Californians are being asked to approve more than $15 billion in additional bonds on the November ballot. But the state hasn't sold many of the bonds approved in the 2006 election. According to the Sacramento Bee, less than $4 billion of the $42 billion approved in 2006 (as part of Gov. Schwarzenegger's infrastructure package) has gone out the door. This is a political problem for the bond measures on the ballot. From children's hospitals to the Los Angeles Unified School District, varoius entities are asking for more bond money long before they've spend the money from previously approved bond measures. I suspect that Californians are about to vote down a number of bond measures around the state.

Particularly vulnerabile is L.A. Unified's Measure Q. It's the most financially irresponsible bond measure in recent memory. And in California, that's saying something. It's a $7 billion bond -- more than twice as much as any school district spending plan can justify -- and is being sought by a district that has flat enrollment and that has just had a huge, multibillion dollar building plan. What's more, as the LA Times recently reported, the district is skirting laws preventing taxpayer money from being spent on political campaigns in spending big money to promote its own bond measure.

Every time a school bond is voted down in Southern California, we hear recriminations about selfish voters or older people or white people who are unwilling to pay to educate our state's immigrant children. Well, voters in Los Angeles have been among the more generous, approving four multibillion dollar school bonds in the past decade. But I suspect the $7 billion LA Unified School District bond just placed on the ballot is in deep trouble.

Check out this LA Times story on how the bond was put together -- or, more accurately, it became a Christmas tree of political goodies that more than doubled in size in the next two weeks. There is actually no plan at all for $2 billion of the $7 billion; they'll just use it to fund what they like. That's dangerous. The real question is why the school district, which has been unable to provide accurate checks to its teachers, thinks it deserves another blank check. Other questions is this really a good time to borrow? And why do we need more borrowing now, with enrollment flat and headed south? It would be better for the board to reconsider, pull this measure from the ballot before it is defeated, and try to come up with a reasonable, fiscally responsible plan for the district.