DATE: Wednesday, May 28, 1997               TAG: 9705280482

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B4   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY MATTHEW BOWERS, STAFF WRITER 

DATELINE: SUFFOLK                           LENGTH:   65 lines

SUFFOLK DELAYS STARTING AN ALTERNATIVE SCHOOL BOARD LOOKS FOR WAYS TO MAKE DO AFTER CITY ALLOCATED LESS THAN SCHOOLS REQUESTED.

A glum School Board agreed at a special meeting Tuesday to keep driving essentially the same model school system - missing a few knobs and sporting little trim, but still running OK - for another year.

The board had hoped to slip into an upgraded model with a new option or two - primarily a daytime alternative school - but last week received almost $1.3 million less than it had requested from the City Council.

In passing its final budget Tuesday, the board erased most of the deficit by delaying the $772,000 startup of such a school for troubled students who get suspended or expelled and are left on the streets.

``Five years we've talked about that alternative school,'' said frustrated board member Lorraine B. Skeeter. ``But I have no magic wand. . . .

``It's something that we need.''

The board rejected a proposal that a scaled-down alternative program be started in the Florence Bowser Elementary School building that would serve only students already participating in an in-school program for slow learners. Plans had been made for Bowser to house kindergarten and special classes beginning this fall, to ease the enrollment load on nearby elementary schools.

``I can't see compromising a program we all want so bad and worked on so long,'' said board Vice Chairman Calvin W. Jones.

Suffolk schools should establish a ``first-class'' alternative program, ``not just put something out there,'' agreed board member James E. Perkinson.

``We would not be reaching the students we're talking about, the ones walking the streets,'' added board member Frances L. Alwood, a retired guidance counselor.

The board, in accepting Superintendent Joyce H. Trump's recommended budget adjustments, also agreed to save almost $57,000 by not participating in Gov. George F. Allen's reading-intervention program; placing $80,000 in new high-school security equipment in an upcoming capital budget; and leaving three new jobs unfilled: an assistant principal, a psychologist intern and a custodian.

Other big savings came from updating estimates of electricity usage - $100,000 less - and procurement of a new health-insurance contract - $120,000 less.

Good news came in the form of proceeds from the sale of now-public Trigon health system stock the city will share with the school system. Half of the estimated $430,000 will go toward school employees' health insurance, thereby saving a 4 percent average raise for all employees - a salary increase school officials called necessary to keep the city from slipping further behind neighboring school divisions.

Officials otherwise would have cut the raise to 3 1/2 percent to fit the budget.

Tuesday's action means that this fall the 16-school, 11,000-plus-student Suffolk Public Schools system will operate on $62,051,600, with $16,051,600 coming from city taxpayers.

With a new elementary school scheduled to open by September 1998, board members expressed hope that there would be enough classroom space to free up Bowser Elementary again so it could be used for the long-sought alternative program.

``When you're underfunded by a million dollars, you have to make some difficult decisions . . . and it's hard not to affect some programs,'' said Trump, who worked with her staff over the Memorial Day weekend to scour the budget for items to chop.

Board Chairman Mark A. Croston said he was sure the City Council did the best it could, ``but the pressing needs won't go away.''

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