THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, June 26, 1994 TAG: 9406240220
SECTION: VIRGINIA BEACH BEACON PAGE: 14 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: Bill Reed
DATELINE: 940626 LENGTH: Medium
Red flags, you may recall, are symbols invented by nautical honchos to indicate alarm, danger. The symbols mean something is amiss or potentially harmful.
{REST} Raising that banner and waving it like Gen. J.E.B. Stuart once waved the ``Stars and Bars'' is Councilman John D. Moss, the council's budget maven and perennial nickel squeezer.
It seems, Moss points out ungallantly, that the city school system must shell out $1.7 million to cover cost overruns for two new schools.
One of them is Ocean Lakes, which will require $1.2 million, over and above the $27 million allocated for its construction, to pay the bill.
The new flag pole, a high-tech model, with dual carburetors, A/C, FM-stereo system, dual airbags, anti-lock brakes and a built electronic gizmo that automatically unfurls the American flag, helped run up the cost.
On Tuesday the School Board voted to use $1.7 million, set aside earlier to make repairs at older schools, to cover the Ocean Lakes overrun.
Of that sum $500,000 will go to cover the excess building costs for the new Larkspur Middle School, which was to have been constructed for $19.8 million.
Without additional funds the new schools wouldn't have computer systems for classrooms and administrative offices, insisted School Superintendent Sidney L. Faucette.
``I don't think the people of Virginia Beach expect us to open new schools that way,'' he added.
The School Board voted to take the money out of a $10.1 million pot set aside for reroofing or installing new heating and air conditioning systems at 19 old school buildings in 1994-95.
That means some schools may have to limp along with leaky roofs and creaky heating and cooling systems for a year or two.
Some may have to do without altogether and school officials have yet to decide which ones will be bumped down the list.
You can bet there'll be some very sweaty kids and teachers who will be real unhappy with the decision, no matter which way it goes.
Not to worry, says Hal Canary, chief finance officer for city schools. There may be a patch of blue in that gloomy fiscal sky, after all. There could be some money left over in the school budget on July 1, the end of the fiscal year. If so, it could could be applied to the cost overruns.
The big reason for the overruns, says Canary, is that school building estimates were made during a sluggish economy, when bids were low and contractors were hungry.
Things change. The economy eventually revived, interest rates and building costs rose and initial school construction estimates suddenly were as stale as Grandma's Sunday dinner leftovers.
``They made a mistake,'' said Moss, who argues that school officials should have adjusted their building plans to meet the original estimates.
``I suggest we look at Ocean Lakes,'' he said. ``There were many opportunities for reducing the cost of construction for that school. And we can start with the flag pole.''
Then, in a piece of elegant understatement, he added: ``I think it's excessive.''
Faucette himself acknowledges that the purchase of the flagpole was ``ridiculous.'' It was approved by an assistant superintendent who no longer is assistant superintendent. No doubt he was flogged, relieved of his executive beeper and drummed out of office without so much as a by-your-leave. It's unfair to criticize the school system for one teensy-weensy, insignificant little boo boo, Faucette contends.
``I think that to say the flagpole means we're making all bad decisions is an over-generalization of all decision-making,'' he said.
No, but it could mean that Moss hit the nail squarely on the thumb on this particular issue.
``Who pays?'' Moss asks rhetorically. ``The older schools, with all their needs, shouldn't be the ones to pay.''
Amen, John.
by CNB