ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Saturday, May 11, 1996 TAG: 9605130084
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JOEL TURNER STAFF WRITER
Cave Spring Supervisor Fuzzy Minnix believes Glenvar Middle School should have adequate instructional equipment and furniture. He said he would be willing to personally help cart in equipment for the new Roanoke County school that will open this fall.
Minnix thinks the Northside Middle School gym project should be finished. He said he would help do manual work to complete the gym, which is under construction.
And he believes that air conditioning should be installed at Cave Spring Junior High and the school's electrical system should be upgraded.
Yet Minnix might not vote to spend $5.6 million for the three projects unless he is assured that the problems of space shortages and inadequate facilities at Cave Spring Junior and Cave Spring High will be addressed.
"I'm leaning that way," he said Friday. "I'm not sure that throwing money at the people who are screaming the loudest is the way to solve our problems."
Minnix is afraid that if the Cave Spring Junior, Northside and Glenvar projects are approved, the long-range problems in Southwest County won't be solved. "This $2.5 million for air conditioning and electrical upgrade doesn't address our needs," he said.
Some parents are still insisting that a new Cave Spring High be built despite the defeat of the bond issue for a new school last month. They want a new school so ninth-graders can attend high school.
A majority of the School Board members and supervisors will be up for election next year and could be replaced, Minnix said, adding that new supervisors and board members might not be committed to dealing with the issue.
"If I don't get a commitment up front, there is a good chance nothing will be done," he said. "What I fear is that if we don't address all of this at the same time, Cave Spring will have to make do."
Minnix has become a key supervisor in the fight over money for the school projects following the defeat of the bond issue. The supervisors will vote Tuesday on whether to provide the funds or delay the projects until a study of all county school needs is finished.
County school officials plan to study all school needs and rank them in priority. That study is expected to be finished early next year.
"We have limited funds for capital projects. What I fear is that if we throw money at this and that project, we won't have anything left for Cave Spring," Minnix said.
In the meantime, the School Board wants to finish the Northside project, provide equipment for Glenvar and install air conditioning at Cave Spring Junior.
Supervisors chairman Bob Johnson said he will make the motion to provide $2.5 million for air conditioning and electrical upgrading at Cave Spring Junior because he promised to do so if the bond issue was defeated. The money would come from a state Literary Fund loan.
The supervisors refused to provide the money for Cave Spring Junior before the bond referendum because the plan called for the school to be closed if voters approved the bonds.
"As it now stands, I don't know what is going to happen to the Northside and Glenvar projects," Johnson said.
The bond issue included $2.8 million to complete the Northside gym and $1 million for equipment and renovations at Glenvar Middle and High Schools. Parents in Glenvar and Northside want their projects to be funded, but voters in the Glenvar and Northside areas rejected the bonds by a large margin because they said it was unfair for $33.6 million to be spent on a new Cave Spring High.
Parents in Southwest County have said it would be unfair for the supervisors to fund any projects that were included in the defeated bond referendum unless all are funded.
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