SCHOOL CONSTRUCTION TO START; A.V. DISTRICTS TO USE PROP. 1A MATCHING FUNDS.

Byline: Karen Maeshiro Daily News Staff Writer

With the passage of the nation's largest school bond measure, Palmdale School District will move forward with building permanent schools for Barrel Springs and Buena Vista, two long-time temporary campuses.

Construction of the $12.8 million Barrel Springs School will begin in December, and construction bids will go out this week for the $13.7 million Buena Vista campus, school officials said last week.

``I'm really happy with it. It's really going to help us, because we are really bursting at the seams with this growth,'' board member Helen Acosta said. ``They keep expanding on the eastside. Every lot that was empty, they are filling in.''

The $9.2 billion Proposition 1A, passed by 62 percent of California voters last week, will also boost school building efforts of other school districts in the Antelope Valley that have passed or are pursuing approval of local school construction-bond measures because it will provide 50 percent matching funds.

Proposition 1A will allocate $6.7 billion statewide for new school construction and rehabilitation of deteriorating facilities from kindergarten through high school, and $2.5 billion for colleges and universities.

Voters in the Eastside Union School District approved a $15.5 million bond issue last November to build a middle school and an elementary school.

Superintendent Connie Webb said the district will apply for matching funds from the state to double the amount of the local bond.

``That's what we were hoping for and really counting on, saving the local taxpayers from having to carry the whole burden,'' Webb said.

Grading for the $9.5 million Gifford C. Cole Middle School will begin in December.

Westside Union School District in last week's election got approval from voters to extend a school construction tax for 18 years to raise another $14.7 million.

Lancaster School District will seek passage of a $29 million school construction bond measure in an election in March. The bond amount, combined with $3 million in a district construction fund, allows the district to qualify for $32 million in matching funds from the state.

``The district will get that money that it is able to match with local dollars,'' said Ned McNabb, assistant superintendent for business services. ``Our plan is maximizing state dollars.''

After failing twice in 1996 and 1997 to pass an $81 million school construction bond, Palmdale School District turned toward refinancing district debt and issuing bonds through a Mello-Roos special tax district to come up with funds for the Barrel Springs and Buena Vista projects.

The district also used general fund money to get the building projects further along in the process, for which the district can receive credit from the state.

``Our board made a commitment several years ago in order to get things in this phase. Out of the general fund, we paid upfront the architectural fees and getting the construction documents ready and purchased land,'' Smith said.

The Palmdale district will receive $12.5 million from the first of four phases during which Proposition 1A money will be distributed, Smith said. That represents the state's 50 percent match for the Barrel Springs and Buena Vista projects.

Barrel Springs, which has been a temporary campus since 1993, and Buena Vista, which has been temporary since 1990, now share the same site near 37th Street East and Avenue S.

The permanent Barrel Springs campus will be located at 25th Street East and Columbine Street. Buena Vista's permanent site will be at 52nd Street East and Avenue S-4. Both will be kindergarten-through-eighth grade schools.

Barrel Springs is scheduled to be completed in July 2000; Buena Vista in January 2001.

Buena Vista also will include a 3,000-square-foot medical therapy unit for disabled students, eliminating the need for busing many special education children to a clinic at Linda Verde School in Lancaster to obtain speech, occupational and physical therapy services.

Included in the $12.5 million allocation is $40,200 to begin work on modernizing Tumbleweed School, including repainting and recarpeting classrooms, installing energy-efficient windows and a new asphalt playground, and wiring for technology.