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Madison-Plains bond issue fails
(by Kristy Zurbrick, Madison Editor - August 04, 2010)
Madison-Plains Local Schools will not be building a new K-12 school. The district’s bond issue request on the Aug. 3 ballot failed, 1,133-1,354 (45.56 percent-54.55 percent). Voter turnout was 43.5 percent.
This was the district’s last chance to pass a bond issue in conjunction with the Ohio School Facilities Commission’s Exceptional Needs Program. The bond issue would have covered 64 percent of the building’s cost. The state would have covered the other 36 percent.
“I’m disappointed for the kids,” said Superintendent Boone Hall. “We can’t dwell on it, though. We need to move on to the next phase, which is bringing in modulars.”
Starting with the 2011-12 school year, the district will close the Mount Sterling and Madison Rural elementaries. The plan is to house kindergarten and first grade at Midway Elementary, second through fourth grade at the middle school, fifth and sixth grade in modular classrooms outside the middle school, and seventh and eighth grade in modulars outside the high school.
“In the meantime, we’re going to get out in the community and answer people’s questions about what classes are going to be where, bus routes and that kind of thing,” Hall said.
“At least students will have a better place to go to school, where the heat is regulated, there’s air conditioning, and the rest rooms are accommodating. It won’t be top shelf, but it will be better,” Hall said.
Ken Morlock, Madison-Plains’ school board president, also said the election results were disappointing.
“Unfortunately, voters either don’t want state money or they want to pay more for a new building in the district,” he said. “I don’t think modulars are the permanent way to go. I don’t think anybody thinks that. We need to come up with something.”
John Shilling, a member of the Tri Elementary Preservation Association, which opposed the single K-12 building plan, said he is pleased with the election results.
“This makes up for the clicker meeting (school officials) keep coming back to. This is the real, true will of the people,” he said.
“Our whole concern has been to protect the elementary schools in the communities they are in now,” Shilling continued. “The thing we need to work on now is... retaining students and getting kids who do graduate to stay here and raise a family here.”
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