HATTIEVILLE —The Wonderview School District superintendent said the proposed 6.9-mill property-tax increase in Tuesday’s school election is needed to add classrooms and remodel old facilities, but not everyone is supportive of the increase.
St. Vincent resident George Myers said he is against the Wonderview School District’s proposed construction project.
The 69-year-old Vietnam veteran said “it’s aggravating” that the district is asking for the increase.
“All it’s doing is putting a hardship on the elderly, handicapped and widows,” he said. “There are 17 widows in a 2-mile radius here. We didn’t get any Social Security raise.”
The $12.3 million project includes classroom additions, remodeling of elementary buildings, which are nearing 50 years old, and construction of a 1,200-seat gymnasium and a bus-maintenance facility. The gymnasium is estimated to cost $5.6 million.
Superintendent Carroll Purtle said the existing gym, built in the 1980s, is in poor condition, but it could be used for physical education and peewee basketball programs in cooler weather after a new one is built.
“We can keep using the old gymnasium for a while. It’s in bad condition. If you do update it, it’s going to cost at least $3 million,” he said.
“We have community things going on in my facilities almost every night; the school is a big part of the community. The board decided it would it be more cost-effective to build a new one [gymnasium] than put $3 million into this old one that might buy you 15-18 years,” he said. “Also, bond money is still fairly cheap.
“If this plan goes into action, it should be good for the school for 30-40 years,” Purtle said.
The board voted 4-1, with two members absent, to put the proposal on the ballot. Board member Jamie Brice voted against it.
If adopted, the millage rate would increase from 36.2 to 43.1 for the 457-student district. It would cost someone who owns a home with an accessed value of $100,000 an additional $138 per year in property taxes.
Myers said the increased cost in taxes “might mean food in the pantry or prescribed medicine” for some senior citizens.
Purtle said the increase in property tax “might affect some elderly people; it might not; it depends on where you fall on the scale and how much property you own.”
“I’m almost 65, I understand what they’re talking about; I have medications I can’t afford because they’re not covered by insurance. Everybody is going to have to make up their own minds about how they’re going to affect them,” he said. Purtle said he raised cattle for 30 years, so he understands how the property-tax increase affects landowners.
“Most [of the proposed project] has to do with the fact we’re growing swiftly from elementary to high school,” Purtle said. “At high school, we’re talking about mainly building a technology center.”
An estimated $1.25 million will go toward construction of a two-classroom addition to replace two portable classrooms that will be torn down, Purtle said. Also included will be a computer-study area to house approximately 60 computers.
When Brice was contacted for a previous story in the River Valley & Ozark Edition, she said she didn’t want to go into details about why she voted against the proposal.
“I have several reasons …,” Brice said. “I’m all for school improvement; don’t get me wrong, but I believe we need to address several issues that we’re not looking at right now.”
Brice said she was talking regarding classrooms and that she discussed her thoughts at a previous school board meeting.
Otto Zimmerman, 86, said he doesn’t support the property-tax increase, either.
Zimmerman, who said he lives halfway between St. Vincent and Wonderview, is a former board member of Sacred Heart Catholic School in Morrilton.
“I don’t think it’s necessary,” he said of the proposed construction project. “We spent a whole lot of money up there on buildings, and we haven’t spent anything on helping the kids’ education. It’s too much too fast. I think we should wait and pay off some debt, and we can consider something else.”
Purtle said that money has been spent on students’ education.
“We have been spending a lot of money on computer systems, a lot to restructure things to get kids into the 21st century,” Purtle said. “We’re trying to move into STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) … and beef up our curriculum.”
One of the men commented that raises for teachers weren’t being considered, but Purtle said teachers’ salaries cannot be paid out of bond proceeds.
Elementary school Parent-Teacher Organization President Shawna DuVall, who also teaches kindergarten, said she and her husband, Brent, are both excited about the proposed projects the millage increase would fund. They have three children — an eighth-grader, a third-grader and a second-grader.
“My thoughts on the millage would be it’s something we desperately need at Wonderview,” she said in an earlier interview. “We’re definitely for it, and we think it would be something that would greatly benefit our school.”
As a parent of a daughter who plays basketball, DuVall said a new gymnasium would be nice, because the current facility is not air-conditioned. DuVall also said the new science classrooms are needed.
Board President Tom
Nelson of Cleveland said enrollment is up in the elementary school, “and it’s going to catch up to us.”
“We’ve been wanting to add to our preschool
program,” Nelson said.
Purtle said the board opted to add a third classroom to the preschool, which is in a former residence near the baseball/softball complex, instead of building another facility. The estimated cost is $560,000. The existing building will be remodeled, and the basement has to be restructured.
“We also want to add a safe room,” Purtle said.
The elementary wings are nearing 50 years old, Purtle said, and will be remodeled to add two science labs — one for grades four through six and one for kindergarten through third grade.
Purtle said a structural engineer found that the elementary buildings are sound.
“We have old buildings in great shape that will cost about half the cost to remodel than build new ones,” he said.
Another part of the project is a new bus-maintenance facility. The existing one, a 1936 former agriculture building, will be razed and another one constructed at an estimated cost of $500,000, Purtle said.
If the millage proposal doesn’t pass, “we go back to the drawing board, because we still have to figure out why it didn’t pass. We still have a growth issue where I’ve got to have classrooms in high school,” Purtle said.
At least one project has to be done immediately, he said.
“If I can find the money, we have to at least start working on that foundation down in the preschool. I don’t know where that money will come from. Eventually, this has to be done,” he said.
“If you sit still and do nothing, you’re going to fall behind everybody; we’re trying to stay ahead,” Purtle said.
Purtle said the polls will be open from 7:30 a.m. to 7:30 p.m. Tuesday in the elementary library.
Senior writer Tammy Keith can be reached at (501) 327-0370 or tkeith@arkansasonline.com.