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State Education Board restores local control to two school districts Tuesday, Apr 22, 2008 By John Lyon Arkansas News Bureau LITTLE ROCK - The state Board of Education voted Monday to restore local control to two public school districts that had been taken over by the state because of financial problems. The board voted unanimously to remove the Helena-West Helena and Midland school districts from fiscal distress status and return them to local control starting July 1. The state took over the Helena-West Helena School District in September 2005 and the Midland School District in Independence County in January 2006. The board also voted to remove the Hughes, Omaha and Turrell school districts from fiscal distress status. Seven other districts were added Monday to the state's fiscal distress list: Gentry, Greenland, Westside Consolidated in Jonesboro, Hartford, Hermitage, Murfreesboro and Concord. The state took over the Helena-West Helena and Midland school districts under the Omnibus Education Act of 2003, which gives the state Education Department and the education commissioner broad powers to sanction, take over or force consolidation of districts in fiscal or academic distress. The superintendents and boards of the Helena-West Helena and Midland districts were removed at the time of takeover. Helena-West Helena was expected to end the 2005-06 school year with a $2.26 million deficit, Assistant Education Commissioner Bobbie Davis told the board. Since the takeover, the district has adopted numerous measures to improve oversight of finances, addressed a long list of audit issues and completed an inventory of every piece of equipment in the district, she said. "That was a monumental task," Davis said. "That's a very, very large district." Helena-West Helena is projected to end the current school year with a balance of $5.37 million, she said. Education Commissioner Ken James said the district has come back from a difficult situation, one in which "there was very little control, if any," over finances. Midland was expected to end the 2005-06 school year with a deficit of more than $200,000, Davis said. The district is expected to end the current school year with a balance of $1.63 million, she said. A district placed on the fiscal distress list must prepare a plan for removing itself from the list, then have the plan approved and successfully implement it to be removed from the list. Failure to be removed from fiscal distress status within two years results in automatic consolidation. Gentry, Greenland and Westside Consolidated appealed their placement on the fiscal distress list, but the board denied their appeals Monday. The board tabled an appeal by the Mineral Springs School District. Davis told the board the Gentry School District is projected to end the current school year with a $254,000 deficit. "We congratulate both of the districts," Board President Diane Tatum said. Gentry Superintendent Randy Barrett said the district made the decision to build a new elementary school and add 12 classrooms to Gentry High School at a time when the Northwest Arkansas district was growing. That growth has halted, he said. "We haven't lost students, but we have flat-lined," he said. The Greenland School District is projected to end the current school year with a deficit of nearly $289,000, Davis said. Greenland School Board President Bill Groom told the board the district suffered financially when it annexed the Winslow School District, then saw 178 Winslow students transfer out of the district rather than attend Greenland. Winslow is 17 miles south of Greenland. Another school district, West Fork, sits between Winslow and Greenland. "That was probably not a good financial decision," Groom said of the decision to annex Winslow, which was made before he joined the Greenland School Board. Greenland will ask voters to approve a 2.6-mill increase and a debt restructuring plan on June 10, Groom said. Davis said the Westside Consolidated School District is projected to end the year with an $87,061 deficit. Westside Consolidated Superintendent James Best said the Education Department's calculations were based on numbers from the fall semester and did not take into account recent reductions in personnel costs. Best also said the district is still trying to overcome being known for a 1998 shooting rampage at Westside Middle School in which four students and a teacher were killed. "Please do not add this. Our people have been through enough," he said. Also Monday, the board voted to revoke the teacher's license of former Farmington High School teacher David Anthony Warner, who pleaded guilty in December 2006 to sexual indecency with a child. Prosecutors said Warner asked a female student to perform oral sex. Warner was sentenced in Washington County Circuit Court to six years probation and ordered to pay $1,000 restitution, register as a sex offender, complete a counseling program and have no further contact with the student. |
