Mt. Hood bond leaves us stirred not shaken

Voters who live in the greater reach of Mt. Hood Community College have an important, and impactful decision due next week, by Tuesday the 16th.
The MHCC District board has placed a $75 million general obligation or “GO” bond on the May special election ballot.
The college celebrated its 50th anniversary last year and, as with any group of aging buildings, there are things that need to be done to ensure the campus is renovated and up-to-code as it should be.
This tax measure is to help obtain money (outside of raising tuition rates and other tools to fund Mt. Hood’s annual operating costs) that would do a lot for the school:
Make overdue repairs, improve security systems, and better protect its buildings against earthquake damage. The measure also would fund construction of a new Applied Technology classroom building.
As things stand, Mt. Hood is paying off debts that it has accrued over the past several decades.
While those debts have helped the college become the remarkable school it has become, they cost the school about $800,000 per year in interest payments alone.
Nearly a million dollars that the school could be putting to much better use on anything from salaries for teachers and faculty to improving student programs could be saved by voters passing this bond measure.
The college has not passed a GO bond since 1974, and is eagerly looking for help to meet the future and improve its current infrastructure.
What will determine voters’ choice?
First, let’s go over the cost to the average taxpayer in the sprawling Mt. Hood district (reaching from the Parkrose neighborhood and East Portland to Cascade Locks, Boring and Sandy), and what they could expect to pay.
The estimated tax rate for the bond measure, 26-190 on the ballot, would be $23 per $100,000 of assessed property value. That would be $46 for a house worth $200,000 – a rough average for home assessments in East Multnomah County, say college officials (not to be confused with sales market value, they add).
That’s in the first year: The ratepayer cost gradually decreases as total property values increase, over the 20-plus years of the bond.
Okay, so the average homeowner in the MHCC district would have to pay less than $50 per year, or about $4 per month.
The school isn’t asking a lot, we believe. When the school asks for this money, though, we must ask ourselves, Why do they really need it?
According to Mt. Hood, most of the money would go to update many of the college’s buildings, which  were constructed in the early 1970s.
While the MHCC District “has done a heroic effort in keeping the buildings operational, time is slowly catching up with them,” proponents of the bond state.
It is time to modernize, upgrade and prepare for the future,” they continue, and we at the Advocate agree.
The average voter might ask why the school needs this money right now.
The answer seems to be two-fold. First, the Oregon Legislature has offered an $8 million match to MHCC, saying that if the school can come up with $8 million of its own bond money, the state will pay that amount. But that offer won’t last much longer, and if so, that’s a big amount of money that MHCC District taxpayers may need to cover down the road.
Secondly, it’s an issue of room. When the school was originally designed and built in the ’70s, it was made to serve approximately 5,000 students. Now, however, Mt. Hood sees 25,000 or more students in an average year.
The average student has a lot to gain too, because an influx of bond money would free up operating dollars currently used for infrastructure and repairs to be used instead on things like new programs and events.
What assurance do voters have that the money will go where the school says?
Built into the bond is the requirement that the money can’t go toward salaries for staff or faculty. There also would be a citizen committee overseeing the bond money, and providing periodic financial audits.
Why should voters in area neighborhoods want to help MHCC if no one in their household currently attends? Because of the large financial impact the school makes on our surrounding area.
The college boosts our local economy in several ways: It trains employees to be ready for a competitive workforce and to be  able to offer better services to customers and employers alike.
In its most recent Economic Impact Report, the college directly put $92.3 million into the local economy in goods, services and value added, along with an overall impact of nearly $700 million when factoring in success of students, alumni and jobs created – in or beyond the greater Gresham-East County area. All this, in a single year.
If the bond measure doesn’t pass, what does that mean for the school? These improvements still have to be made.
The MHCC Library still needs to have earthquake-resistance upgrades done, the classrooms are still going to need to be changed and we’re still going to need a new applied technology building.
If the school doesn’t get the money, future students might see increases in their tuition, and we might see a cut in both current school programs like clubs, organizations and even the advocate itself, and a cut in funding for faculty with the school possibly letting some teachers go.
In closing, MHCC offers a lot to its surrounding community, and is doing the best with the buildings, classrooms and infrastructure that are available, even though they were all designed for a much smaller student body.
It is not asking a lot of the community, at only around $4 a month, and with the $8 million state match, it’s important that this measure be passed this year so the school can take advantage of that, rather than asking for more from local taxpayers later.
As students, we have to keep in mind how Mt. Hood has opened doors for us all, in supporting immigrants, in supporting people who wouldn’t otherwise be able to afford secondary education.
Above all, Mt. Hood is giving this community a place that can make our lives, and the lives of future students, better.
We need to support our school which has done so much to support us. We at the Advocate wholeheartedly support this bond measure. We think it’s potentially a great thing for MHCC, and we hope that all of you reading agree.

Advocate Staff