ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Tuesday, March 18, 1997 TAG: 9703180037
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JOEL TURNER THE ROANOKE TIMES
The proposal suggests keeping Cave Spring High and building a 1,100-student school in Southwest County to ease overcrowding.
A new high school tops a list of nearly $100million in school improvements in Roanoke County over the next decade that have been recommended by a residents' study committee.
The committee proposes that the county retain Cave Spring High and build a second 1,100-student high school in Southwest County instead of building one large high school, as an earlier study recommended.
The 22-member panel, which spent nearly eight months reviewing the building needs at all 28 county schools, recommends that the school be built in the U.S. 220 corridor south of Tanglewood Mall, but it did not identify a site.
Committee members said the optimum size is 1,000 to 1,100 students. No high school should exceed 1,400 students, they said. The ideal size became an issue in last year's unsuccessful bond referendum for a proposed 2,000-student Cave Spring High. Some parents said they would prefer two high schools in Southwest County, but others favor one large school.
The panel recommends that Cave Spring High, which has about 1,250 students, be renovated and upgraded so it would no longer have to use mobile classrooms. The enrollment would be reduced to about 1,000 students.
Both high schools in Southwest County would house grades 9-12, as do the county's other high schools. Cave Spring High now houses only grades 10-12 because there is not enough room for ninth-graders.
Cave Spring Junior High would be renovated and become a middle school for grades six through eight, as would Hidden Valley Junior High.
The plan calls for the two high schools to share a football stadium and other athletic facilities at a Merriman Road site that had been considered for a new high school in last year's referendum.
Cost of the recommendations would be $121 million based on the construction phasing and an annual inflation rate of 4 percent over the next 10 years.
The panel, which was appointed after the referendum defeat, gave its report to the School Board and Board of Supervisors on Monday night.
The committee made no recommendations on how to pay for the school projects, but it urged the county to develop a financing plan.
Bob Johnson, chairman of the Board of Supervisors, said he expects the county to appoint an implementation committee within the next week to develop such a plan.
Johnson said he thinks the county can afford the first phase, estimated to cost about $40 million, without a bond referendum or tax increase.
The supervisors can issue bonds through the Virginia Public School Authority to finance school projects without submitting them to a referendum.
"It would be criminal not to build on what the committee has recommended," Johnson said. "This is the future, and we can afford to do no less."
Michael Stovall, chairman of the School Board, said the committee has "planted the seed" that will improve county schools. "I'm excited about the report."
County and school officials undertook the countywide study to counter complaints of favoritism in last year's plan, in which most of the money would have been spent on a new Cave Spring High.
Martin & Associates, a Roanoke Valley architectural and engineering firm, has worked with the committee that was appointed by the School Board and Board of Supervisors.
Ron Martin, president of the firm, said this is one of the first times that a school system has evaluated building needs at all of its schools in one study.
The panel recommends a three-phase improvement plan based on school projects' ranked priorities. Improvements are recommended at every school.
The committee made no recommendation on a bond referendum or how to pay for the school projects, but it urged the county to develop a comprehensive plan to finance them.
The committee's second priority was an addition to Glenvar Middle School so its students won't have to share cafeteria, classroom and library facilities with Glenvar High School students.
Parents of Glenvar Middle students have complained to school officials in recent months that their children should not have to mix with older, high school students.
The committee also recommends building an elementary school in the Bonsack community so the 82-year-old Roland E. Cook Elementary in Vinton may be closed. The pupils at the Cook school would be reassigned to the new Bonsack school, Herman L. Horn Elementary and W. E. Cundiff Elementary.
The panel also said Burlington and Clearbrook elementary schools should be renovated and expanded within five years. Those are two of the oldest school buildings in the county.
On another issue, the committee urged the county to charge nearly 650 nonresident students the full cost of attending county schools next fall.
Most of these nonresident students - who have been attending county schools for several years - pay $100 in tuition. Students from outside the county who enrolled this year pay $500.
If the recommendation is approved, the tuition for nonresident students would be more than $2,800 a year. It would be paid by the parents, the student's home school district, or by them jointly.
Stovall said this recommendation might have to be phased in because some nonresident students in high schools are close to graduation.
"We have people who are sophomores and juniors from out of the county who are looking forward to graduating from county schools," he said.
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