Parents plan to organize informational campaign about school funding issues

By Steve Moyer

Nevada Daily Mail

The Nevada R-5 Board of Education received a show of support from a small group of parents who attended the board's work session Wednesday night. The only item on the agenda for the meeting was the budget but that one subject kept the board busy for two hours trying to find solutions to the situation the district finds itself in.

Dr. Ted Davis, R-5 superintendent, reminded the board how long they have been trying to resolve the budget situation. "We've really been addressing the budget since this time last year's," Davis said. "Our initial cry for help in August was predicated on our attempt to keep our performance at the same high level as before."

Much of the discussion centered on the failed levy increase. Davis said a lot of misinformation was out in the community and that might be one reason the measure failed. "I've had calls, and I'm sure you have as well, from people who had heard stories that the increase would cost them an additional $500 a year," Davis said. "These rumors are what people are hearing about instead of the actual numbers. The average homeowner would pay an additional $40 to $50 a year. We need to let the public know that this won't cost them nearly what people are saying it will."

A homeowner with a $40,000 house would pay about $29 in additional tax per year if the levy increase passed, until the sunset provision would kick in four years from now. An $80,000 house would cost a homeowner $59 in additional tax.

Two of the parents who attended were mothers of ROTC participants, Debbie Williams and Rowann Bastow. Both women were enthusiastic in support of the program they say helped to change their children's lives for the better and didn't want to see the program hurt by the budget concerns. They offered to help the board get the word out.

"My son was in the ROTC class that went to D.C.," Williams said. "ROTC helped to motivate him and the program was one of the reasons I was eager to get back here to Nevada. I was really worried when I heard that they were cutting it."

Bastow had a son in the same class as Williams and still has a daughter in the program. She said the program was underfunded as it is and any cuts in it would be unfair given the small part of the budget for the program.

"ROTC gets the bones," Bastow said. "Football gets the steak and we get bones. A lot of people think the military pays for all of the things ROTC needs but they don't."

Bastow and Williams both said they aren't asking for ROTC to get preferential treatment, just that this is the program that gets them and their children excited -- just like other programs are important to other parents and children.

"I don't want to give the impression that I want to protect ROTC at the expense of other programs," Williams said. "I'd like to see parents with kids in all sorts of activities take part in helping to keep them funded."

Many of the board members expressed the same feelings Larry Forkner did. "I think we have to put all options on the table," Forkner said. "I know some of them are unpalatable but I think we have to consider every option, no matter how unpleasant. I'd hope that all of us could be strong enough to deal with facing unpleasant options."

Dr. Warren Lovinger suggested user fees for extracurricular activities. "I think one option we have to look at is a user fee for students who take part in extracurricular activities," Lovinger said. "It might be that a student will have to pay $50 to participate in band or football."

Davis pointed out that some changes would hurt programs without improving the budget situation much. "ROTC is an immediate payoff. A-plus Schools are an immediate payoff," Davis said. "We could eliminate programs like those and because they are funded from other sources it wouldn't change things. We have some teachers who don't cost us a thing -- they're paid for by state or federal funds. We could cut their programs and it wouldn't save us a penny."

Davis also said that the real meat of the budget is in salaries, and the largest amounts of salaries are in the core areas of instruction. "Because a lot of these programs receive funding from other sources a lot of our teachers that cost us are in the core subjects," Davis said. "You just don't cut reading, writing and arithmetic."

Chris Ellis, board president, said that after all the smoke is cleared away there are only two ways to approach the budget situation. "The way I see it there are two options," Ellis said. "We don't go for another try at the levy increase, and I don't think we'd be as good a district if we didn't; or we go back and try to keep our district's ability to function at its present level and see if we can't get the levy passed."

Davis told the board the earliest the levy question could be put on the ballot would be June 7.

"There is a date in April but we missed that deadline," Davis said. "The earliest date we could try again would be in June. We would have to decide at the March meeting whether we wanted to pursue it then or wait until August."

No decisions were made by the board Wednesday night. Members will consider the budget at the March board meeting.

Williams said she would be happy to help organize a parents group that would help rally support for the levy increase.

"We can mobilize the parents to get out and make others aware of the situation," Williams said. "I wouldn't want to step on the board's toes but if they don't have any objection Rowann and I can get together and see if we can get some parents organized."

Davis said that he would be happy to see a big turnout. "I think it would be great if there were enough people at our next meeting that we had to move to bigger quarters." Davis said "This is the most important thing we do and people should come to the meetings and participate."

"Just give us the green light to contact people and we'll get started on organizing the group, Williams said.

"Consider it given," Davis said.