FAYETTEVILLE — Fayetteville Superintendent Vicki Thomas told the school board Thursday plans to send a survey to all voters who participated in the school district's millage election Sept. 15.
She also said work on the committee that is reviewing and screening applications for architects and construction managers will continue.
Voters rejected a proposed 4.9-mill property tax increase to build a new high school facility on the current site. The amount of bonds the district had requested for the project was nearly $116 million.
Thomas said she plans to make the survey simple and easy to fill out and return. This will be one of the first steps in assessing what next steps should be taken to address needs at the high school.
More than 10,000 residents voted in the election, and the proposal was rejected by a 59 percent margin.
Board President Susan Heil said she was proud of the turnout, even though the vote didn't go the way she wanted it to.
There were a variety of issues related to the proposal that some residents might have disagreed with, Heil said. This included the plan to add ninth grade to the campus, staying on the current site, and the fact that the district did notwork out a deal to sell the current site to the nearby University of Arkansas last year.
As to whether the UA would still be interested, Chancellor G. Dave Gearhart wrote an e-mail Thursday which stated, "There has been no discussion at this point."
The response was forwarded by UA spokesman Steve Voorhies in response to a phone inquiry.
Asked if the board would be interested in revisiting the issue if UA officials approached them, Heil said, "I think it's too early to speculate on something like that."
While there were many issues involved, Thomas said she didn't hear anyone state that they didn't think the school district needed a new high school.
Board member Becky Purcell said she thought most people agree the current facility has some building needs but some people may have disagreed with how many brand new facilities were needed.
Heil said the overarching thing she head was that the cost of the proposed plan was too high.
"We need to look at the cost side and how to change things for the better," she said.
Bo ard member Ji m Halsell gave a report on the screening committee's plans and said they would proceed with screening potential architects and construction managersfor a high school project despite the millage failure.
The committee first met Sept. 2 to interview potential architects. There were six applications for construction firms.
Halsell said they would narrow the list down to five architects and five construction firms for the board to consider at a future meeting. The school board would then make the final selection.
Missy Kincaid, who helped lead A Stronger Fayetteville, the main group that promoted the increase, said she thought a survey to voters would be a good idea.
At the school board's meeting Thursday, Thomas presented Kincaid with the Superintendent's Honor Roll Award in recognition of her efforts to help promote the millage increase.
In other business, the board voted to reject a request from the Prism Education Center to operate an open-enrollment charter school in Fayetteville. As a practical matter, though, the vote is only a statement that it does not endorse the proposed program.
The Arkansas State Board of Education serves as the final authority for approving or denying charter school applications. Most school districts vote against endorsing such proposals, and they are then considered by the state board.
Prism provided a listof information about its proposed program to the school district. The documents stated the school planned to locate at 3162 W. Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., across from the Wal-Mart Supercenter in the Owl Creek School attendance zone, Associate Superintendent John L. Colbert said.
Colbert and Associate Superintendent Ginny Wiseman cited transportation issues to and from the site and a request for a waiver from the Arkansas Education Department's rules on highly qualified teachers as some of the reasons why the application should be rejected.
In its application materials, Prism stated in part, "The mission of Prism Education Center is to decrease the academic achievement gap between individuals from different socioeconomic strata."
Heil said she doesn't believe the program would be providing a service that the district could not.
"It did seem like there is a lot of duplication of services, based on the plan," she said.
Also at the meeting, the board reappointed Heil as president, Tim Hudson as vice president and Tim Kring as board secretary for another year.
News, Pages 3 on 09/25/2009