By Stephen Smoot
The Pendleton County Board of Education held its regular meeting after a thorough presentation of the current status and future goals of the middle and high schools.
After the Pledge of Allegiance, J. D. Wilkins opened the meeting with the invocation. His prayer included, “Almighty God, we ask You to bless the staff and we ask You to bless the students.”
- P. Mowery provided the budget, treasury, and financial information. As he has through the school year, Mowery had positive information to report about school system finances. On January 31, the system had a cash balance of a little less than $2.6 million.
Since the winter months see a significant slow down in revenues from property taxes, grants, and aid from the state and federal governments, Mowery stated that the healthy balance was “not bad” and represented “a good cash position for us.”
Pendleton County Schools has earned this position, in part, because it did not use COVID funds to create programs and positions with ongoing costs. They used these funds for single time needs and less costly obligations that would not overwhelm the budget with obligations once the COVID funds ran out. Other counties face significant layoffs and other issues that, in some cases, could even lead to school closings because they did not take a conservative financial approach.
Carrie Nesselrodt reported that between grades six and 12, 20 students spend part or full time taking virtual classes. Some of these costs started during the COVID pandemic and were paid for by COVID funds, but moving these to the general fund will not overburden the school system budget.
Mowery predicted by the end of the fiscal year, the school system should have between $1.5 and $1.8 million in surplus funds. Of course, prudence dictates that the school system stay the course and husband its resources in the fat years so that it can remain resilient in the lean.
One issue that Mowery urged the board to keep its eye on is the Secure Rural Schools program. Pendleton, Randolph, and Pocahontas counties get aid based on the acreage of national forest land in each county. Pendleton had received $120,000 per year until recently when the poverty part of the formula got tweaked. Now the county schools get $70,000. Mowery said, “$70,000 is still $70,000” even though compared to the full budget, it seems relatively small.
Secure Rural Schools support, as Mowery explained, has gotten bogged down in Congress. All of the West Virginia delegation support the measure, but it has not yet passed both chambers. Mowery stated that it could fail to pass, but that he expected a better result.
West Virginia University Extension Services submitted a financial request based on local match requirements. State policy mandates that extension services get matching funds from the county board of education and county commission. Each must come up with $11,600, but a phase-in time period will help each.
President Donald Trump’s orders to investigate federal funding and freeze some disbursements created concern among county schools workers paid from federal funds. Charles Hedrick, Superintendent, stated that he sent an email to all school system workers that these positions and their pay were safe.
“All that money is now at the state level,” Hedrick explained.
Travis Heavner then gave an update on facilities. He addressed concerns raised by Pendleton County Middle/High School principal, Nicole Hevener, sharing that he had been working on the problem with old and damaged lockers in the middle school section of the school.
Locker replacement will be a big ticket item. Mowery explained that, although expensive, it likely would not qualify for a state major improvement project grant. The entire project will cost between $70,000 and $80,000, a price much higher than pre-COVID times. His plan lay in replacing the lockers in phases to spread the expense burden on the budget over time.
Heavner will apply for a major improvement grant to cover work on the HVAC system and controls in Franklin Elementary School. These types of projects do often qualify for such grants.
Sonny O’Neil, board member, asked about the issue with hot water in the bathrooms that Hevener raised during the school presentation. Heavner stated that the distance hot water had to travel from the heater to the bathroom made it difficult to have hot water instantly at that point. He said that he was examining different options for improved circulation that would provide consistency in temperature, especially not allowing it to come out at dangerously hot temperatures.
At the opening of the meeting, there was a reading of updated policies required by law.
The next meeting will take place at 5:30 p.m. on Feb. 18 at the board office.