As the school year passes into history, the Pendleton County Board of Education met to hear of summer recess duties, mostly concerning maintenance and the yearly budget.
After recognizing the Golden Horseshoe winners, the board moved on to J. P. Mowery’s treasury and financial report.
He discussed a series of grants, discussing first a child nutrition grant that helps to pay for using locally grown food for school lunches. Mowery mentioned that during the past year, for example, Teets from Hardy County has provided some of the beef used.
After listing a number of small grants, he then noted a $70,000 grant secured through the efforts of the incoming Pendleton County Middle/High School principal, Derek Lambert. The grant will go to pay for programming next year. Additionally, Mowery shared that some federal grants “were reduced slightly.”
As he has throughout 2025 so far, Mowery reiterated that the budget for the school system was healthy and the predicted carryover of funds left over from fiscal year 2025 to 2026 will still occur.
“We’re still on target to meet our end of year forecast,” Mowery shared. The end of year refers to the end of the fiscal year on the last day of June.
He added that he expected some minor revisions as he and his team finished preparing the budget for the state. Mowery asked for, and received from the board, authorization to submit the revisions to the superintendent for approval rather than calling for a separate board meeting at the end of June.
Mowery said that “we had some pretty hefty payroll to be processed on June 3 . . . but that was expected.” Other recent bills included one for asbestos mitigation at Brandywine Elementary School required prior to scheduled repairs.
Upon conclusion of Mowery’s reports. Board President J. D. Wilkins, board president, said, “Thank you for your all’s hard work this fiscal year.”
Travis Heavner provided a report on facilities and maintenance, thanking Sonny O’Neil, board member, for his help in doing some work on the tarp covering damage incurred at the Harold Michael Building in Circleville.
Equipment inside the damaged area was deemed to be “in pretty good shape” with only one instrument damaged.
“I appreciated his help on Saturday for a couple of hours,” noted Heavner. He added that insurance adjusters had examined the damage and would send a cost total based on their findings.
He then discussed other projects coming up during the summer.
This included a project to paint the gymnasium at Franklin Elementary School. Once done, the same crew will work on painting exterior doors at the middle/high school. Heavner stated that they would also restore the safety signage on those doors.
In response to a Wilkins query about the locker rooms, Heavner stated that he had requested that all cleats and other equipment be removed in anticipation of a thorough cleaning of those facilities. “We’ll get a cleaning done in there before football starts,” Heavner assured the board.
He also stated that he hopes to get the middle school locker project done prior to the start of the school year and would reserve some of the removed lockers. They will go out to the elementary schools so that students can get practice in accessing them before moving on to sixth grade.
The board members then approved renewal of the memorandum of understanding between Pendleton County Schools and Eastern West Virginia Community and Technical College. This continues dual credit and Grow Your Own classes and related programming.
Charles Hedrick, superintendent, noted in his comments that the board would have to take up the cell phone issue after the West Virginia State Legislature passed an act that gave boards explicit authority to regulate them in the classroom.
“It’s not a blanket policy,” he said, adding “there are options for us.”
