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Trustees restore meeting date for meetings
The Halifax County School Board will continue to hold its regular
monthly meetings on the second Monday evening of the month,
following
action taken on Tuesday during a budget work session. On a 6-2 vote
with new trustees, Devin Snead and Stuart Comer opposing the action,
the Board approved the second Monday night meeting schedule which
they
have followed over the past several years. Therefore the next
regular
meeting of the School Board will be Monday evening, February 11.
During their earlier regular monthly meeting on January 14, the
meeting
date had been scheduled for the second Thursday evening of each
month
with the first motion to change the date dying on a 4-4 split, then
passed on a second try, 6-2, with Trustees Joe Gasperini and D. H.
McDowell opposing.
Also on another split vote trustees Tuesday afternoon voted to
furnish
themselves with laptop computers. The motion, made by Gasperini and
seconded by Snead, passed on a 5-3 vote with McDowell, Steve
Anderson
and Walter Potts opposing the matter.
The Board also voted to move their next budget work session to
February
20, rather than February 19.
Most of the work session, however, centered on discussion of the
Governor's proposed budget which includes no money for teacher
salary
increases. "This is a big concern for us," said Superintendent Paul
Stapleton, who noted that this is the first time he can remember
that
the Governor had zero money for teacher salary increases. "It just
means that if we are to give our teachers a raise, it will have to
come
from local funds," he added.
Another major concern of the Governor's budget is that of a $150,000
cut in funding for the four year old program. "We're just going to
have
to deal with these things as best we can," Stapleton said. He noted
that school staffers are working to develop a draft budget to
present
to County Supervisors by the end of February, some two months
earlier
than they have in the past since the County has voted to go to
bi-annual real tax collections. That means that Supervisors have to
know how much revenue the County must generate in order to set its
tax
rate in order be able to pay the County's bills.