1 district for south of river gains favor

Panel studying county’s school areas

Little Rock School District Superintendent Baker Kurrus (left) talks Wednesday with Pulaski County Special School District Superintendent Jerry Guess at a meeting on boundaries for the three school districts in the county.
Little Rock School District Superintendent Baker Kurrus (left) talks Wednesday with Pulaski County Special School District Superintendent Jerry Guess at a meeting on boundaries for the three school districts in the county.

A committee studying school district lines in Pulaski County favors creating one school district south of the Arkansas River, according to preliminary recommendations Wednesday.

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Arkansas Democrat-Gazette

Jay Barth (left) and Kim Davis of the committee studying school district boundaries in Pulaski County hear Little Rock Mayor Mark Stodola speak in favor of having just one school district south of the Arkansas River.

North of the river, the committee suggests leaving intact the current school districts, setting a course for Sherwood and Maumelle to break from the Pulaski County Special School District and each form a district.

The Scott community, which is losing its elementary school next year because of its small enrollment, also would detach from the Pulaski County Special district, and its area would be divided between the North Little Rock and England school districts.

Portions of Saline County that are now in the Pulaski County Special district would be redesignated as in the Bryant School District.

The committee, headed by state Board of Education member Jay Barth of Little Rock, made the preliminary recommendations during a meeting and workshop Wednesday. Sam Ledbetter, Education Board chairman and a committee member, was absent.

The three committee members present said they recognized that the current boundaries are not working. They cited long bus rides, the condition of school facilities and a lack of school choice, among other things.

"I've gotten very, very, very convinced that great communities make a great state, and great communities only exist when schools and those communities are working in sync," Barth said. "When you have these disconnects ... I think you've got an inherent problem."

Wednesday's preliminary recommendations came after pleas from city and community leaders, state representatives, school district officials and parents. Arkansas Education Commissioner Johnny Key had no comment Wednesday because he had not attended the meeting, said Kimberly Friedman, spokesman for the state Department of Education.

At the meeting, Baker Kurrus, the superintendent of the Little Rock School District, said the Little Rock district has no "communities of interest" and that's the district's single, biggest problem.

"We have to define a community of interest, draw the biggest circle that we can, take all the people in who want to be in that circle ... [have] the spirit of cooperation, and then we can run the school district efficiently and effectively," Kurrus said. "The key factor, to me, is not where the boundaries are. It's where the communities of interest exist."

Kurrus, along with Little Rock Mayor Mark Stodola and Vice Mayor Lance Hines, spoke in favor of having one school district south of the Arkansas River.

Hines represents the city's Ward 5, a western portion that includes Chenal Valley. The majority of the ward, he said, is in the Pulaski County Special district. He told the panel that the growing area does not have enough of a voice in the school district and needs more secondary schools.

He said he would have supported a countywide school district. But with the newly formed Jacksonville/North Pulaski School District, and with Maumelle and Sherwood wanting their own districts, one countywide district likely won't be feasible, he said.

"Bringing us in as a part of Little Rock would help [us] heal," Hines said.

State Sen. Joyce Elliott, D-Little Rock, said in an interview that she wished there had been more discussion by the panel on the possibility of a countywide school district.

"I think what it shows generally is that there's some recognition that the configuration that we have right now is probably not optimal for a school district," Elliott said.

She said she recognizes that the Arkansas River is a natural boundary for the districts, but it doesn't have to be.

Arkansas is a small state, making Pulaski County a small county, she said. Having one district countywide would leverage resources, Elliott said, and it wouldn't mean that all of the schools within the county have to be big.

"Right now, we work for adequacy in all three districts," she said. "We could consider excellence that goes beyond adequacy if we're all pulling together."

Elliott -- a former teacher -- was not at the committee meeting Wednesday, but she commended the committee members for taking the time to review the current boundaries.

North Little Rock representatives have asked the state panel to consider extending the North Little Rock School District boundaries to the city limits.

The whole discussion is overlaid by the fact that the Pulaski County Special district is still under federal court supervision as part of a decades-long desegregation case. The district has to get all of its buildings in equal condition and meet other desegregation requirements before presiding federal Judge D. Price Marshall Jr. can determine it as unitary, which would release the district from court monitoring.

The court supervision means that any changes to the district need approval from Marshall.

That supervision also adds some uncertainty should the Education Board decide to redraw Pulaski County's school district boundaries.

The board has the authority under two state laws to change district boundaries.

Under Arkansas Code Annotated 6-13-1414, the board can consider a boundary-line change after receiving a petition from a school district or local board of directors.

The second way to change boundaries -- a more indirect way, said Education Department attorney Kendra Clay -- is under state laws related to accreditation standards, facilities distress, academic distress or fiscal distress.

Key is acting as the school board for two of the districts in the county: Little Rock and the Pulaski County Special.

The state took control of the Little Rock district in January after six of its 48 schools were labeled as academically distressed, meaning that less than 50 percent of its students scored at proficient levels on state math and literacy exams over a three-year period.

The state is in its fourth year of a takeover of the Pulaski County Special district, which was designated in fiscal distress.

Clay said the state, though, is no longer a party in the Pulaski County desegregation case and cannot insert itself into the case at any time.

On top of that, the education commissioner can control a district for only five years, and the county district has been improving, the committee members said Wednesday. If the county district is released from state control, the Education Board could change the boundary lines only under provisions in Arkansas Code Annotated 6-13-1414, Clay said.

And so, some community representatives are urging the committee to move quickly on the boundaries.

The Pulaski County Special district had asked voters Tuesday to approve a 5.6-mill tax increase to help improve facilities, but the increase was overwhelmingly rejected. That means that a plan to temporarily keep an elementary school in the Scott community is no longer feasible, and students from that school in the next academic year will be transported to a different school in the district some distance away.

"If that school needs to be closed, if it is a financial thing, can anything else be worked out for those children?" asked Diane Zook, an Education Board and committee member from Melbourne. "Or can Pulaski County continue to run that school another year? In the meantime, do we go to the attorney general and say, 'Here we are.'"

The state needs to come up with a master plan, instead of a piecemeal one, to present to the federal judge, Barth said.

At the same time, Zook said, the group hasn't heard from all parties that have an interest in the boundary change plan, and she suggested getting "boots on the ground" to talk to those parties.

"We don't want to make the same mistakes that we have in the past," she said. "I think we need to also be aware that we need to meet with and talk to the communities involved constantly. The vast majority aren't here."

Barth will begin drafting a report listing the recommendations and hopes to have it to the Education Department and other board members by May 22. The committee would then meet a second time this month to finalize the report before the full Education Board would take it up in June 11-12 meetings.

Metro on 05/14/2015

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