Board of Supervisors Meeting July 15, 2008
Dr. Thomas, Superintendent of Page County schools, came before the Board with 4 requests.
1. The school needs $38K additional money from the county to make the floors flat. The discussion from the board centered around the concept that the contractor who bid the floors should have been expected to bid them flat in the first place. The request was tabled, pending additional talks with the contractor about how it is that he bid floors that weren’t flat.
2. The schools need $6,700 to buy 2 flashing signs that say School Zone. The School Board wants this money to come from construction funds, not operating funds. The County Board wants to know why this money can’t come from operating funds, since there was extra there. Chairman LaFrance said the inks not even dry on the budget cycle request, and here you are coming in with requests for more money. Dr. Thomas said he would be back every month because of change orders that have to be approved. Then Chairman LaFrance started talking about how the Board abrogated its responsibility to oversee the School Board budget when they yielded to public pressure in April and voted not to have line item oversight on the school budgets. He asked for an itemized list of what happens with the budget money, because the county coffers are dry. The county board voted 4 – 2 to give them the money for the signs, with Mr. Sours and Mr. LaFrance voting No.
3. The schools need $25,000 to pay Embarq to bury the phone lines. The Board postponed action in favor of asking Embarq if they could get a private contractor to do it more cheaply.
4. And the most interesting one. The school has $163,000 leftover from last year, which represents additional federal and state money received that they weren’t aware they were getting. Apparently it’s not clear how much state and federal money is going to be allocated to the schools, and it comes in at the end of the year by surprise. This was most interesting because in April, 2008, the School Board asked for $390,000 from the county, which the county agreed to give them after much gnashing of teeth. About 100 people came to that meeting and expressed their desire for the county to give them the money, which meant the county budget had to be cut from other places in order to do it. But then right after that happened, it turned out they had $163,000 new money they hadn’t expected. So the school board was asking to put this money into escrow, to use it possibly for libraries for the middle schools. Previously, the Board voted to let the school board manage their own contingency funds, so if this money were put into the school board’s funds, they might use it for the libraries, or they might flatten the floors, or they might buy some more land, or whatever. This caused Chairman LaFrance to start in on a lament about how come the Board voted to abrogate its responsibility to oversee the line items by category, and how can we have the school constantly asking for more money, and we’ll have to raise taxes to cover it.
Then Mr. Cave said he didn’t think it was a given that the Board was going to raise taxes next year. Then Dr. Thomas said he was going to have to come back month after month asking for money because of the change orders, and the contingency funds aren’t in the school board’s hands so they have to keep coming to ask for them. Then Mr. Sours said, he wondered where the money for furniture and athletic fields was going to come from, and he was skeptical about the Bake Sale plan.
Then the Board voted not to let the school board keep their $163,000 that the state and federal government gave them, and take the money back and put it in the general fund.
And the 100+ people who came in April, weren’t there to see it happen.
Now, back in April when all those people were in the room, Mrs. Strickler made a proposal that the school board and the county board needed to sit down together and work more closely. She suggested that a rotating committee be set up so that 2 members of the Board could meet with the School Board to encourage communication. Considering the amount of money involved, the dire straits the county will be in for money next year, and the cost overruns that ALWAYS happen on a construction project, this was a very good idea.
But it never happened.
Stay tuned to this channel, because something has to get straightened out here, or this will blow up in the future. Yes, $56M was the amount approved for the schools, and something more than that has been borrowed, or is approved to be borrowed. But it’s not enough. It wasn’t enough when it was estimated, and it’s not enough to cover what needs to be done. It never included the athletic fields, which were a major part of the reason the citizens wanted two schools (hey, never mind the taxes, let’s make sure we have competing football teams). It never included the furniture. It never included the ever-present and to-be-expected construction cost overruns. Not to mention that since more money was borrowed than was budgeted, the school board is wondering why the extra money borrowed is not available when they need it.
This is a problem that needs real leadership, not administration. It can’t be solved by following Roberts Rules of Order and processing it to death.
Feel free to comment on this. If no one speaks up, this will spiral until it becomes a Force of Nature.
