Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, April 7, 1994 TAG: 9404070312
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-1 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: By BRIAN KELLEY STAFF WRITER|
DATELINE: CHRISTIANSBURG LENGTH: Medium
Its members want the county School Board to get on the ball and give them an answer about the so-called fiscal reporting agreement.
"It's laid there now for two months and it's something I'm not very happy about," Supervisors Chairman Larry Linkous said Tuesday. "I would hope that they would respect this board enough to act by June 30, one way or the other."
Supervisor Joe Gorman raised the issue as the Board of Supervisors debated the 1994-95 budget and tax rates. "Somebody needs to light the fuse to get some action," he said.
Just a few blocks away, the county School Board was struggling to even find a date on which all nine members could be present to talk over the proposal.
After 10 minutes of talk, the School Board agreed to meet at 7:30 p.m. April 18 to talk it over with its attorney.
"We made a decision. That was tough, wasn't it?" School Board Chairman Roy Vickers asked his colleagues in jest.
The delay by the School Board and the impatience on the part of the Board of Supervisors are just the latest twists in a controversy that started two years ago.
The Board of Supervisors voted on the proposed solution in the wee hours of Feb. 15 after a closed-door discussion. This annoyed School Board members, who had no idea it was coming.
Yet when Linkous made a rare appearance before the School Board on March 1, it was all smiles. The School Board even passed a late-night resolution of its own in which it pledged to continue to improve relations between the two boards.
At that point, the School Board agreed to discuss the fiscal reporting agreement, but didn't set a firm date to do so.
Since then, School Board-supervisors relations have been strained by a dispute over a budgeting error that has cost the county $515,000 more than expected in local funds for schools. Part of the budget resolution passed by the Board of Supervisors late Tuesday would recoup that money in the next fiscal year, which begins July 1.
Under the proposed fiscal reporting agreement, which is not related to the budget, the Board of Supervisors would drop its efforts to consolidate the school and county finance departments.
In return, the School Board would agree to give the Board of Supervisors and its staff more timely access to the school system's financial information.
That access to information is described in 13 detailed conditions set forth in the contract. The agreement would also allow the supervisors to consolidate the finance operations immediately if those conditions are not met.
The School Board also would waive its right to sue the Board of Supervisors over such an immediate consolidation.
by CNB