THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, January 21, 1995 TAG: 9501210165
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA
SOURCE: BY PERRY PARKS, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: ELIZABETH CITY LENGTH: Medium: 81 lines
Pasquotank voters soon will have the chance to tell officials if they're ready to support bonds to build a new middle school - and maybe a new high school - in the next several years.
County commissioners agreed Friday to hold an informal public hearing on their plans for a bond referendum to meet what they say is a critical need for a second middle school.
The meeting is set for 7:30 p.m. Feb. 1 at Elizabeth City Middle School.
The $9 million to $11.5 million bond would be the first local school referendum in more than 25 years. It would round out funding requested by the schools in a $24 million construction plan to reduce crowding in the burdened system.
Commissioners have already approved $10 million in spending to improve the current middle school and add classrooms to four elementaries.
But when all was said and done, the school system would still find itself grappling with a critical crowding problem at Northeastern High School a few years down the road.
On a recommendation by Commissioner Chairman Zee Lamb, offcials are batting around the notion of putting middle and high school funding up for a single vote this year. A new high school could cost between $15 million and $18 million, which could put a total bond referendum at more than $25 million.
In the first, and apparently last, meeting of a joint committee of school board members and commissioners on Wednesday, officials agreed they did not want to risk the middle school by asking voters for too much at once.
A new middle school would free up classroom space in the elementaries and the existing middle school, and could save hundreds of thousands of dollars a year in modular classroom purchases, officials said.
``I'd hate to collide the issue,'' agreed School Board Chairman Marion Harris. ``I believe we'd have a better chance with just a middle school by itself.''
Lamb's argument had been that voters would be more likely to approve one big bond than two smaller referendums a few years apart. And he said the high school matter would be just as pressing in a few years as the middle school is now.
So members of both boards have decided to wait until they hear from residents on what the county should ask for.
Paying the debt for just the middle school and the other planned improvements would mean coming up with more than $1 million in extra annual revenue, County Manager Randy Keaton said.
It is difficult to come by exact numbers, as the costs of construction are constantly changing, and officials are having a hard time pinning down a final price tag.
In the commissioners meeting Friday, Lamb lamented the inconsistency of estimates that have been thrown around over the past several months. Original costs for a middle school were pegged at $11.5 million, but Lamb thinks it can be done for less.
``We've heard $8 million, we've heard $11.5 million, we've heard $9 million,'' a frustrated Lamb said, adding that architects would design a building to meet available funding.
Even if the county's bond issue seeks only to build a middle school for now, it would be with the expectation that a second bond would be needed four or five years later to pay for a high school, McGee said.
By that time, McGee said, new funding options may be open to the county. Officials said the General Assembly may consider allowing counties to introduce a local one-cent sales tax this year. Such a measure would help the county pay off its bond debt.
But officials said the local tax possibility will probably be up in the air until the end of this year's legislative session - too long to wait before moving on the middle school.
Even if the process moves as expected, with a referendum held around June, the school probably still wouldn't be on line until the 1997-98 year, Superintendent Joseph Peel said.
Peel was before the commissioners on Friday seeking 10 new modular classrooms for 1995-96 to tide the schools over until elementary school additions are built. Outgoing Commissioner Bill Owens, long an opponent of modular units, asked Peel to consider pushing for classroom construction by December and weathering three months without the new modular classrooms. by CNB