Voters to address school construction

At Meadow Elementary School in southern Johnston County, plaster falls off the walls in large flakes. Teachers and students walk up and down stairs to get to classrooms and restrooms on the first and second floors. The third floor of the 76-year-old building is cordoned off.

At the other end of the Triangle, the smell of mildew permeates the halls of Hillsborough Elementary School, where about 150 fourth- and fifth-graders share a bathroom.

And in Durham, some students at Rogers-Herr Middle School spend every period except lunch inside trailers.

Help may or may not be on the way. Voters in Johnston, Orange and Durham counties will decide Nov. 6 whether to approve bond issues totaling $ 226 million, including $ 176 million in education spending to build new schools and upgrade old ones.

Local school bond promoters hope voters won’t be turned off by the softening economy, the disruptive aftermath of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, or the fiscal implications of borrowing millions of dollars at a time when the economy seems so unstable.

“There’s too many people out there that have lost their jobs, and too many out there that haven’t lost them that are scared,” said Thomas M. Moore, a Johnston County commissioner. He supports the Triangle’s biggest education bond referendum this year, $ 75 million for Johnston County schools and $ 2 million for Johnston Community College.

Johnston Superintendent Jim Causby is hoping voters will support the bond referendum as a patriotic act. Even with the cooling economy, he said, there is still a pressing need for new school construction in Johnston, which was North Carolina’s fastest-growing county during the 1990s.

The Johnston bonds would pay for two new elementary schools, two new middle schools and renovations and additions at more than a dozen existing schools.

“I think our people know that we need schools regardless of the economy and regardless of what’s going on around the world, and I think our people will be supportive,” Causby said. “But time will tell.”

Orange County voters face a $ 75 million bond referendum, a record high for the county, including $ 47 million for schools. The $ 47 million would pay for two new elementary schools for the Chapel Hill-Carrboro school district, a new middle school for Orange County Schools and renovations in both school systems.

“There’s much to be concerned about in terms of asking the voters and the community members to pass a bond [issue] that in essence will have some financial effect on the future as well,” said Randy Bridges, Orange schools superintendent. “But at the same time, I think there’s a sense of the needs. And we have to try to work as a community to meet those needs.”

Libbie M. Hough, 40, lives in central Orange County and has two daughters at Grady Brown Elementary School. She hopes that the terrorist attacks on the United States will not distract residents from the local elections.

“Part of what we need to do is stay on task with our goals, even in the face of this — especially in the face of what we’re dealing with,” Hough said. “We’re investing in the community and taking care of the folks in our our community, and we have the freedom to do that.”

But not everyone agrees this is a good time to borrow money.

Jonathan Hill, director of North Carolina Citizens for a Sound Economy, a grass-roots group that frequently lobbies against increases in public spending, says the $ 75 million bond referendum in Orange County is simply too much.

“With the economy as it is and people on fixed incomes in Orange County, there’s got to be a better way,” Hill said.

In Durham, bond promoters have some concerns about the economy and the war, but seem preoccupied with other issues. Durham voters will consider five referendum questions totaling more than $ 74 million, with schools to receive just under $ 52 million. The money would go toward a new elementary school in southern Durham as well as renovations and expansions at existing schools.

John Burness, a Duke University senior vice president and co-chairman of a group promoting the bond issue, said most of the Durham debate so far has focused on what the county’s priorities should be, not on whether now is a good time to borrow money. Durham’s NAACP chapter has opposed the bonds; and the Durham Committee on the Affairs of Black People has expressed concern, saying the school district should put more money toward inner-city schools.

Other than those criticisms, Burness said, “if anything, what we’re hearing is that because of the cuts in interest rates, there probably has never been a better time to be borrowing.”

In Durham and Orange, voters are likely to face tax increases to pay back the debts incurred in selling the bonds. In Durham, officials say the payments would add about 2.5 cents per $ 100 valuation in property taxes per year for the first few years after the referendum. The amount would gradually decrease as the debt is repaid. In Orange, county officials say the debt will likely cost taxpayers about 7.5 cents per $ 100 valuation over the course of several years, at most.

Johnston officials say they believe they can still pay off the debts without raising taxes, though that depends, in part, on the state of the economy.

The last time voters in Johnston voted on a school bond referendum, voters in every precinct approved $ 83 million for the schools and Johnston Community College by an ratio of about 3-to-1. The county commissioners’ pledge then not to raise taxes likely played a key role in the overwhelming success of the bonds.

Moore, the Johnston commissioner, is worried that if the economy sinks too far, a tax increase may be necessary to pay back the debts. “Although we say we won’t raise taxes, we all know if the money’s not there, we’re going to have to …,” Moore said. “This is a bad time to do anything like this.

“If we can get a majority this time, we’ll be lucky,” Moore added. “I’ve talked to a lot of people who said they won’t vote for it because of the economy.”

Joyce R. Jenkins, 47, of Smithfield has had two children graduate from Smithfield-Selma High School. She hasn’t heard a lot about the school bonds, but she calls them “a good thing.”

“This county is growing in leaps and bounds, and it’s going to continue to grow because more people are migrating from the North,” Jenkins said.

She is confident the economic situation will bounce back.

“My feeling is any time there’s a war involved, you’re going to see some changes in the economy. The kids still have to be educated.”

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Triangle School Referendums

School bond referendums to be decided Nov. 6 in Johnston, Orange and Durham counties

Johnston County

Two questions totaling $ 77 million ($ 75 million for Johnston County Schools and $ 2 million for Johnston Community College).

New construction:

– Elementary school east of Clayton, $ 9.8 million

– New Smithfield Elementary School, $ 10 million

– New Benson Middle School, $ 8.8 million

– New McGee’s Crossroads Middle School, $ 10.5 million

Construction on present sites:

– Clayton High School completion, $ 6.5 million

– Cooper Elementary School renovation and media center, $ 1 million

– Four Oaks Elementary School, 20 new classrooms, $ 2.5 million

– McGee’s Crossroads Elementary School, 12 new classrooms,

$ 1.7 million

– Meadow School, demolish the three-story building, replace it with a new building, make site improvements, $ 7 million

– Micro-Pine Level Elementary School, 6 new classrooms, $ 1 million

– North Johnston Middle School, 6 new classrooms, $ 1.2 million

– Polenta Elementary School, 12 new classrooms, $ 1.7 million

– Smithfield Middle School, 8 new classrooms, $ 1.5 million

– West Clayton Elementary School, 12 new classrooms, $ 2 million

– Wilson’s Mills Elementary School, 10 new classrooms, $ 1.8 million

Renovation:

– Four Oaks Elementary School, $ 1 million

– Princeton High School, $ 2 million

– South Johnston High School, $ 5 million

Johnston Community College

– A new industrial technology building with about 27,000 square feet for classes in heating, ventilation and air conditioning, welding machine technology, tool-and-die making, industrial maintenance technology, a general vocational training lab and a computer lab, $ 2 million

Orange County

Four questions totalling $ 75 million (including $ 47 million for Orange County and Chapel Hill-Carrboro schools).

New construction:

– Chapel Hill-Carrboro, two new elementary schools, $ 12.8 million each

– Orange County, new middle school, $ 18.5 million

Renovation:

– Orange County, $ 900,000

– Chapel Hill-Carrboro, $ 2 million

Durham

Five questions totaling more than $ 74 million (including $ 52 million for schools).

New construction:

– New elementary school in southern Durham, $ 11.9 million

Expansion and renovation:

– Rogers-Herr Middle School, new classrooms and renovation, $ 11.9 million

– Carrington Middle School, new classrooms and renovation,

$ 8.1 million

– Lakewood Elementary School, new classrooms and renovation, $ 6.6 million

– R.N. Harris Elementary School, expansion, $ 4.2 million

– Chewning Middle School, renovation, $ 4 million

– Bethesda Elementary School, expansion, $ 2.3 million

– Oak Grove Elementary School, expansion, $ 1.1 million

Also $ 1.6 million for six smaller projects, including $ 325,000 to buy trailer classrooms.

(Sources: Local schools and Johnston Community College)

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GRAPHIC: 2 c photos At Meadow Elementary School in Johnston County, Principal Pat Morgan shows deterioration in a classroom wall. If bonds pass Nov. 6, Meadow will be torn down and a new school built. The media center at Meadow Elementary School in Johnston County has little storage space. The school was built in 1925. Standing at right, Principal Pat Morgan talks with Olive Auger, center, media coordinator, and Jean Barefoot, media assistant. Staff photos by Robert Willett