ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Tuesday, May 28, 1996 TAG: 9605280085
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JOEL TURNER STAFF WRITER
Michael Stovall, vice chairman of the Roanoke County School Board, was angry and frustrated when he left a recent Board of Supervisors' meeting.
He had just listened to several supervisors sharply criticize the School Board for a lack of proper planning, cost overruns on recent projects and the decision to award a contract for the Northside Middle School gymnasium without having enough money to complete it.
"I'm sick and tired of being beat up on for projects I didn't have anything to do with," said Stovall, who represents the Vinton district. "These are projects that were first proposed in 1991 or 1992."
He took office in January 1995 as a member of the county's first elected school board. Four of the five current members have served less than 18 months.
After wrangling for more than an hour, the supervisors, on split 3-2 votes, approved $5.6 million for three projects that had been in jeopardy after the defeat of the county's $37.4 million school bond issue last month. But the supervisors cut in half the board's request for $600,000 for instructional equipment for the new Glenvar Middle School.
Planning for all the projects - air conditioning at Cave Spring Junior High, the Northside gym and the Glenvar Middle School - began several years ago, and cost estimates were developed before Stovall and most board members were elected.
The split votes and biting criticism have focused attention on the tension between the supervisors and the county's first elected School Board. The defeat of the referendum and debate over school funding have underscored the School Board's lack of taxing power, political clout and authority to do projects without the supervisors' approval.
Supervisors Chairman Bob Johnson sympathized with School Board members - even as Supervisors Harry Nickens and Lee Eddy berated them for what they portrayed as bungled school projects.
"I don't know why you people serve. You are in a Catch-22 situation," Johnson told Stovall and other board members. "Without taxing power, I don't know that the School Board can ever address the school needs."
The change to an elected board was promoted as giving the board more political influence and as a way to enhance support for schools, but it hasn't worked out that way.
"As far as having more clout on money, that hasn't occurred," said Terri Langford, co-chairwoman of Citizens for Education, a group that promoted the bond issue. Langford supported an elected school board because she thought it would be more responsive to parents and school needs, but she said the board must still depend on the supervisors for funds.
"I think the School Board has taken a bad rap on these projects. The supervisors are just as responsible for the cost overruns because they have delayed funding for them," Langford said.
The School Board wanted supervisors to approve funds for a new Cave Spring High and other projects without having a referendum. The supervisors could have issued bonds through the Virginia Public School Authority, but they they a referendum.
School Board members wanted several school projects in other parts of the county to be included in the bond issue to counter the argument that it favored Cave Spring. But the supervisors said the county couldn't afford more projects. As a result, board members got blamed for the proposed bond issue that opponents attacked because 90 percent of the money was allocated for one school.
The School Board did not want funds for finishing the Northside gymnasium to be included in the bond issue. Because the bids were higher than the estimate, board members asked supervisors to provide the money last fall to complete the project. But supervisors refused and included $2.8 million to finish the gym in the bond issue.
When School Board members asked for the money for the gym after the referendum, several supervisors criticized them for splitting the project into two phases.
"It was irresponsible to award a contract for a project when you didn't have the resources to complete it," said Nickens, who voted against the funds. "We [the supervisors] were set up so we'd be forced to provide the rest of the money."
Eddy voted for the money, but he, too, accused school officials of trying to pressure the supervisors into providing the funds by splitting the gym into phases.
School Board member Tom Leggette said he is frustrated because school needs were pushed aside in recent years as the county focused on constructing Spring Hollow Reservoir, establishing a Police Department and other projects.
School officials developed a plan for school projects in the early 1990s that were to be financed with state Literary Fund loans, said Leggette, a board member since 1995. But the state stopped providing Literary Fund loans for several years and the projects remained unfunded.
"These projects were delayed, and that's the reason we have a bottleneck now," Leggette said. "We went to the supervisors with a plan to move quickly on them, but they weren't willing to issue bonds through the Virginia Public School Authority for them."
The supervisors now are blaming the board for not having a plan to meet all of the county's school needs, Leggette said. But he said the board does have a plan.
Some supervisors have also blamed school officials for a lack of foresight in dealing with the space crunch and inadequate facilities in Southwest County.
But Superintendent Deanna Gordon, who has been in her post less than two years, inherited the problems at Cave Spring High and Cave Spring Junior High. She has been pressing for a solution since she became superintendent.
School Board members also have been frustrated on the school budget for next year. They asked the supervisors for an increase of nearly $8 million in local funds, saying they needed that much to provide pay raises for school employees, hire more teachers and buy instructional equipment that had been included in the defeated bond issue.
But the supervisors have approved only about one-third of the request - and they accused the board of trying to pressure them for more money by trimming the proposed 5 percent teacher pay raises to 3.5 percent.
"If we're going to reduce raises, let's turn over every rock and find where we can save money," Johnson said. "The easiest thing to do is to cut teachers' raises."
School Board chairman Jerry Canada denied there was a hidden motive in the board's proposal to reduce the raises.
Nickens said the board's strategy to get more money for raises worked. The supervisors didn't fund more than $4 million for instructional equipment, additional personnel and other items, but they did agree to provide more money so school employees could receive average raises of 5 percent.
LENGTH: Long : 119 linesby CNB