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Public asks questions about Marietta City Schools levy at meeting

MARIETTA — The Thursday night public meeting on the Marietta City Schools levy proposal drew about a dozen people. The subdued group asked a few questions as board of education vice president Russ Garrison went through his presentation of slides and charts.

The meeting was the eighth held by the committee, each of them a two-hour come-and-go, informal session, held at several times of the days. Garrison has said that each has its own personality, depending on who comes. The meetings have been attended by as few as four people, others have drawn a dozen or more.

At each of them, Garrison is available to answer questions as he goes through the complex of factors involved in the proposal to build an entire new public education complex for the district.

The levy proposal would build a three-school complex on 49 acres of land adjacent to Washington State Community College, a project estimated at $85 million, to replace the district’s six schools, which range in age from nearly 50 to 107 years.

Garrison emphasized that the levy committee’s slogan, “The Time is Now,” is not empty rhetoric.

A provision in the state budget for 2020-21 put the Marietta levy proposal to the top of the funding list for the Ohio Facilities Construction Commission because it would be located adjacent to a community college, and it added an extra 10 percentage points of state funding. That provision, however, is deadlined for July 2020, and Garrison said it would be a political battle to get it extended.

The additional 10 percentage points means millions in additional state support for the project.

“Under the language in the budget bill, we have to apply before May 2020 to get into the system to hold that 39 percent (state funding portion),” he said. “The window would be the March primary election, and I’m not sure I would put it on the ballot in the middle of the presidential primary.”

The area’s state legislators – representatives Jay Edwards and Don Jones, and Sen. Frank Hoagland — inserted the provision with the support of the governor and the lieutenant governor, in part because it would create a public education system unique in the state, essentially a single campus from kindergarten through second year college, an idea that appeals to supporters of workforce development.

“They got it through the House, it disappeared in the Senate, then was added back in conference committee,” Garrison said. “I’ve talked to the legislators, and they are articulating the body blows they are taking from other districts who if not for this would have been at the top of the list. I’m not confident we could get this in another budget cycle.”

Garrison told the group that new schools would complement the district’s education strategies that work toward encouraging children’s creativity and teaching them to solve problems and execute complex project in small groups with team work.

Although those strategies can be implemented in the old buildings – and will be, even if the levy fails – the structure of the buildings themselves, with box-like classrooms strung along corridors, is obstructive, he said.

Several questions on more pragmatic details were asked.

“I never rode the bus to school, but it looks like more kids are going to be spending more time on the bus,” Tom Fenton said.

Garrison acknowledged that because students would be attending school in one location instead of six scattered ones, the demand for bus transportation would increase.

“I don’t think this will extend the time they’re on the buses. We’ll have additional buses and shorter routes in town. A lot of kids who were walking will ride,” he said. “We’ll have to decide whether we’ll continue to follow state guidance (bus service for elementary students who live greater than one mile from school and older students two miles away) or shorten it up – for example, make it available to kids on Seventh Street that aren’t quite a mile away, if that kid has to walk up Glendale. We’ll have to buy more buses. We’ll have more people outside that walking area, and we’ll have to decide which we maintain, or make more eligible (for bus transportation).”

Garrison said the additional buses would be purchased using Permanent Improvement Levy funds.

Nann Welch asked about the district’s agreement with the college.

“What does Washington State Community College get out of it?” she said.

The letter of intent with the college provides for the school district to purchase the 49 acres of land for $6,000 an acre. Garrison said that the proximity of the college would mean access within short walking distance of the college’s lab and technical facilities, as well as indirect encouragement for younger students to consider career paths through the institution by exposing them first-hand to its career possibilities.

“When our students get college credit, we pay for that,” Garrison said, adding that the district paid between $600,000 and $700,000 for college credit courses last year. He had told the group earlier that 63 percent of the students at Marietta High School were involved in some variety of blended education, including College Credit Plus courses taken either on Marietta College or Washington State Community College campuses or from teachers at the high school accredited to deliver college course instruction.

“What Washington State Community College gets is more interest from our students, and the more students they get, the more it helps their enrollment and viability,” he said. “The focus is, how are we helping students get best prepared, how do we deliver what our students need.”

The next session will be held in the basement meeting room of the Washington Public Library main branch from 10 a.m. to noon on Tuesday.

Michael Kelly can be contacted at mkelly@mariettatimes.com

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