By CHARLES HAND/The Valley Chronicle

Not everyone wants Measure G, the Mt. San Jacinto College bond issue on the June 6 primary ballot.

Steve Beutz, who wrote the ballot argument against the measure, has put up a Web site on which he charges the college with not making efficient use of the facilities it has and failing to get all the state money available.

Joan Sparkman, a member of the college board, disagrees. Vehemently.

“It always amazes me that people would vote against any education opportunity,” Sparkman said.

Mt. San Jacinto has been instrumental in retraining those displaced by economic shifts and operates a nursing program from which students are hired even before they graduate, she said.

Beutz's Web site is a source of misinformation, she said, as is one of those listed as an opponent of the bond measure, former MSJC board member John Motte.

His wife, Ann Motte is a current member of the board and the only one of the five board members to vote against putting the bond measure on the ballot.

The $720 million the bond issue would fund the expansion of the college district's San Jacinto and Menifee campuses. It would renovate some of the existing buildings, some so old they still have asbestos in them, build new structures, and build two satellite campuses, one in Banning and the other in Wildomar.

Beutz said the college does not need money for those projects when slipshod operation of the facility has resulted in the loss of “millions in state money.”

Ann Motte has sounded a similar theme as a member of the board.

Sparkman categorically rejects that contention.

Motte's contentions of declining enrollment are inaccurate, as are her charges that the college is not well run, Sparkman said.

The most recent enrollment study indicated the college has grown, rather than lost students as Motte contends, said Sparkman.

What is more, Sparkman said, the college faces rapid growth with the large number of people moving into Southern California and will need not only new buildings on the old campus, but new campuses to accommodate that growth.

“You can't expand programs without physical expansion,” Sparkman said.

Besides, the more space the college has in which to accommodate students, the more money the college gets from the state since state reimbursement is based on enrollment, she said.

The bond measure would also draw money into the district by bringing in matching state construction funds.

Beutz sees it differently.

In his rebuttal to the ballot argument in favor of the measure, he said: “Handing a check for $720 million to MSJC would probably only encourage more administrative inefficiency than we already have.”

As supporters of his position, Beutz's Web site lists Gerald S. Burchell, a member of the Republican Party Central Committee the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association; the Riverside County Libertarian Party; the California Republican Assembly; and The Inland Empire Taxpayers Association.

The Inland Empire Taxpayers Association issued a news release in which it describes itself as a new group with the immediate goal of stopping the Mt. San Jacinto College bond and another in the Banning Unified School District.

Though the person listed on the news release as the contact point for the group, Chris Mann, did not return calls seeking comment, the release said property owners face too much in the way of tax increases.

“The Inland Empire Taxpayers Association aims to become a large and well-funded grassroots organization with the ability to confront and defeat all efforts to raise taxes or pass bonds in Riverside and San Bernardino counties,” the release said.

Sparkman said she is disappointed in the substantial Republican showing among the opponents of Measure G.

“I'm a Republican myself and I'm voting ‘yes' on G,” she said. “I am very passionate about this.”

She said the ballot wording caps the annual property assessment at less than $20 per $100,000 of assessed valuation. Assessed valuation is not the market value of a home.

Delaying construction will not end the need for new facilities, Sparkman said, and every year of delay increases the price tag.

For example, when the college decided to build a new instructional building not long ago, the price came in at $11 million, well beyond the budget established for it.

The board scaled back the design and put it out to bid again. The price had jumped to $12 million for the lesser facility, Sparkman said.

“If you don't do it now, it will cost you more,” she said.

MacFarland entered the police station on Latham Avenue about 4:15 p.m., said Hemet police Sgt. Joe Nevarez.

MacFarland said he had the bomb in the front seat of his car, which was parked in front of the Police Department lobby, according to Nevarez.

Officers evacuated the lobby and the businesses across the street, and closed the surrounding area to traffic.

Pictures snapped by firefighters revealed a bomb about 28 inches long sitting on a pillow in the front seat of MacFarland's Oldsmobile. Officers estimated it came from the World War II era.

A three-person hazardous device team arrived about 6 p.m. and determined that the bomb was not a hazard.

“It was expended,” said the team's Cpl. Frank Anderson. “It's a training bomb.”

He said it would be disposed of.

MacFarland said his son-in-law found the bomb about a year ago, and he and MacFarland's daughter had kept it. MacFarland, who recently returned to Hemet from San Antonio, had found out about the bomb Tuesday and decided to take it to the Police Department for disposal.

“I don't know that it's not live,” he said. “That's why I brought it here - to dump it.”

Nevarez said MacFarland should have left the bomb at home and called the Police Department. However, charges would not be brought against him.

“He was trying to do the right thing. ... Unfortunately, like usual, it's done in the wrong manner,” Nevarez said.