Nearly six years after voters approved an $800 million bond measure for the Peralta Community College District (PCCD), many projects to repair and upgrade Peralta’s facilities have moved forward while some are on standby.
Two key projects at Laney College have been held up, due to delays in approvals to a much-needed overhaul of Laney’s fire alarm system.
Sharon Serrano, a representative from AECOM, the infrastructure management firm that manages Peralta’s bonds, gave a brief update to the district’s $945 million bond program at the June 25 meeting of the PCCD Board of Trustees.
The upgrades, outlined in the district’s “Master Plan” for facilities, include renovations, brand-new constructions, and technology improvements across the four colleges and district headquarters. Most buildings at Laney College, Merritt College, and the College of Alameda needed renovation or replacement, according to the plan.
The plan is being executed in two phases. That gives the district the flexibility to reassess after phase one is complete, Serrano explained.
In all, 58 out of 123 phase one projects have been completed, big and small. Serrano said 42 are still in progress while 23 have not been started.
Two local bond measures are funding the improvements. Alameda County voters passed a $390 million bond for the district, known as Measure A, in 2006; in 2018, voters approved another $800 million bond, known as Measure G. About $65 million is left of Measure A funds.
According to Serrano, the bonds were also leveraged to get additional money from the state and federal government, through a practice known as “fund-matching.” Many state and federal grants require grantees to “match” funds with local sources of revenue, such as local bonds.The bond program’s budget, as of May 31, totals $945.1 million, according to Serrano. That includes $77.1 million in state funds and $3 million in federal grants.
Serrano provided updates on several major construction projects at each of the four Peralta colleges.
Many key construction projects have broken ground. However, upgrades to the Laney College women’s locker room and theater can’t move forward until the Division of the State Architect (DSA), which oversees construction projects for public schools in California, approves designs for a new fire alarm system for Laney.
“We are looking forward for that fire alarm project to be DSA approved by August,” Serrano said.
According to PCCD Chief Operating Officer Greg Nelson, the fire alarm project is the “first domino” needed to get other projects moving forward.
The DSA is requiring PCCD to submit a new, functional, campus-wide fire alarm system design that is up to date with existing fire code standards, Nelson stated in an email.
“Several projects from 20+ years ago were not certified as complete, so the district had to remedy that situation before we could proceed,” according to the statement.
Fire alarms on the Laney campus have had issues for years. In 2019, the Oakland Fire department found “critical deficiencies” in Laney’s fire alarm system, including broken alarm panels and blocked fire exits, according to a KTVU report.
“The fire alarm project […] is complex due to the age of some buildings and getting access through areas made of materials like concrete walls,” Nelson explained.
The DSA can take anywhere from six to eighteen months to approve facilities projects, according to Nelson. “The time depends on the project’s complexity, the facility’s age, and the last time upgrades were made,” he added.
Other major repairs have been completed across the district, according to Serrano. These include elevator repairs, roofing, paving, electrical repairs, and a sweeping $8 million upgrade to the district’s information technology infrastructure.
“The last item that we’re looking forward to,” Serrano said, “is planning for the next issuance of Measure G so we can complete all the phase one projects and look forward to moving to phase two.”
Citizen oversight: Does it work?
As required by California law, Measure G and Measure A funds are overseen by a citizens’ oversight committee, known as the Bond Measures Oversight Committee (BMOC).
The committee’s primary activities include reviewing audits and listening to AECOM present construction updates, according to Marcus Crawley, a BMOC member since 2019.
Crawley, who is also the President of the Alameda County Taxpayers’ Association, and chaired the committee during the 2023-24 school year, said he believes AECOM is doing a “great job.”
However, he feels that the committee’s ability to ask probing questions during presentations is somewhat limited.
“They show charts that have thousands of numbers on them,” Crawley said. “[…] You see all these numbers, and you just take their word for it.”
Crawley noted that BMOC has also struggled in the past to meet its quorum of four, the minimum number of committee members that must be present to hold a meeting. Four out of ten meetings in 2023 were postponed or canceled “due to lack of quorum,” according to BMOC agendas and minutes.
A pattern of vacancies has aggravated the issue. The student member seat was vacant for nearly three years before PCCD trustees appointed Laney student Cole Sexton in February.
The result is delays to “ordinary business,” according to Crawley.
“Everything gets pushed downhill ‘till finally it’s irrelevant,” Crawley said.
