ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Wednesday, April 9, 1997 TAG: 9704090039
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-10 EDITION: METRO
Roanoke County supervisors candidate Don Terp should quit worrying about where the school superintendent lives.
AS "SCANDALS" go, this one is a nonstarter.
Don Terp, Roanoke County supervisors candidate, is upset that school Superintendent Deanna Gordon pays most of her real-estate taxes to Bedford County.
Expecting top officials to live in the locality they serve is not unreasonable. In this case, though, there's less than meets the eye.
More than 30 years ago, when Gordon was a schoolteacher, she and her husband bought property on the Roanoke-Bedford county line, near the Blue Ridge Parkway. They found that the land in Roanoke County would not percolate for a septic tank, so they built their house on the Bedford County side.
Three years ago, when Gordon was appointed superintendent, she told the School Board of this and offered to move. The board decided she shouldn't have to leave her longtime home.
Was that decision a betrayal of county taxpayers who, Terp seems to be implying, are being made to pay for the profligate ways of an administrator whose wild spending doesn't affect her own tax bill?
Has a load of money been wasted on county schools? Not so as anyone - except, possibly, Terp - would notice. A citizens committee just completed a study identifying millions of dollars in school-building needs, including roofing and general maintenance long deferred because of bare-bones budgets.
Whether Terp would support spending to expand and upgrade school facilities is a question far more pressing than where Gordon lives.
LENGTH: Short : 37 linesby CNB