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Daily Planet Staff 

Berkeley educators, parents and community leaders are joining forces in an attempt to persuade Gov. Gray Davis to propose increased school spending when he releases his revised budget next month. 

But those some people – who have formed a new organization called “Advocates for Public Schools” – admit their effort may not be successful if they’re unable to create a broad base of support throughout California. 

“This needs to be a statewide document,” said Mark Coplan, president of the Berkeley PTA Council. “It’s critical that it gets out everywhere, so it’s not just a Berkeley document. There are just so many people in Berkeley, and we’ve got to be bigger than that.” 

The “document” was introduced Tuesday night during a meeting of the Blue Ribbon Resources Advisory Committee, which is examining ways for the Berkeley Unified School District to find new sources of revenue and is exploring options for restructuring the district’s budget in an attempt to save $2 million. The figures the district is working with are based on the original state budget introduced by the governor earlier this year. He will deliver a revised budget proposal on May 10, and teachers, parents and community members from around the state are planning on rallying in Sacramento on May 8 to urge him to allocate more money for education, particularly with the state looking at an ever-growing budget surplus. 

“This of course is aimed not just at the May 8 action in Sacramento, but we see this as a long-term document,” said Russ Ellis, vice chancellor emeritus at UC Berkeley and one of the supporters listed in the petition. “It is completely useful for you to get two people or one organization to sign on.” 

So far, the endorsement list includes all five members of the BUSD School Board, representatives from the Berkeley Public Education Foundation and the Berkeley chapter of the League of Women Voters. 

Tuesday night, most of the Blue Ribbon Budget committee members endorsed the measure, and former UC Berkeley Chancellor Chang-Lin Tien has added his name to the list. 

The petition calls for the state to help provide “fair pay” for teachers, fund ongoing teacher training and parent involvement, finance academic support programs and allow districts greater flexibility in how they use certain portions of state-allocated funds. 

Organizers will begin distributing the petitions today, and committee member Marissa Saunders, whose child attends City of Franklin Microsociety Magnet School, encouraged her colleagues to use “traditional” means for getting out the word – not just email and other high-tech means, which leave lower-income families out of the loop. 

“I’m sure that there are parents out there who don’t know this is going on because they’re not as involved as we are,” she said. 

Barry Fike, president of the Berkeley Federation of Teachers, issued his own word of caution after Tuesday’s meeting. He told the Daily Planet that he’s concerned the focus on drawing more money out of Sacramento could be a distraction for local ways to resolve the stalled contract negotiations between the teachers union and the district. 

“The concern I have is that this is not addressing the internal scandal here in Berkeley,” he said, referring to figures distributed by the union showing that even though the district’s base revenue limit continues to increase, the amount of money allocated for teachers’ salaries has not increase at the same rate.