THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, August 11, 1995 TAG: 9508100232
SECTION: VIRGINIA BEACH BEACON PAGE: 06 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Column
SOURCE: Beth Barber
LENGTH: Medium: 75 lines
Get more than two City Council members together in an informal setting and you still have a meeting open to public and press. That's the case with City Council retreats, as on Aug. 4 and 5 at the Pavilion. The public stayed home in droves. The press came in a pair.
Some council members seemed to find the press' presence inhibiting. Others found it worrisome. It can be both. But this wasn't the scene of a tragedy, with some idiot reporter abusing the newly bereaved. This was Scene No. 95,847 in the ongoing saga of city governance, aka the public's business. And what scares council more than its potential for tragedy is the potential for misconstruing its comedy. The zinger, the joke that breaks up the room today is a challenger's ad next May. Or ammunition for a police association shooting for a bigger raise . . .
But a council gathering without wit is like a summer afternoon without sun: prime siesta time. And the most serious subject can be advanced by a sound-biting remark. As in this exchange:
Councilwoman Henley, on the school budget maze: ``Sounds like money-shuffling to me.''
City Manager Spore: ``Shuffling? We're talking shuffle-BOARD.''
The upshot of the ensuing discussion was council's resolve, at the suggestion of Councilmen Branch and Harrison, to draw a plan for consolidating city and school finance-support services, to let the School Board accept or reject it and to let voters weigh in on the subject via School Board elections in May.
From past comments, this School Board would sooner boil in bile than merge accounting operations with the city. So what if the former superintendent had no answer when asked how much money the school system had? Or assured the board, erroneously, of sufficient money for summer-school scholarships? Or had to shift millions of dollars in overbudgeted or unused accounts into the underbudgeted or overused? So what if schools still don't know how much in the black (or red) they were at fiscal year's end June 30?
So what if the city's finance department, which has served of late as the Miracle Mop of school finances, is upgrading to a wondrous computer system that could do double-duty wonders with school accounting, too?
So far, Spore says, city and schools have merged landscaping, benefits and television shows. Also, says Spore, the city has broached consolidation of printing, payroll, accounting/purchasing, construction, building maintenance and legal services.
The answer hasn't been no. But it hasn't been yes, either, despite the schools' flagpole flap, the request for a $150 million referendum to buy computers outdated long before the bonds are retired, the unbudgeted rent for the (unbreakable?) lease for Celebration Station, the last-minute $2 million teacher-raise maneuver, the . . .
Well, you see why Councilmen Dean and Jones suggested leaving the educating of children to the school system's educators and turning over the provision of services and construction to the city's professionals. And why Mayor Oberndorf suggested hiring a businessperson as superintendent with a top deputy overseeing education (a trend nationwide).
Councilwoman (and former School Board member) Strayhorn sounded one of two notes of caution: that consolidation work both ways, with schools providing the city services in which they excel (reprographics, maybe).
Councilman Heischober warned that the confrontational approach once ended with a superintendent standing ``high and holy'' on his constitutional prerogatives. ``We got,'' said this veteran council member, ``very little done.''
Would the board vote for the consolidation that the city proposes, not to get control over school policy and spending decisions but to infuse efficiency, clarity and accountability into school spending? Only one thing's sure: The nearer we get to May, the closer the board's vote will be.
KEYWORDS: VIRGINIA BEACH CITY COUNCIL
by CNB