School facilities survey creates dilemma

GENTRY -- If the Gentry School Board was hoping for clear direction and guidance in pursuing a facilities plan which would provide more modern space for the Gentry Intermediate School, what they received from an online survey which ended Sunday was a dilemma, with the majority of survey takers indicating they wanted the board to pursue the building of a new high school but would not be willing to pay for it.

The 15-question survey obtained some basic information about the survey takers -- whether they lived in the school district, had children or grandchildren in Gentry Public Schools and were employed by the school district, along with their age, sex and family income bracket. The survey allowed participants to choose one of five options for future building plans in the district.

The survey choices included five scenarios for future building projects designed to provide modern and safe facilities for students in the Gentry Intermediate School since parts of that campus are approximately 50 years old and have, according to the school district and the Arkansas Department of Education, exceeded their useful lifespan for school facilities.

Scenario 1 in the survey was to demolish the older wing buildings at the existing intermediate school campus and build a new standalone classroom in that space. Portable classrooms would have to be rented during the construction. Estimated cost is $3 million to $4 million and one to three additional mills.

Scenario 2 in the survey was to use expansion space on the southwest corner of the middle school to build classrooms for the fourth and fifth grades and to move the third grade into the classrooms used by specialty classes at the primary school. The scenario would involve the reconfiguration of the schools to make the primary school include kindergarten through grade three and the middle school to include grades four through eight. This would likely be the least expensive option but could create some crowding problems at the primary school in the near future. Estimated cost is $3 million to $4 million and one to three additional mills.

Scenario 3 in the survey was to build a new intermediate school in the district-owned land behind (to the west of) the primary school. Estimated cost is $10 million to $12 million and four to five additional mills.

Scenario 4 in the survey was the construction of a fifth-grade classroom on the southwest corner of the middle school, a fourth-grade classroom in the circle drive to the north of the primary school and a third-grade classroom on the northwest corner of the primary school. This option would include the reconfiguration of the middle school to include grades five through eight and the primary school to include grades kindergarten through four. Estimated cost is $5 million to $6 million and two to four additional mills.

Scenario 5 in the survey was the construction of a new high school, with a competition gym, to the north of the existing high school and moving the middle school into the existing high school facility and the intermediate school into the existing middle school facility. This was the option the school board had hoped to accomplish with $5 million to $6 million in partnership funding from state, but that request was denied, making the costs in taxes much higher for school district residents. Estimated cost is $20 million and eight to 10 additional mills.

All of the above options, except for Scenario 1, would also require an additional access to the Pioneer Lane campuses and a driveway or street on the west side of the facilities to ease traffic on Pioneer Lane. Whether that expense would be the school district's responsibility, the city's or a shared cost has not yet been determined. A rough estimate of possible cost was approximately $250,000.

Out of 311 survey takers answering questions 12 and 13, 145 or almost 47 percent of the survey participants elected Scenario 5, the building of a new high school at the approximate cost of $20 millions, and moving the middle school and intermediate school up to the existing high school and middle school facilities. Eighty-six, or almost 28 percent, chose Scenario 3 to build a new intermediate school behind the primary school on district-owned land at a cost of $10 to $12 million.

Yet, when it came to how many additional mills survey takers were willing to pay for a school building project, only 15 participants, or less than 5 percent of the survey takers, were willing to pay the cost for a new high school or a new intermediate school. Of the 311 survey takers answering those questions, 54 were unwilling to pay any additional mills and nearly 200, or almost 63 percent of the survey takers were only willing to pay the cost to build new classroom space on the intermediate school campus or add on to the middle school and merge the intermediate school with the middle and primary schools. Yet these two options were among the least desirable in the survey.

Question 14 gives survey takers the option to revisit their scenario choices but includes costs and added mills to the scenarios. It did not ask survey takers if they were revising their answers to the questions of how many additional mills they would be willing to pay to fund a school facilities' project. Scenario 5 remained the front runner, with 99 of the 307 answering, or just over 32 percent, choosing that option.

The survey also allowed participants to relay additional information in the final question. Among answers were concerns that combining the intermediate school with the middle and primary would cause overcrowding in those facilities and cause more traffic problems. A number of survey takers suggested that the new high school is what the district needs and the district should work toward that goal and not take shortcuts which could push a new high school even further out into the future. Others suggested that the immediate need for newer and safer facilities for the intermediate school needed to be the top priority. A few complained about money spent on the PAC building rather than using that money to build a new school.

A matter of concern is the question of how well the survey responses represent the opinions of the district since just over 300 took the brief survey and thousands of residents in the district did not. This raises the question, as well, of how many voters who did not take the survey would take the time to vote on the issue if it were to be put before them in a special school election. Many questions remain unanswered.

In order to further clarify the wishes of voters within the Gentry School District, the school board, on Monday, suggested Barrett remove the two scenarios which would have combined the intermediate school with the primary and middle schools and prepare a new survey and find ways to get a broader sampling of voters, including a mass mailing to voters in the district.

General News on 05/20/2015