelson and Greg Coladonato are doing some due diligence on their square footage proposal, which is good. This is how investigations start, and a lawyer didn't immediately rule out their proposal, which means they may have a valid proposal. I don't smell any conspiracy here - if I knew a lawyer from college, I'd call them first before doing a random search and getting some person of unknown merit.

I personally think the square footage tax is more fair than a flat parcel tax given that some parcels are huge and house many kids going to school. A per-parcel tax makes someone living in a tiny house pay as much as a hundred apartment development towards the school system. Square footage is a somewhat better approximation of number of kids in the school system than a parcel tax.

Why is there so much vitriol about these two guys? They're not doing some shady thing, just acting in the way they said they'd act.

I encourage fellow MV residents not to use the parcel tax as a political act against the board. The message should be the future of kids should never be a political chess piece, not by the trustees, and not by voters.

Parcel tax funding is more insulated from board in-fighting than school construction. Parcel tax funds are largely determined by the district professionals, and overseen by the district-wide Parcel Tax Oversight Committee. The board merely "oversees the oversight."

While yes, if the parcel tax expires, it can be renewed any time in the future, but schools don't operate so cleanly. Any gap in funding means that current staffing being funded by the parcel tax, like our talented teaching coaches could be in jeopardy.

If we reject a $191 total parcel tax, all the while other towns like Menlo Park will have on their ballot a $350 increase (to make their total $1,053) and Palo Alto and Los Altos pay proportionally three times as much, we just end up hurting our teachers and students. District drama is merely an annoyance on educators and not on the radar of students, but if reject the parcel tax, we may lose staffing or instructional momentum, that's real harm. I look forward to the day we start investing in our schools the way neighboring towns do. If I didn't convince you to support the parcel tax, I hope you can then pledge to give the same amount as the parcel tax over to the Mountain View Education Foundation or school site PTAs.

@ Steve Nelson

" The article clearly states the position of Nelson and coladonato. All you need is for one more member to read the article and they know how they know their one vote can effect my the outcome. Bingo - Brown act violation. Why don't you call the DA if you would like to verify?"

i dont need to call the DA. There is no direct communication between officials. unless you think the voice Is part of th conspiracy. The fact that the newspaper reports their position is irrelevant. You need to have three commncate directly thru a private meeting, phone call or an email and agree to support each other on an item up for consideration. Just Stating a position is not a violation

Of course
If you think it's a BA violation, why not report them.

The proper legal office to report a suspected Ralph Brown Act (or Public Records Act) violation is the Santa Clara County District Attorney. They have an Office of Public Integrity unit, and their mailing address is:

Santa Clara County District Attorney RE: Public Integrity Unit
70 W. Hedding St., West Wing
San Jose, CA 95110

You may find this monogram from the League of California Cities useful to remind you of the details of the statute and the extensive case law that supports the statue.

Web Link

However - you will find that James Brown's act is now dead - as is Bowie's!

MVWSD Trustee Nelson often expresses his own opinion (which you may not quite grok)
Good journey, Major Tom!

@Christopher Chiang of North Bayshore

While I respect what you tried to do while on the Board and your difficult choice to resign in an effort to fix things with the Board by other means and I often agree with your positions on issues, I do have a point to make here...waiting on the Parcel Tax may well be much better for our kids, teachers and schools.

You wrote:
"I encourage fellow MV residents not to use the parcel tax as a political act against the board. The message should be the future of kids should never be a political chess piece, not by the trustees, and not by voters."

It was NOT the voters nor the tax-payers nor even parents who decided to turn the next Parcel Tax into a political act for their own purposes and against the best interests of our kids, teachers and schools.

We already suffered through years of our K-5 schools being used as political tools to be exploited for personal political agendas with the resulting waste and deliberately orchestrated school-versus-school animosities because the public had no power to do anything but express our complaints, which mainly fell on deaf ears and which in the end made no real difference.

Fortunately, due to the specific timing of events, we the people finally have the opportunity to change the dysfunctional Board in a meaningful way even if they remain deaf. We have time to BOTH change the Board AND to THEN pass a Parcel Tax with renewed optimism for the new Board.

Think of it this way, given the understandable distrust/disgust with the current Board, many people wont support any Parcel Tax and many wont support any increase, HOWEVER, if the Board gets slapped hard by the November elections, the general voting public is much more likely to give the new Board the benefit of the doubt and support a Parcel Tax and even a larger increase in the Parcel Tax.

We the people are not the ones trying to exploit issues to serve political agendas, we the people can be the ones to put an end to such things.

@Resident of Old Mountain View
You wrote:
"It sounds like Steve Nelson and Greg Coladonato are doing some due diligence on their square footage proposal, which is good."

It COULD be just fine, IF they were working at the STATE legislative level or organizing the many California school districts to join together to push a mutual opinion and ask for the courts or legislature of the state to pass a law or to get the courts to clarify things for FUTURE Parcel Tax purposes.

HOWEVER, it's not fine for them to be exploiting our school district's short-fused need for a new Parcel Tax as a vehicle for their own political agendas.

"This is how investigations start, and a lawyer didn't immediately rule out their proposal, which means they may have a valid proposal."

Fine, just not on our districts time/dime.

If they honestly believe in this issue, they have every right to go out and spend their personal time to work with other district's leadership to craft proposals and legal opinions and other legitimate methods to pressure the state or courts to deal with this issue in the proper manner and in the proper time that such changes require.

"I personally think the square footage tax is more fair than a flat parcel tax given that some parcels are huge and house many kids going to school."

Fine, NOBODY is saying otherwise, NOR is that relevant to our district NOW.

The courts have made it clear that certain types of Parcel Taxes are lawful and are safe from challenges and certain types are not lawful and will be voided. The courts did not rule on every possible structure, so anything they did not "bless" is almost certainly going to draw lengthy and costly challenges and may well be struck down. How long court challenges will take is anybody's guess, but certainly more than the time MVWSD has to enact a new Parcel Tax.

"Why is there so much vitriol about these two guys?"

If you're seriously asking that question, then you were NOT paying attention in 2015, let alone the last 3 years. Fortunately, you have all the research info you need here in the MV Voice archives, but for a better view, just watch the many videos of the Board meetings from 2012-2016.

The videos are self-explanatory on your question.

"They're not doing some shady thing, just acting in the way they said they'd act."

Now there I'll agree with you, they are indeed.
Just goes to show how most voters don't pay any attention to what goes on in school districts and know virtually nothing about the candidates they elect to school Boards.

@PACT Parent:

My impression is that most parents don't really pay attention to what's happening in the board, but I happen to since I care about the school district, particularly because I want my kids to go once they're old enough, and I'm not rich enough to send them to private school.

It also seems that most parents are ok with board decisions and basically stay quiet until their one or two pet issues get resolved the wrong way, then there's a cacophony of complaints. This is the nature of local government, however. Can't please everyone when thousands of people are bound by the same decisions.

I don't always agree with the board, for instance, I think their measure G bond usage is wasteful and it boggles the mind how they can spend so much on such small improvements, but I do understand that government pays several times more than the private sector for construction due to a legacy of many expensive laws and regulations.

@Resident of Old Mountain View

"@PACT Parent:
My impression is that most parents don't really pay attention to what's happening in the board,"

Most parents have not been forced to repeatedly face the possibility that their school may be closed and our kids required to change from our own campus in control of our own destiny and instead get shoved into a corner of a combined campus run by an administration that is hostile to our school's existence. As the families of Stevenson has repeatedly faced for years now.

Remember also that many of the parents at all the K-5 schools have kids who wont be effected by the future changes because they will graduate before the changes happen. If your youngest kid is already a 4th or 5th grader, they wont be effected by the current dysfunction and drama of our Board.

Most parents have not had to face the prospect of taking a once highly integrated single school and split that school into 2 very different schools on the same location and the costs being used as a political football for years. As the families of Castro/Mistral have faced.

Most parents have not had to face the very LOW (and unfair) public opinion of their school to the point where a survey of families showed that all but one family in Huff-A would rather sell their homes and move out of the district rather than be required to go to Theuerkauf AND faced the political tactic from the Board to possibly close or merge Theuerkauf to improve it's public image.

Most parents have not been campaigning for several years now to get the Board to take away the district resources from other schools to build them a new walking distance school in their area because their walking distance school was not sustainable back in 2005. As the Slater families worked on for years.

Monta Loma faces serious facilities conditions problems at their campus and the possibility of enrollment problems of unknown magnitude due to Slater, but probably wont face closure.

Huff, Bubb & Landels are over-crowded, but don't face potential closures.

So, unless your kid is below 4th grade AND at or possibly bound for Stevenson, Theuerkauf, Castro, Mistral or future Slater, then there is no major driving force to take you away from your kids to deal with MVWSD school Board dysfunction and pointless drama issues.

"but I happen to since I care about the school district, particularly because I want my kids to go once they're old enough, and I'm not rich enough to send them to private school."

And most parents of younger kids already have so much on their hands that they have no bandwidth to get informed and involved with the district drama.

"It also seems that most parents are ok with board decisions and basically stay quiet"

OR, they are in communication with those parents at their schools who have the bandwidth to dig in deeply ad get involved and help speak for them. A great many parents care deeply about what is going wrong in our district, but simply cannot spare the time. They rely on those of us who can take the time to get directly involved.

"until their one or two pet issues get resolved the wrong way, then there's a cacophony of complaints."

Often it's too late by that point.

"This is the nature of local government, however. Can't please everyone when thousands of people are bound by the same decisions."

With this Board of elected so-called "Trustees" the only "everyone" they are trying to please are themselves and their political agendas.

"I don't always agree with the board, for instance,"

I have yet to find one person who does.

"Over time I become more libertarian, not because I am indiscriminate with respect to the morality or utility of a particular choice, but because I think it is a greater evil for the government to take your choices away in attempting to prevent you from being foolish or reckless. The State continues to be the worst allocator of economic resources and any argument that government truly preserves the morality of its subjects by law and regulations is indefensible."


Excerpt taken from Shane Balloun website
Web Link

I recognize that it is a tad bit of a conspiracy theory, but could it be possible that this is a way to sabotage the Parcel tax? Mr. Balloun doesn't believe the government can effectively allocator resources (our district is an example) and he is now will defend a tax to give more resources? I'm skeptical

the fact that this attorney who claims no relevant experience in his marketing materials was hired by our libertarian activist trustee makes your concerns quite rational.

NO NEW TAXES.