By JAN LARSON McLAUGHLIN
BG Independent News
Bowling Green City School officials want to know what local residents think about the various building plan options, but they don’t want to spend a fortune collecting those opinions.
The costs submitted by surveying firms ranged from $12,500 to $24,000. “I think that’s a lot of money to sample the population,” Superintendent Francis Scruci said Tuesday during the board of education meeting. “That’s a big chunk of change,” for gathering the opinions of approximately 300 people, he said.
The school district is facing the decision of building one new facility for all the elementaries, or remodeling the elementary schools, plus making some major renovations at the high school. Scruci tried to take the public’s pulse about the options with a series of public meetings held at each of the school buildings. But it seemed that a lot of the same people showed up for most of the meetings.
“I feel strongly that we don’t have enough community input right now,” to make a decision, said school board member Jill Carr.
Scruci agreed that he would like more input, but the professional survey prices have gone up substantially since many people no longer have landlines, and it is more costly to access people’s cell phones.
The board discussed various options, such as putting a survey on the district’s website, or possibly using the city’s all-call system to notify local residents. But the difficulty is still how to reach farm families in the district, retirees, and people without children – many who may not be aware of the building discussions.
Board member Bill Clifford shared Carr’s concerns. “We don’t have a lot of data,” he said. And the estimates from the professional survey firms are “hard for me to swallow.”
However, “We know our facilities are in need,” and delays in getting public input means the district “keeps on spinning our wheels,” Clifford said.
Scruci said he would work on coming up with some type of survey and bring it back to the board next month.
Also at Tuesday’s meeting, the school board took action to put a 0.5 percent income tax renewal on the ballot in May. The tax duration would be five years.
Scruci also said he is looking for some dates to hold a public meeting on possible plans to start conducting drug testing of students. The testing could start as early as this fall.
“I think the community ought to have a chance to discuss that with us,” Scruci said.
The superintendent also informed the board that 177 ½ “boots” have been sponsored so far for doors in the school district. The boots are designed to keep intruders out in the case of an emergency. The preparation work for installing the boots started last week.
In other business, it was announced that Patricia Rish was retiring after 31 years as a library media specialist, most recently in the Middle School.
