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HomeMy WebLinkAboutMinutes - 20020923 APPROVED 11/19/2002 MINUTES JOINT MEETING ORANGE COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS Orange County Board of Education Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Board of Education September 23, 2002 The Orange County Board of County Commissioners met for a Joint Meeting with the Orange County Board of Education and the Chapel Hill-Carrboro City School Board on Monday, September 23, 2002 at 7:30 p.m. at the Southern Human Services Center in Chapel Hill. North Carolina. COUNTY COMMISSIONERS PRESENT: Chair Barry Jacobs and Commissioners Margaret W. Brown, Moses Carey, Jr., Alice B. Gordon and Stephen Halkiotis. COUNTY ATTORNEYS PRESENT: Geof Gledhill and Sean Borhanian COUNTY STAFF PRESENT: County Manager John Link, Assistant County Manager Rod Visser, Assistant County Manager Gwen Harvey and Clerk to the Board Donna S. Baker. (All other staff members will be identified appropriately below). ORANGE COUNTY BOARD OF EDUCATION MEMBERS PRESENT: Chair Dana Thompson, Vice-Chair Delores Simpson and Board Members Robert H. Bateman, Keith Cook, Susan A. Halkiotis, Brenda Stephens (Members-elect: Libby Hough, Randy Copeland and Betty Phelps- Davidson) and Interim Superintendent Mike Williams. CHAPEL HILL-CARRBORO CITY SCHOOL BOARD OF EDUCATION MEMBERS PRESENT: Chair Valerie Foushee, Vice—Chair Gloria Faley, and Board Members Nicholas M. Didow, Elizabeth Carter, Lisa Stuckey, Edward Sechrist, Maryanne Rosenman, and Superintendent Neil Pedersen NOTE: ALL DOCUMENTS REFERRED TO IN THESE MINUTES ARE IN THE PERMANENT AGENDA FILE IN THE CLERK'S OFFICE. Chair Jacobs called the meeting to order and introduced the two Orange County School Board members-elect— Betty Tom Phelps Davidson and Libbie Hough. Valerie Foushee, Chair of the Chapel Hill-Carrboro City School Board, thanked the Board of County Commissioners for having them there. Dana Thompson, Chair of the Orange County School Board, introduced Orange County Interim Superintendent Dr. Mike Williams. Valerie Foushee introduced member-elect Ed Sechrist, Jr. Chair Jacobs said that we continue to make progress on all fronts by working together. He made reference to two handouts for the Board of County Commissioners —one from Mr. Voyce that addresses the development for the Horace Williams Tract, and the yellow sheet, which is the draft minutes of the meeting held between the two school board chairs, the Manager, the CHCCS Superintendent, the BOCC Chair, and Mr. Boyle from the Institute of Government. County Manager John Link made reference to the item for distribution that relates to central funding scenarios for the third high school. 1. County/OCS/CHCCS Discussion/Policy Issues a. Task Force Progress Reports 1. High School Planning Task Force John Link said that the minutes of two meetings of the High School Planning Task Force were in the agenda packets — May 13`h and September 3''. At the last meeting, there was a discussion on collaboration with both school systems. This is the yellow sheet. The other area of major discussion was having the County staff cost out a regular sized high school (1,000-1,500 students) and compare it to two smaller high schools (500-600 students) and seeing what the difference is in costs. Secondly, the County staff offered to demonstrate how by taking the bond money designated for Elementary School #10 and using it for creating high school space. This could move up the construction of the third high school earlier than what was anticipated. Alternative financing could then be used for Elementary School #10. The County is still waiting for a definitive response from the Chapel Hill-Carrboro School Board on this high school space. Budget Director Donna Dean made reference to attachment 1a-1-c, which is an outline on how to fund the high school by reverting some funds earmarked for Elementary School #10 to the high school. The major piece would be the 2001 bond funds of$12.8 million designated for elementary School #10 and revert it to the high school. There has also been $11.3 million identified in the 2002-2012 CIP and School Construction Impact Fees. Also, in the alternative- financing plan, there is $3.7 million identified for new high school studies of some sort. This would postpone Elementary School #10 and it could be financed with alternative financing. Chair Jacobs asked for an explanation about moving funds from the elementary school to the high school and Assistant Manager Rod Visser said that there is nothing against statutory standards to use the bond money in this way. In Orange County, bond orders are written rather broadly and as long as the funds are used in the general category of school facilities it will be fine. Donna Dean referred to the hand-out (pink area) that pointed out that a 750-student high school is what the Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools would like. She talked with Bill Mullin, and the Department of Public Instruction has included in their package a 600 and an 800-student school. The total square footage for an 800-student school is 145,000 square feet. For a 600- student school, it would cost about $17.5 million and $23.9 million for an 800-student school. Two 600 or 800-student schools could probably not be built with the funding that is outlined. John Link said that, given the discussion of the improvements to the Lincoln Center, the County staff cannot project how to project generating more than $27 million for high school space through debt financing. Superintendent Neil Pedersen asked for clarification on what John Link said. Donna Dean said that the debt capacity would allow for what is outlined on the funding possibilities for Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools. At that point, we would be coming close to the limitations according to the debt policy. Neil Pedersen asked about the time frame under these funding scenarios. Donna Dean said that there was a 36-month planning process and this would allow the school to open in three years and the elementary school could be planned at the same time. John Link said that he thinks we could come pretty close to what CHCCS's timetable would require. Chair Jacobs suggested that he and the Chair of the Chapel Hill-Carrboro City School Board write a letter to the Mayor of Chapel Hill and inquire of the Town to look at sites that are available outside of the urban services area. At this time, there is a lack of clarity. We need to get a viable answer from the Mayor. He said that he had a 3-way call with Superintendent Pedersen and Mayor Foy last week and Chapel Hill was welcomed to participate in the discussion as to where school sites are located. Valerie Foushee said that the letter should be written as soon as possible. Chair Jacobs made reference to the school construction impact fees and said that these projections are based on a scenario that does not include the Schools Adequate Public Facilities Ordinance. There may be an impact on the actual income derived from impact fees as a result of the SAPFO. Donna Dean said that a certain amount of these impact fees have already been collected by the school system. John Link said that we need to get a handle on the impact fees. Chair Jacobs said that the High School Planning Task Force is going to meet again in the near future. Commissioner Carey asked about getting the scheduling of the building of schools in writing. He said that we need to know what the implications would be for 2005 and 2006. 2. School Facilities Task Force Rod Visser referred to the minutes of the School Facilities Task Force. Most of the discussions have been related to the Schools Adequate Public Facilities Ordinance. He deferred to Commissioner Gordon and Commissioner Brown who have been co-chairing this group. Commissioner Gordon said that the main thing they have been talking about is the Schools Adequate Public Facilities Ordinance. The group has met four times. She said that the Schools and Land Use Council made recommendations on every variable that is necessary for the SAPFO. The Schools and Land Use Council has been waiting for the input from the School Facilities Task Force on these variables and these were finished at the last meeting. She said that they spent a lot of time talking about the methods of projections and finally ended up with an average of the five projections. There is some desire to have further analysis of the methods. The other major discussion was with the levels of service because there is an indication from jurisdictions that they do not want the SAPFO to trigger an immediate moratorium. The next meeting is October 10`h to continue these discussions. Commissioner Brown said that they have finished up with the work for the Ordinance and hopefully it will be ready by February 15`h. The Task Force will then look at school facilities issues such as the new high school. Gloria Faley said that she perceived that there were many of the issues dealing with the levels of service and she is not sure that the School Facilities Task Force is the place to decide the levels of service and that it crosses with municipalities. She said that it would be better for the Schools and Land Use Council to decide the levels of service rather than the School Facilities Task Force. Chair Jacobs said that the County Commissioners envisioned the levels of service being decided by the School Facilities Task Force because they thought it was a focus group that would move faster through the issues. Commissioner Gordon asked about segueing into the item on the SAPFO, since we are already talking about it. Gloria Faley said that in her group there were many questions that were cross-municipality questions. Commissioner Brown asked her about the questions. Gloria Faley said that the municipalities come from different directions and what is the impact of the levels of service on their development, on their tax needs, etc. Commissioner Brown said that she thought it was the job of the Board of County Commissioners and the school boards to come up with the levels of service. Commissioner Gordon said that what the School Facilities Task Force decides comes before the School Land Use Council and the Schools and Land Use Council has municipality representatives in it. Chair Jacobs said that if we have already gotten feedback from the municipalities officially, then he does not think we need to consult them again. Dana Thompson asked about setting construction standards and how high school standards might change and said that she would also like to review construction standards for the middle schools. Commissioner Brown asked about using the construction design of Smith Middle School. Chair Jacobs made reference to the copy of a video from the Department of Energy that featured conservation minded, energy efficient, and environmentally sensitive schools around the country. Smith Middle School was featured in this video. 3. Chapel Hill Township Park and Educational Campus Work Group Environment and Resource Conservation Director Dave Stancil is the lead staff person with this group and reviewed the time frame. Chair Jacobs introduced Randy Copeland who had just arrived and is one of the new Orange County School board members. David Stancil said that there is a meeting of this group next Monday evening. This is a 193-acre site, which is located near the intersection of Old NC 86 and Eubanks Road. This work group is comprised of 23 members and has appointed representatives from each school board, Chapel Hill Town Council, and Carrboro Aldermen. The group will be co-chaired by Commissioners Brown and Gordon. They are looking at a report and plan by May or June of next year. They have been looking at similar sites around the southeast and they are hoping to plan a site visit for members of the work group to Chesterfield County, Virginia, which has done a combined park and educational campus similar to this design. Valerie Foushee asked about steering closer to a date that is needed by the school system. David Stancil said that they left it TBA on purpose because it would depend on what facilities are designed and to what degree. David Stancil said that he would provide a roster of members of this group to all school board and Board of County Commissioners members. Superintendent Neil Pedersen asked about the schools on this site and if the Board of County Commissioners sees us moving forward and acquiring a high school site before the master plan is finished. Chair Jacobs said that he could not speak for the rest of the Board but he wants more clarity on alternatives to this site. He said that the Board was looking at this with as much flexibility as possible because no decisions have been made about what educational facilities would go on this site. Nick Didow said that he and Mr. Sechrist would be representing the Chapel Hill- Carrboro City Schools on this trip to Virginia. b. Opportunities for Collaboration Between School Systems 1. School Survey Results Superintendent Neil Pedersen said that his staff has been trying to work out a schedule with Orange County staff to pursue this and they are anxious to do this. Dana Thompson reviewed the hand out and said that there were fewer responses at the high school level than the middle school level and they want to do it again at the high school level and hope for a better response rate. Chair Jacobs asked if both school systems found the information about interest in the other system intriguing enough to continue to discuss it and the answer was yes. 2. Proposed Institute of Government Assessment John Link said that the yellow sheet is a review of the meeting of September 18`h with the school board chairs, the Manager, and the Superintendent. He referred to the second paragraph, "Interests and Issues in Collaboration". There are nine issues that were identified. There is also a potential time frame with three steps to accomplish by June 2003. Professor Boyle from the Institute of Government would help with this process and the County would assume the costs. Dana Thompson said that she appreciated having the conversation and having Dr. Boyle with them and to prompt them to look at things differently. Valerie Foushee referred to item #7 since they spent a lot of time on this issue. This item states, "We need to establish short-term objectives and achieve some initial short-term progress yet keep in mind that collaboration is a long-term and ongoing process." She said that if we are going to continue in this effort, we do not want to put up stumbling blocks to stall us. She thinks that the most crucial thing is to identify the objectives in the short-term and establish a plan to get there. Commissioner Brown wanted to understand how the yellow sheet will be pursued and how it is related to collaboration and the next step. John Link said that this is a good initiative to pursue and he will call Dr. Boyle and set up another meeting. He asked if the Board would like to expand the group and include others. Chair Jacobs said that they would make a proposal to the other three boards from the smaller group and then let the other boards (Orange County Schools, Board of County Commissioners, and Chapel Hill Carrboro City Schools) decide who else could meet. The proposed scenario has the governing boards endorsing this in October, which would mean that there would have to be another meeting and recommendation within the next few weeks. Commissioner Brown made reference to the survey and said that it was based on the student's interest and gaining a varied education and finding students who want to attend a less crowded school in the county system. Chair Jacobs said that this was brought up in the meeting with Dr. Boyle to make some short-term success before grappling with the big things that might turn everybody off. Presumably, it will be in the mix at some level. Elizabeth Carter referred to item 7 on the yellow sheet and said that this is a starting point. She said that we need to have these conversations about what the intent is. Dana Thompson said that she found reassuring that Dr. Boyle was interested in this and in helping us get to this point. Commissioner Carey said that it sounds to him that Elizabeth Carter is suggesting that the work group come up with short and long-term objectives before they send anything to the three boards for consideration. He thought this process was designed for the consultant, Dr. Boyle, working with all of the parties to do this. Elizabeth Carter said that she might be the only one that does not understand in which direction we should be going with this collaboration. She just does not know the target for collaboration. Valerie Foushee said that in response to Commissioner Brown's suggestion, that several committees discussed this topic. She referred to the minutes of the May 13`h High School Planning Task Force where Susan Halkiotis reminded us that even though we talk about these possibilities and providing the best educational opportunities for all of the students in Orange County, it is not how the students think. She read from the minutes as follows: "There may be some students who would cross district lines, but only a handful." Most students think about other things than what is going to be best for them in terms of courses offered, etc. She said that it should not be a forced collaboration, but it should be marketable to students and families. She said that in the meeting, they all agreed that the outcome should be that what we offer is the best for all of the students in Orange County. Susan Halkiotis said that, if she recalled correctly, the discussion of collaboration began with the idea that we could try to identify every efficiency possible by working between the two school systems. She said that the benefit of collaboration is that students would have more resources available to them for education. Chair Jacobs said that it was almost operating on two different levels. One is how to make as many opportunities available to students as possible and the other was how to proceed in a way that we do not scare each other off. He said that Dr. Boyle was counseling that we look at what we want to achieve before getting into the details. Commissioner Gordon said that there are some schools that we are figuring how to fund and that process will proceed. This is a parallel process that will be designed to get the maximum efficiencies and the maximum collaboration. She verified that one process would not be dependent on the other. c. Schools Adequate Public Facilities Ordinance— Timeline & Outstanding Issues Planning Director Craig Benedict was asked to give the status of the timetable for adopting the SAPFO. He said that this has been worked on for three years. The Schools and Land Use Council made recommendations to the local governments on the SAPFO. All of the local governments and school districts over the last two years have signed on to the Memorandum of Understanding, which includes a model ordinance. The model ordinance will eventually be implemented into the land development code of the local governments. In the Memorandum of Understanding, there are seven different facets, and three are considered as part of the base MOU. One is the level of service and the following decisions were made: Elementary School — 105%, Middle School — 107%, and High School — 110%. The third aspect of the base MOU was the building capacity to make sure that portable units were not counted as permanent capacity. There were other facets that needed to be included before the MOU was sent out. One was the capital improvement program that included some programming for new school openings in the future. The second issue was the student projection methods. He described each of these methods. The Schools and Land Use Council recommended an average of the five projection methods. The third issue was the student generation rate. It was recommended that the Tischler Associates student generation rate be used for this. There is a possibility that the levels of service could be breached, and it is not recommended to implement a new ordinance that would create a de facto moratorium. This is being reconciled. Regarding the timeline, it is the intent to fill the unknowns within the next couple of weeks and transmit them back to the local governments and school districts for the last run through. If all parties are in agreement, then on November 15`h we will be looking at new school membership data to make projections into the future. The Board of County Commissioners will certify the new numbers by February 1, 2003. If the new numbers are certified, then the SAPFO system would be in place, and by February 15, 2003 the SAPFO would go into effect. Any new developments that come in at that time would be subject to looking at available seats in schools. Commissioner Gordon highlighted that at the September 17`h Board of County Commissioners' meeting, the Board confirmed the County's commitment to address the SAPFO in a proactive and timely manner. The Board indicated its intent to schedule a work session on the SAPFO in mid-October. Also, the Manager's office will coordinate all of these meetings for the different task forces. The Schools and Land Use Council, in its meeting of September 25`h will try to address any remaining issues. At the end of the meeting, the Schools and Land Use Council will write a letter to all the jurisdictions, giving them an update on the status and what remains to be done and the timeline for implementation. Nick Didow said that his Board has already approved the Memorandum of Understanding and he asked if it would only come back for consideration again if there were any changes. He asked who had adopted the MOU. Craig Benedict said that all school boards have approved it and all entities have reviewed it. The only reason to take it back through would be the school projection implications with the level of service. All the boards can re-address the levels of service expectations. Commissioner Gordon said that the changes that were most detailed were the ones proposed by the Town of Carrboro. Also, the Orange County Schools has some questions. One of the concerns of Carrboro is if the CIP actually does address the schools that are needed in time. Carrboro does not want a moratorium to go into effect. She said that if it is clear that the proposed schools are going to come online in a timely manner, then we may need to temporarily raise the levels of service. d. Water Conservation Measures Chair Jacobs said that no one forced the school systems to do anything in the way of water conservation, but both systems have taken some proactive steps. The Boards received this as information only. e. Affordable Housing Opportunities for School Employees (such as IDA Program) Chair Jacobs said that a lot of the public employees are not always able to find affordable housing in Orange County. As we talk about trying to attract and retain teachers, it seemed important to bring to the attention of both school boards some of the opportunities that are available for teachers. Housing and Community Development Director Tara Fikes gave a review of the affordable housing opportunities in the County. Executive Director of the Orange Community Housing and Land Trust Robert Dowling said that Orange Community Housing already works with both school systems. He said that rather than each non-profit coming to each entity (schools, County, and towns), they thought it would be better to have a systematic way to get information out about affordable housing for school employees and County employees either through emails, flyers, posters in break rooms, etc. He welcomed any ideas from any of the boards. Superintendent Neil Pedersen said that they all have promoted opportunities in general. He asked about specific houses and how to notify staff members about availability. Robert Dowling said that usually it has been houses in developments like Meadowmont. Now they have re-sales and cannot afford to work with realtors. It would be good to have a mechanism to get the information out to people. Mr. Sechrist asked about emails to the teachers about houses. Superintendent Neil Pedersen said that if houses come on the market it would be no problem to notify people through emails. Dana Thompson said that they would quickly direct the staff to begin working closely with the affordable housing organizations to get the information. Commissioner Halkiotis said that this information could go as an addendum on all three websites (two school systems and the County) within the Human Resources Department. A picture of the houses could go there with a description, etc. 2. Issues Identified/Presented by Orange County Schools Dana Thompson expressed thanks for meeting with the Board of County Commissioners. There have been many challenges for them — looking for a new superintendent, changes in the school board, opening a new high school, and looking at building a new middle school. a. Office Space for Orange County Schools Support Services Staff Interim Superintendent Mike Williams distributed a hand out with a list of the number of staff that will be disbursed to other areas as a result of the renovations at Hillsborough Elementary. He said that there are air quality and space issues. The architect shared that the best use of the support services space and the most economical approach was to return it to classroom use. He said that even if they were not talking about expanding the number of students, they still would have needed to capture this space. He reminded the Board that Hillsborough Elementary is the only year round school and the only School of Choice countywide. It is important for this school to grow. He said that they need to consider where they are going to house the support staff long term. Susan Halkiotis reiterated that housing some of the staff at the high school is a temporary luxury. Chair Jacobs made reference to a letter from DPI from 1996 where they were projecting that Orange County Schools would have 1,875 high school students by the year 2005-2006. Orange County Schools already has more than this. He said that DPI's projections are not accurate. Dana Thompson asked where the discussion was with funding for central office expansion. John Link said that the Board of County Commissioners addresses the CIP on an annual basis. He said that the Board could address the proposal for support staff space at the same time that they address the Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools' third high school. Commissioner Brown asked if they were looking for any possibilities at this point for the support services staff to be located. Dana Thompson said that the plan from the beginning was a package deal. They have not made any decisions because the funding has been up in the air. Commissioner Brown asked if they were thinking about building something and Dana Thompson said that there is nothing else available at this point, so they would have to build. Keith Cook spoke. John Link said that there is $1.6 million scheduled for this issue in 2004-2005 with alternative financing. This is in attachment 4d-5. Dana Thompson clarified by saying that they have received documents at different times showing that the central office expansion had been moved much later. She said that it is difficult to move forward with the renovation without the knowledge that the other half is going to follow suit. Chair Jacobs said that if the Board contemplates any change then they would notify the school board. b. Funding for Facility Improvements at Orange High School Interim Superintendent Mike Williams distributed another hand out. He said that the renovations proposed at Orange High School are not cosmetic in nature, but deal with the infrastructure such as fire alarm systems, ceilings, etc. The renovations are things that are critical to the life and function of the school. They recognize that the money is available and they just want to make sure that it stays there. c. Student Population Projections Dana Thompson referred to the hand out and Interim Superintendent Mike Williams said that they have been providing all parties with regular updates on student membership this year, and they have exceeded DPI's projections. He said that DPI uses its own method for projecting student average daily membership for the next year. Orange County's membership at the end of the first month was 240 students over DPI's projections. The growth was at all grade levels — 90 at the elementary level, 56 at the middle school level, and 94 at the high school level. He said that this information was just to highlight that Orange County Schools is growing in contrast to the projections that have been made. Dana Thompson said that she understands that there will be an analysis of the methods of projection. She said that there is no method that is absolutely accurate, but they are very interested in looking at all the methods and assessing which ones are most accurate for both school systems. d. Status of County Appropriation for Funding School Nurses It was stated that Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools is interested in this also. John Link said that the plan that was adopted last year was to move ahead with trying to fund nurses for each school. This year they suspended this plan due to the budget constraints and he hopes to enact this after the hiring freeze is over. Chair Jacobs said that the legislature may be voting tonight to deny us the opportunity to recover$1.5 million that we had hoped to recover through being forced to raise the % cent sales tax. Susan Halkitois asked at the point that the County is able to fund these positions, and if the ideal would be to catch them up and address the nurses for this year and next year. They have had to add a nurse this year with a new school opening. John Link said that they understand the deficit and will address it as quickly as possible. 3. Issues Identified/Presented by Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools Valerie Foushee said that she wanted to go on record to say that it is the preference of the School Board that the third high school be cited in the southern part of the district. She said that she and Nick Didow did approach the Mayors of both municipalities and indicated to both of them that it is their preference to locate the third high school in the southern part of the district. Nick Didow said that in January they took to each of the Mayors (Chapel Hill and Carrboro), the results of the initial site review. Part of their message was the bad news that the engineering review across from Southern Village showed some problems. In the fall, they had identified some possible other school sites, and when they met with Mayor Foy, they shared with him the two resulting sites— one to the north of Ray Road and the other to the east of Smith Level Road. Mayor Foy said that he did not sense a willingness on the part of his colleagues to reconsider moving the urban services boundary back to where it was two years ago. He said that they also spoke with Mayor Nelson of Carrboro and received a favorable response for a high school to be built within the Carrboro jurisdiction off Smith Level Road. However, because of the requests of some citizens of Chapel Hill —the town may reconsider these options regarding the urban services boundary. Valerie Foushee said that at their last meeting of these three boards, the school board also indicated at that time what their preference was in terms of citing the new high school. Her recollection of the presentation was that there was a fair amount of urgency with regard to when the school board thought that the third high school should come on line. In the earlier CIP, they indicated the preference of locating the school in the southern part with no less than 750 students, with the possibility that this facility could be expanded upon. She made reference to attachment 3- a, and said that the projections justify moving ahead with a third high school. She asked the Board of County Commissioners to work with them to develop a financing plan and to take necessary actions to open this facility by 2005-06. Commissioner Gordon asked about the 20`h day membership for the high schools combined. Assistant Superintendent Steve Scroggs answered that the 20`h day membership for high school students was 3,197 with a capacity of 3,035. Commissioner Gordon said that she went to a school board meeting quite a while ago and Steve Scroggs wanted to apprise her of further developments. She has not met with him in a long time, so she is not up to date. When she does talk to him, she would like any information that is given to her to be given to the County Commissioners. Gloria Faley said that it was startling for her to be in the School Facilities Task Force meeting and to hear the projections for high school students. She said that we need to move on this schedule for the third high school. Valerie Foushee said that the board has also discussed the possibility of converting Lincoln Center to a magnet high school. They believe that this would meet the projected high school needs through 2013. If they are able to build a school for 1,000 or 750 with the capability of expanding to 1,000, and with Lincoln Center holding 500 students, then they would have the aggregate of a 1,500 student capacity. Commissioner Halkiotis asked how many acres of land did Lincoln Center sit upon and it was answered 12 acres. Commissioner Gordon said that she understands that the Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools wanted the Board of County Commissioners to further evaluate the site across from Southern Village and the 89-acre site that is listed on the comprehensive plan for a school site. She asked if this was still a request. Valerie Foushee said that this request did not come from their School Board. This site is no longer being considered. Valerie Foushee said that if they were able to convert Lincoln Center to a high school facility, it would stand to reason that they would need a facility to house the central administration staff. She asked the County Commissioners to think about this possibility. Nick Didow said that they are also leasing two office suites at Willow Drive to accommodate space for the central office. Commissioner Brown asked if the school board would be interested in the school campus site. Valerie Foushee said that their preference is to locate in the southern part of the city, but they would not turn down a site given to them. Gloria Faley made reference to the northern site and said that#10 still needs to be someplace and another middle school is upon the horizon. One of these schools could use the northern site. Commissioner Gordon asked about the capacity of the high school and if they wanted it to be 750 or 1,000. Valerie Foushee said that their first choice would be to site the school with a capacity of 1,000. Neil Pedersen said that the Lincoln Center could only accommodate 500 students. He made reference to Elementary School # 10 and said that the money was in the bond issue and if it were used for the high school then they would look at alternative funding options. Their elementary enrollment continues to increase and they just had their largest kindergarten class in history and these can push projections. Commissioner Brown asked about Orange County School's central office and if they were asking for a new facility and Dana Thompson said no, that they were only asking for expansion of the existing central office space. Neil Pedersen said that their central office space was in their 10-year CIP. Commissioner Brown asked, in terms of timing, if CHCCS was talking about the 1,000 student high school first and then the Lincoln Center conversion. Neil Pedersen said that they would have to move out of Lincoln Center first and then renovate it for a high school. The CIP includes money for administrative offices, but does not include money to renovate Lincoln Center to an educational facility. They would be looking to build a new central office on another site. Commissioner Halkiotis asked about field 3b that is being leased out by the Town of Carrboro for Rainbow Soccer. The Town of Carrboro is collecting $3,400. He asked how much it costs the CHCCS system to maintain these fields. He asked if it costs more or less than $3,400. Basically, it is not fair for Carrboro to get the revenue and for the school system to pay for the maintenance of the field. Gloria Faley said that she wanted to address the issue about the 750 or 1,000 student capacity school and 500 for the Lincoln Center. She said that they are trying to be creative in housing the 1,500 students. Chair Jacobs suggested that the CHCCS board put all of their requests and preferences in writing for the third high school. Chair Jacobs read from an article from the News and Observer about the budget, as follows: "Next year is when the problem comes, said House Speaker Jim Black (Matthews Democrat). There is a hole for next year. We'll have to get very innovative if the revenue doesn't come." He said that if the Board sometimes seems hesitant, it is because this is staring them in the face. He said that there would be a work session in October with a report on all the different cuts that the State has made. Commissioner Gordon urged both school boards to ask for what they need and not let the budget totally drive the requests. She would like to hear how the 12 acres at the Lincoln Center would be adequate. She would like the schools to ask for what is best for the students. THE ITEMS BELOW WERE NOT DISCUSSED a. Update on Major CIP Projects with Identification of Next Steps for Board of County Commissioners 1. Third High School (for at least 750 students) 2. Conversion of Lincoln Center to an Educational Facility for Students 3. New Facility for Relocated Central Offices 4. Elementary #10 4. County/OCS/CHCCS Informational Reports a. 2002-03 School Budget Outlooks (pending adoption of State budget) b. 20`h Day Student Membership for 2002-03 c. Major Capital Project Status Reports 1. CHCCS Elementary #9 2. OCS Middle #3 3. Hillsborough Elementary Renovations d. Timeline for First 2001 Bond Sale and Alternative Financing The meeting was adjourned at 10:10 P.M. and the next scheduled meeting will be a Regular Meeting of the Board of County Commissioners that will be on Tuesday, October 1, 2002 at the F. Gordon Battle Courtroom in Hillsborough, N.C. Barry Jacobs, Chair Donna S. Baker Clerk to the Board