| By Bob Weaver
Charging county school booster and extra-curricular groups for increased bus transportation costs, particularly since gasoline prices have sky rocketed, has been a debated issue for several months during school board meetings.
Last night, after routinely passing the first of two policies out on public comment, the
Wellness Policy, the Board clearly was not ready to pass the "Differentiated Reimbursement Schedule for Bus Trips" policy in the form it had been on comment.
Superintendent Blankenship has expressed fear about money problems with the budget, since the county does not get reimbursed fuel costs for about two years.
After much debate and
discussion, Board Member Rick Fitzwater moved to accept the policy
as presented, but the motion failed for the lack of a 2nd motion.
Board president Carlene Frederick and board member Don Harris suggested it might be a good idea to let new board members be part of the decision, but Cynthia Dale said "It needs to be decided now," with Rick Fitzwater saying he felt it was important to settle the issue.
Dale then
made a motion to amend the policy to assess curricular and extra curricular
groups 10% of actual fuel costs, the amount not reimbursed by the state
school support formula.
The motion passed 4-1 resulting in the policy being
out on comment again, and another vote scheduled for the June 19th meeting.
Middle School Booster president Irona Yeager indicated she was pleased with the revised policy, which will be placed on the school board's web site.
Had the amended policy been in effect during the current year, the groups
would have been charged three cents per mile instead of 30 cents per mile.
The board went into executive session to suspend a system employee, whose name or position was not announced.
Superintendent Blankenship had already suspended the employee for 30 days, but needed board approval to "suspend indefinitely" until the board hears the results of an outside investigation.
The board suspended the employee, who has been identified as a school bus driver.
Board president Carlene Frederick congratulated the three new members who were elected to the board. They will take office July 1.
Frederick expressed concern for the number of drop-outs, twenty-one so far this year. She also said she had received complaints regarding Calhoun Middle-High Schools lunch program running out of food during lunch hour.
Administrator Donnie Pitts said it could have happened, since there is sometimes a problem getting a head count of students who are going to eat lunch.
The monthly report given to board members said the county has a 57.9 college going rate in 2004-05.
A large number of jobs were posted, several hires made, in addition to a number of transfers.
Additional story to follow.
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