THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, February 10, 1996 TAG: 9602100259
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY KAREN WEINTRAUB, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: VIRGINIA BEACH LENGTH: Medium: 96 lines
The School Board's decision this week to reinstate the man whose last budget fell $12.1 million short has deepened district morale problems and increased the School Board's political troubles locally and in Richmond.
Five members of the Virginia Beach delegation to the General Assembly held a Richmond news conference Friday to denounce the reinstatement and question the judgment of the seven board members who voted early Wednesday morning to bring back Mordecai L. Smith.
``The rehiring of that gentleman to me is like putting the fox back into the hen house,'' Del. Leo C. Wardrup, R-Virginia Beach, said later Friday, ``and it tells me that the School Board is not a very good chicken farmer. I think they made a very serious lapse in judgment.''
A special grand jury is still deciding whether to blame someone for last year's deficit. But it is clear that many people inside and out of the district aren't willing to trust Smith, the past and future budget director, with another year's spending plan.
``I can assure you of one thing,'' Vice Mayor W.D. Sessoms Jr. said Friday, ``I will not give any credence to the numbers that are presented to the City Council if they come from the same source that put together the last budget from the School Board.''
Smith, then chief financial officer, was placed on paid administrative leave in September, one month after the deficit was discovered. An outside audit and an internal auditor have completed reports that suggest the schools' fiscal management was so bad that district officials didn't know how many employees they were paying or how much money was - or wasn't - in the bank.
Budget department employees have indicated they don't want to work for Smith. Like Sessoms, other City Council members don't trust his budgeting, and state legislators said Friday that they consider his rehiring a sign of the School Board's lack of fiscal responsiblity.
Members of the public, surprised by the reinstatement and concerned over potential cuts this year, have flooded the district and officials' homes with phone calls this week. The next School Board meeting, Feb. 20, will include an extra public comment period at 7 p.m.
``We're overwhelmed with public comment on the phone and everywhere,'' district spokeswoman Anne Meek said Friday.
Administrators say privately that morale problems, which have plagued the district throughout the year, worsened sharply after the Wednesday morning vote. Some central office employees and teachers said they were stunned to learn Smith had been rehired.
The three employees in the Office of Budget Development, including a budget clerk and two budget analysts, have put in for departmental transfers, since learning of Smith's reinstatement, Meek said.
The Office of Budget Development prepares the district's annual budget and presents it to the administration, the School Board and the City Council for review. The department is supposed to have five staff positions, but only three are now filled. Those employees declined to be interviewed about their concerns, Meek said.
Smith has not been available for comment since Wednesday.
Beach legislators said they have received dozens of phone calls from constituents angry about Smith's reinstatement and the board's promise to make painful cuts - including the elimination of spring athletics - if the City Council doesn't cover a projected $4.4 million shortfall in this year's budget.
The representatives said they would redouble their efforts to pass legislation requiring the school district to consolidate four financial departments with the city's. The House has already rejected the measure twice. The state teachers union is opposed to the forced merger, as is the Beach School Board.
The council has pushed the board for 18 months to merge the two bodies' payroll, accounting, purchasing and finance departments to save money and increase city oversight of the district's finances. The School Board now says it supports consolidation - as long as it is voluntary.
On Friday, the board and the council established a joint committee to study consolidation, which a city report concludes will save about $200,000 a year.
City officials are optimistic that the committee will help repair relations between the council and School Board. Members of the two bodies have been practically at war for months, screaming at each other at public meetings and sniping behind closed doors.
``I think that there has been some opening on certain members of the School Board to sit down and talk to certain members of the council,'' council member Louisa M. Strayhorn said Friday. ``I hope that's something that really does occur.'' MEMO: Staff writers Aleta Payne and Warren Fiske contributed to this
report.Staff writers Aleta Payne and Warren Fiske contributed to this
report.
ILLUSTRATION: Photos
Mordecai L. Smith
Del. Leo C. Wardrup
KEYWORDS: VIRGINIA BEACH SCHOOLS BUDGET by CNB