A recently published list of more than 200 unused or underused public school district properties turned up the fact that the Fort Smith School District owns a cemetery.
Gordon Floyd, the district's deputy superintendent, said there is not a lot known about the property that the district maintains by keeping it mowed. Even the spelling of the cemetery's name -- placed on the state list as Nolon Springs -- is not at all certain. A marker erected in 2010 by a neighborhood association calls it Nowland Springs, citing the history of a Nowland family as its source, Floyd said.
"The cemetery covers a little over 2 acres on the north side of Fort Smith near the Arkansas River bridge linking Fort Smith and Van Buren," Floyd reported. "The land was sold to the Nowland Springs School District for $75 in 1887. The deed states that the land was 'to be used as a burying ground for the people of said School District according to its present boundaries and no other.'
"Interestingly, the deed doesn't specify the name of the school district. It just gives a legal description. So that doesn't help clarify the spelling issue," he said in an email. "According to a cemetery census there are 59 grave sites on the land. The dates of death range from the 1880s to the 1940s with the majority of burials occurring between 1900 and 1925."
The Arkansas Division for Public School Academic Facilities and Transportation posted the list of unused and underused properties on its website late last month as required by Act 542 of 2017. Most of the listed properties are buildings although there are some vacant lots and agricultural fields, too.
The state law clarifies and expands charter schools' rights of access and first refusal to purchase or lease unused or partially used facilities owned by traditional school districts. The charter schools are required to pay fair market value for any properties they buy or lease from the traditional districts.
NW News on 03/18/2018