Schools need money. How best to ask?

By Emily Richmond

Wednesday, Feb. 13, 2008 | 2 a.m.

The Clark County School Board faces a quandary.

The best hope the board has for persuading voters to approve the largest school construction program in Nevada history lies in explaining precisely what the money will buy — which schools will be replaced, where new campuses will go and so on.

Unfortunately, some of those details are elusive for the district. It is growing so fast and the population is so transient that making hard and fast promises is a perilous endeavor.

The district can offer its predictions to voters, but if growth patterns change, or a school’s condition deteriorates more quickly than expected, construction plans will have to be adjusted. And that could leave voters feeling duped.

At a meeting Monday, the School Board discussed the language of the ballot question, which will go to voters in November. The district wants a $9.5 billion capital campaign, with $5.2 billion for new construction (73 schools) and $4.3 billion for modernization, replacement and other needs.

The trick in making its case is finding the right balance between making specific promises and saying, in effect: Trust us. We’ll do the best we can.

“Do we need a disclaimer on here to show this isn’t written in stone?” trustee Carolyn Edwards said.

Trustee Sheila Moulton said she has heard from constituents who want to know which schools in the older east region would benefit from the new money.

“A number of people have told me they will support the bond based on that (answer) — it could be a turning point,” Moulton said. “If we don’t name specific schools, let’s at least educate people about the selection process.”

Another potential sore spot with voters is a statement the district made in 1998 about year-round schools. In that bond campaign, the district told voters that all elementary schools would operate year-round, saving the expense of building even more schools. Today, 40 percent of elementary schools are year-round.

Trustee Ruth Johnson said the language should not be repeated in the new bond campaign.

“To say all schools will be year-round just isn’t the reality,” Johnson said.

The language in the 1998 bond measure about year-round schools was, in fact, a calculation made for planning purposes to determine the number of classroom seats the district thought it would need, Clark County Schools Superintendent Walt Rulffes told the School Board on Monday. That projection, he said, is different from the district’s “operational philosophy,” which is to convert schools to year-round only as necessary.

Joyce Haldeman, the district’s associate superintendent of community and government relations, said the district had intended to operate all elementary schools year-round, as the 1998 bond measure described. But the measure produced more money than expected, providing enough to build still more schools and keep many elementary schools on nine-month schedules.

In the years since, student enrollment growth has slowed slightly, but demand continues to force year-round schedules. Of the four elementary schools opening in August, all will be year-round.

Even so, some critics say the 1998 bond measure amounted to a pledge and wonder why new elementary schools are needed before existing campuses are moved to year-round schedules.

Johnson said she understands the criticism. If the same language were repeated in the new bond campaign, every elementary school would have to go year-round before ground was broken on the next new campus, she said.

A study group made up of parents, educators, staff and community representatives reviewing the issue of year-round schools recently called on the district to improve its communication with the public. The School Board apparently is taking heed. Members are looking for new ways to explain that the construction dollars are badly needed and will be spent appropriately.

“That’s very smart,” Carole Vilardo, president of the Nevada Taxpayers Association, said of the district’s early strategy. “People want to know that what they’re being told is going to occur really is going to occur. People want honesty.”

Erin Cranor, who has served five years on the district’s Attendance Zone Advisory Commission, said she favors more transparency on bond measures.

“I don’t know how easy it is to put into a ballot question, but there’s time between now and November for the district to show us what’s going on,” said Cranor, who has four children attending district schools.

That should include specific breakdowns of how the $4.3 billion categorized as modernization and other needs would be spent, Cranor said.

“When you look at a budget you don’t want to see a big clump that seems like a slush fund,” Cranor said. “That’s something you don’t want to vote for.”

The bond measure would allocate $500 million for “educational equity,” a phrase that means bringing older schools up to par with newer ones. That’s a top priority especially for parents in older neighborhoods that didn’t see much effect from the 1998 bond, said Mary Jo Parise-Malloy, a member of Nevadans for Quality Education.

The district would also do well to remind people how far the 1998 bond money went, Parise-Malloy said. By all accounts, the 1998 bond campaign has been a success. The district promised voters 88 new schools. Thanks to good fiscal management and rising property values that sent tax revenue soaring, by the end of the campaign the district will have built 99 new schools and replaced 11 campuses. Additionally, 228 schools will have been modernized, compared with the 184 originally scheduled.

“The district doesn’t always do such a good job promoting itself,” Parise-Malloy said. “This is one of those times when they really have to blow their horn.”