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HomeMy WebLinkAboutMinutes - 20060926APPROVED 1111412006 MINUTES WORK SESSION Orange County Commissioners Orange County Board Of Education Chapel Hill-Carrboro Board of Education September 26, 2006 7:30 p.m. The Orange County Board of Commissioners met far a joint session with the Chapel Hill-Carrboro Board of Education and the Orange County Board of Education on Tuesday, September 26, 2006 at 7:30 p.m. at the Southern Human Services Center in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. COUNTY COMMISSIONERS PRESENT: Chair Barry Jacobs and Commissioners Maser Carey, Jr., Valerie P. Foushee, Alice M. Gordon, and Stephen Halkiotis COUNTY ATTORNEY PRESENT: Geoffrey Gledhill COUNTY STAFF PRESENT: Interim County Manager Rod Visser 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 Dennis Whitling, Vice-Chair Ted Triebel, and Board Members Susan Hallman, Anne Medenblik, and Debbie Piscitelli. Superintendent Shirley Carraway was also present. ORANGE COUNTY BOARD OF EDUCATION MEMBERS ABSENT: Elizabeth Brown and AI Hartkoph CHAPEL HILL-CARRBORO CITY SCHOOL BOARD OF EDUCATION MEMBERS PRESENT: Vice Chair Jamezetta Bedford and Board Members Elizabeth Carter, Jean Hamilton, Pam Hemminger, Mike Kelley and Annetta Streater. Superintendent Neil Pedersen was also present. CHAPEL HILL-CARRBORO CITY SCHOOL BOARD OF EDUCATION MEMBERS ABSENT: Chair Lisa Stuckey 7:31:16 PM Commissioner Halkiotis said that Lisa Stuckey and Chair Jacobs were attending a trip to Madison, Wisconsin and may be here later this evening. Commissioner Halkiotis said that Jamezetta Bedford is representing CHCCS and Dennis Whitling is representing the OCS. Dennis Whitling said that two of the OCS board members would be unable to attend this evening. Commissioner Halkiotis chaired the meeting until Chair Jacobs arrived. 1. DiscussianlPalicy Issues a. School Construction Standards Rad Visser said that throughout 2006 the School Collaboration Work Group, which consists of the Chairs and Vice-Chairs of all three governing boards, has been trying to update the school construction standards. There have been several school facility task forces that have looked at this issue in the past. During the spring, the work group had input from representatives of the Wake County school system, the State Department of Public Instruction, UNC's Sustainability Office, and John Locke Foundation to get background information about how schools are constructed in some other places and the considerations in other counties and statewide. Over the summer, the County and school staff met and reviewed the input and developed a draft of updated construction standards far all three levels. The collaboration group reviewed the draft standards. They are trying to get the standards into a farm that the County Commissioners can consider for adoption late in the fall. Jamezetta Bedford said that one of the goals is to get a general idea of these standards and the additional notion of a non-traditional school. Dennis Whitling said that they initially struggled with the non-traditional school concept and haw it will be defined. He said that there is a lot of detail in this plan and the plan is for the work group to finalize same of the detail and come to some conclusion. Commissioner Halkiotis said that he remembers that there was a desire from both school boards to look at the feasibility of including auxiliary gyms in future high school construction rather than waiting until the DPI recommended number of 1,500 kicks in. He said that there should be written guarantees that the communities can use these gyms. The school officials brought forward the argument that there are sa many high school athletic teams, that they do not get through with practice until late at night. The auxiliary gym would not have bleachers, scoreboards, etc. and would save some money. Commissioner Halkiotis said that at the County Commissioners' work session last week, the issue came up that the City of Mebane was interested in seeing the feasibility of Gravelly Hill being an emergency shelter. The County Commissioners discussed the possibility of working into the standards for all future constructions that they be generator-ready. If the City of Mebane is interested, then maybe it could also contribute something financially. Commissioner Carey made reference to the section on the schools being generator-ready and asked if this was for all schools or for those strategically located. Commissioner Halkiotis said that this is part of the discussion. It needs to be an upfront decision. He is in favor of putting generators in all schools. Commissioner Carey said that they have been talking about the concept of a non-traditional school for a while and he thinks that the consideration in the report is wise. He made reference to page 4 where it says, "a non-traditional model would be one that deviates in some ways from the traditional model and would be defined on a project by project basis." His question is who would define it on aproject-by-project basis. Commissioner Halkiotis said that it was an open-ended discussion since the concept of non-traditional may vary from each situation. Dennis Whitling said that essentially the first step would probably be the school board defining this concept with input from other entities depending on where the school would be located. Rod Visser reinforced the point about generators being site specific. Since the collaboration work group met, he talked with EMS about the notion of having schools built to be generator-ready. He said that the language here gets it into the mix so that it is not forgotten. However, there are same limitations as to haw many shelters can be managed atone time. He thinks that it makes sense to have shelters strategically located around the County. Commissioner Gordon reinforced what Commissioner Carey said about fleshing the non-traditional model because otherwise there may be questions. She said that there is a precedent in the SAPFO and the way building capacity is defined. She recommended having some kind of process regarding the non-traditional model. b. New School Construction Progress Reports Rod Visser asked the superintendents and staff to cover this topic. He said that the planning work is on for Carrboro High School and Gravelly Hill is very close to completion and occupancy. Superintendent Pedersen said that overall the project far Carrboro High School is going forward and the issues with the intersection of Smith Level Road have been resolved. They are waiting to see if they will have money for tennis courts. Commissioner Gordon pointed out that there is Moving Ahead money to handle improvements on Homestead Road for Chapel Hill High School. This is $650,000. The original amount was $1.3 million. She thinks that it is worth a letter to DOT to officially ask for the rest of the money. Rod Visser made a note of this. Superintendent Carraway said that they had a test on the sprinkler system at Gravelly Hill Middle School yesterday and they passed. Naw they are awaiting other inspections to receive a certificate of occupancy. They are hopefully on track for the dedication on October 22"d and the first day for students on November 1St Chair Jacobs arrived at 8:01 Pl~I. Elizabeth Carter said that she would like to invite the Board of County Commissioners to Frank Porter Graham to see some recent renovations there. She said that it is important to be mindful of the older facilities and there are improvements that they may need as the years go by. Chair Jacobs began chairing the meeting at this paint. Commissioner Gordon agreed about the older schools and the need for upgrades. She said that the money they have set aside is running out. c. 2006-07 Adopted School Budgets Commissioner Carey made reference to the item on Carol Woods and the contribution for CHCCS. He asked what this was for and Superintendent Pedersen said that Carol Woods became tax exempt a few years ago, and now they give a school an amount each year, though not under any legal obligation. The amount is $50,000. Commissioner Halkiotis said that the ABC revenues seem to be the same going to the schools. He thinks that revenue sales have been increasing, but this number is always the same. He asked how this was determined. Rod Visser said that by state statute, there are certain amounts of monies they have to provide to schools and also to the County, but he will check. Superintendent Pedersen made reference to their second page, under Local Revenue, and said that the board did increase the appropriated fund balance to fund their budget from $950,000 to $1,032,500 to fund some additional positions. Under the State Mandates, the salary increases were larger than anticipated and the retirement contribution also went up. The CHCCS had to absorb $200,000 of additional costs for salary and related expenses. They maintained the contribution at Carrboro High School. There were some other cuts and the school board reduced current expenses by $732,000 because there were new items that had a higher priority. He distributed a sheet with the specifics on this. He thanked the County Commissioners for the contribution to equity and for the increase in the district tax. Dennis Whitling asked clarifying questions about tuition revenue, which were answered by Superintendent Pedersen. Superintendent Carraway made reference to the OCS budget and added that they used local funds for startup costs for Gravelly Hill for materials and supplies. They reduced the amount by about $200,000 because when they enter the school an November 1St, they will only have 6t" and 7t" grades. The expansion items that they were able to provide included three AIG teachers and supplies and materials for the AVAD program. They were not able to add the positions far AVAD, but they added the training and materials. The positions will be added next year. They were also able to add some supplies for science. Dennis Whitling asked if there was a possibility for the Board of County Commissioners to set aside far each school district at budget time an amount of money that could be allocated based on the actual enrollment numbers if they are more than DPI's projections. Rad Visser said that they have discussed this before and the Manager's Recommended Budget included a reserve that could address fair funding considerations or this kind of situation that if a lot mare students showed up. This year the County Commissioners decided to allocate a large portion of the reserve for fair funding. Commissioner Halkiotis said that DPI's numbers are sometimes wrong. He said that they tried two years ago with the legislative delegation asking them to promote a local initiative for both school systems where the County could be exempt from the rule and allocate money based on the actual number of students who show up in the fall. He encouraged both school boards to push for this, along with the County Commissioners as part of the legislative package. This year, OCS lost $420,000 because of DPI's projections that were off. Chair Jacobs said that attachment 1-d-2, item b is the legislation that Commissioner Halkiotis referred to. He said there was a study before about this issue. The numbers ended up being neutral over a long period of time. d. SchoalslLocal/State Fiscal Relationships Rod Visser said that these attachments reflect same of the things that the County Commissioners, the school boards, and the Triangle J Council of Governments have tried to pursue over the last several years related to school funding, etc. He said that the Orange County Board of Commissioners has a long track record of petitioning the legislature each year to broaden the menu of revenue sources. 1. Lottery Proceeds Rad Visser said that they do have the lottery proceeds this year and they have talked about how they will roll those into the capital funding policy. He said that they see this as becoming part of the capital funding policy. Budget Director Donna Coffey said that the first deposit should be in by October 1St 2. Real Estate Transfer Tax Rod Uisser pointed out the attachment for this, An Excise Tax for Conveyances. There has been no success in getting this legislative authority either. 3. Senate Bill 2009 Rad Visser said that this was not new revenue, but it could provide some additional flexibility in the way that the new school construction takes place. Finance Director Ken Chavious said that the County's Bond Attorney Bob Jessup was one of the drafters of this bill. This bill was ratified at the General Assembly 2005 session. The bill authorizes local boards of education to lease school buildings, school facilities, and existing or new facilities. The lease can be far construction, repairs, ar renovations. The law also provides for private developers to contract work and there would be no bidding requirements that currently exist for local governments. The County Commissioners and the Local Government Commission would have to approve the capital leases prior to a school board entering into them. 4. School Construction Impact Fee Study Rod Visser said that the County Commissioners appropriated some funds in this year's budget to update the technical report, which reviews the costs of building schools and establishes a maximum impact fee for both school systems. It has been five years since the impact fee was increased. This is a precursor to potential review by the boards in any recommended changes of the current impact fee structure. 5. State bond issue status Rod Visser said that they had the monthly meeting today and no one is aware of anything definitive related to a possible State bond referendum. Chair Jacobs referred to the resolution about refunds of state and local sales and use taxes and he congratulated all staffs for pursuing sales tax reimbursements. Dennis Whitling asked about the lottery proceeds and if they will be revisiting this in the capital funding policy and Rad Visser said that is one of their top six priorities for the next several months. Dennis Whitling made reference to the land transfer tax and asked if there is an amount that the 1 % tax will raise. Chair Jacobs said that it was $6 million more in 2003 versus impact fees. There has been no calculation since then. Commissioner Halkiotis asked Dennis Whitling if he was supportive of a transfer tax and Dennis Whitling said that he would be supportive of looking at it. Dennis Whitling said that his concern is the continuing burden on the property tax base in the County, particularly related to the elderly. Chair Jacobs said that the hamebuilders and realtors have consistently blocked any discussion of the transfer tax. Other Items Ted Triebel made reference to the dropout mandatory age of 16 and said that they are legislatively thinking of raising it to 18 years. However, the State BOE wants to keep it at 16 years of age. He said that they have heard that the Governor is going to recommend another $% increase for the teachers and also there may be a deficit next year in the State. Chair Jacobs said that even though the State is not interested, the local government could still try if the school boards are interested. Ted Treibel said that he has been told that the high school principals across the State oppose the increase of the age. Commissioner Halkiotis said that at the County Commissioners' Association conference in Winston-Salem recently, there was a Center for Emergent Studies Director there who said that the biggest challenge facing North Carolina by the 2025 is the graduation rate from high schools. If the State does not get this under control, there are na safety valves far the dropouts to be absorbed in. The factories are gone. He personally endorses raising the age to 18. Superintendent Carraway said that the issue is that if you raise the compulsory attendance age to 18, you must have other resources available to the students at the school. She said that they want some thoughtful consideration of this and some way to keep their students in school. If students can be kept until past the 10t" grade, then they will very likely graduate. Discussion ensued on this issue. Ted Triebel said that they are doing some positive things such as the alternative school and Middle College. Chair Jacobs asked if the dropout issue was something the boards would like for the collaboration group to work on and Elizabeth Carter said yes. Jean Hamilton pointed out the importance of looking at the resources they will need to meet the needs of the students so that they stay in school. She said that students have told her that school is a social prison and maybe they could increase vocational trades ar have smaller high schools. They also need to think about the middle schools. Chair Jacobs said that this seems like one of the most pressing issues and they need to work back to make the case far what is required and their resources. Elizabeth Carter said that the Board of County Commissioners should look at each school's programs and the ones that will make a difference in a student's life. Jamezetta Bedford made reference to a conference they went to this week and the example of Davidson County and the wonderful dropout prevention program there. Chair Jacobs suggested that each school board pick items for the School Collabaratian Work Group to discus. 2. Informational Reports a. Implications of 2006-07 Adapted State Budget and Preview of Fiscal Year 2007-08 Budget Rod Visser said that they discussed this at the County staff meeting today and a similar teacher pay package next year. b. 10t" Day Student Membership Rod Visser said that the 10t" day membership numbers compared to the DPI projections for March for both school systems are higher. There are also significant increases when the two systems are added together - it is over 300 students. Chair Jacobs made reference to his trip to Madison, Wisconsin and said that collaboration and communication were the big issues. With no further items to discuss, the meeting was adjourned at 9:14 p.m. Barry Jacobs, Chair Donna S. Baker Clerk to the Board