City College administrators are actively persuading the Board of Trustees to pursue a multimillion-dollar bond to repair neglected hazards in buildings around City College.

The Channels urges the Board to push for attaining this new bond.

The proposed bond will be funded by property taxes and appear on the 2014 ballot as Proposition 39. The funds will repair the Administration building’s basement issues, lessen over-crowding and privacy issues in the Student Services building and fix the multitude of hazards that plague the Campus Center below the cafeteria on East Campus.

According to Campus Officials there is a remaining $17 million in unaddressed maintenance requests left over after the Measure V bond, which was passed on the June 2008 ballot.

For anyone who has been to the first floor of the Student Services building, you can understand why over-crowding is an issue.

Academic Counselors often listen to students and give advice about their studies in front of a line of patiently waiting students who have no choice but to listen to the person currently being assisted.

If professors are required by law to not divulge information to the public about their students, why should the case of academic counseling be any different?

The Campus Center is home to multiple different departmental workspaces and classrooms ranging from The Culinary department to The Channels’ own production lab, which is especially susceptible to rain damage.
During the rainy season, the ceiling drips from every nook and cranny. Giant, auburn-colored coffee rings bleed from the water-damaged ceiling panels. Consequently, we have resorted to the highly technical defense of wrapping two-ply garbage bags over the computers and placing recycling bins strategically around the lab to catch the trickling water.

Last semester, a ceiling panel collapsed and fell over our current Editor-in-Chief’s computer. Luckily for his well-being and that of anyone else on staff, this happened in between our sporadic office hours.

Measure V, which was valued at $77 million, has been used for remodeling the Humanities building on East Campus and beginning the new campus building which will replace the deteriorating portables which we deemed unfit for instruction.

Measure V was the first step to creating a safety compliant campus; this second bond, which would be on the ballot in 2014, will lay these current safety concerns to rest.
To some, the idea of a new bond after the remaining funds from Measure V run dry may seem in poor taste.  This is especially considering the average homeowners in our community who can only handle so many increases to property taxes.

However, with such obvious issues with campus safety threatening our students, it would be heinous to say that this justifies denying the bond.

City College campus is one that draws in students and faculty from all around the world because of its excellent staffing, beautiful setting and stellar academics.  The structural safety of our facilities should be one that lives up to the campus’s ranking as one of the top 10 city colleges in the nation.

This bond is vital to upholding the outstanding campus that the students deserve.

This editorial reflects the opinion of the Channels editorial board and was written by Opinion editor Scott Buffon.