Community leaders from in and around Pulaski County presented to a state Board of Education committee Wednesday their wish lists and visions for alterations to school district boundary lines.
The Scott and Shannon Hills communities in the Pulaski County Special School District, for example, asked to attach to different districts -- the North Little Rock, England and Bryant school systems -- so students can attend schools in those districts that are closer to their homes.
North Little Rock district leaders asked to expand that district's boundaries to the North Little Rock city limits, while Maumelle and Sherwood leaders asked that nothing be done that would waylay plans to carve their own districts out of the Pulaski County Special district in the not-so-distant future.
Leaders from the different cities, communities and school districts made their appeals to the state committee that is studying school boundary lines in Pulaski County. The committee will report its findings and make any recommendations for changes to the full Arkansas Board of Education later this year, possibly in June.
"This is complex stuff," said Jay Barth, an Education Board member and chairman of the boundary committee, at the conclusion of the meeting in which the committee took no action.
"We've probably now looked at about 55 maps of this county," said Barth of Little Rock. "We are swimming in a lot of information."
Committee members will meet again at 1 p.m. May 13, when they will take public comments and then begin developing a report to the full board.
Pulaski County Special School District Superintendent Jerry Guess told the committee Wednesday that he feared that the talk of possible boundary changes in the county will deter Pulaski County Special district voters from approving a 5.6-mill property-tax increase for construction at a special election May 12.
"Regardless of what takes place in the future -- whether Maumelle ever gets a district or whether Sherwood does, or whether kids down here ever get to go to England [school district] -- we have a proposal that will keep our millage rate below the millage rates in the rest of Pulaski County," Guess said.
"And we would provide our students with extraordinary facilities -- not just for part of our students but all of our students. I want it clear that all of these discussions do not negate the idea, or rather the absolute fact, that we need facilities improvements in PCSSD."
If approved, the money generated from the tax increase would be used to replace Mills and Robinson high schools, nearly double the size of Sylvan Hills High, renovate the old Mills and Robinson high schools for Fuller and Robinson middle schools, and build a new elementary school along the Interstate 440 corridor. Renovations, expansions and repairs also would occur at all other district schools, according to plans the district has submitted to U.S. District Judge D. Price Marshall Jr.
The Pulaski County Special district, which circles Little Rock and North Little school districts and includes Sherwood, Maumelle, College Station, Landmark and west Pulaski County, remains subject to federal court supervision of its desegregation efforts in some facets of its operation. That is the result of what is now a 32-year-old federal school desegregation lawsuit involving all three Pulaski County school districts and the state.
To become unitary or released from that court monitoring, the Pulaski County Special district has to equalize the condition of its buildings. The district has some very new buildings in Maumelle and Sherwood and much older buildings in other parts of the district, including in the southeast section that has a greater proportion of black residents.
Barth said that any decisions by the full board on boundaries likely would have to be submitted to the federal judge presiding in the desegregation lawsuit for approval.
"Whatever vision we have, we won't be snapping our fingers and changing these lines," Barth said.
Sam Ledbetter, chairman of the Education Board and a committee member, urged support for current efforts underway to improve the districts, including the Pulaski County Special district's work on facilities, as a prerequisite for "creating a modern-day, forward-looking model or vision" for the school districts.
"Without getting unitary on facilities, we're not going to do that," Ledbetter said. "We do have to support Pulaski County Special district's efforts ... as well as Little Rock and North Little Rock's efforts -- to resolve, finally, what at some points for all of us looked like it was almost unresolvable -- this long-standing lawsuit.
"You have to get past that ... to look forward to what works best," he said. "We need to support the current efforts to build a future that makes sense."
Mayor Mike Kemp of Shannon Hills, which is in Saline County and southwest of Pulaski County, praised the committee for taking on the school district boundary issue. School district boundaries throughout the state need to be re-evaluated, and adjusted to promote efficiency and reduce the cost of school bus transportation, he said.
Kemp said it makes no sense to spend money busing students who would not need to be bused if district lines were reconfigured.
"I hope this catches fire statewide," he said.
Kemp asked that a section of Shannon Hills that is part of the Pulaski County Special district be released to the Bryant School District in Saline County.
"We have kids who could walk or ride their bikes to Davis Elementary" in the Bryant district but instead have to ride the bus a long distance to Pulaski County Special schools, he said.
He also said he has had to argue with Pulaski County election officials to get to vote in Pulaski County Special district elections because of his Saline County address.
"Our people are disenfranchised. They have no voice in the district," he said.
Martin Gipson of the Scott community, which is losing its elementary school next year because of its small enrollment, asked that the eastern part of the Pulaski County Special district be detached from the Pulaski Special district and divided between the North Little Rock School District and the England School District.
The area of the Pulaski County Special district that is generally south and east of Old River Lake would be annexed to the England district. North of the lake would become part of the North Little Rock district, if Gipson's request is approved.
Otherwise students in the Scott area will be assigned to Harris Elementary, more than an hour-long bus ride away in the McAlmont community and to Fuller Middle and Mills High.
Gipson said about 800 students live in the Scott area but fewer than 300 currently attend a traditional public school.
That's because the existing school was not updated and was under constant threat of closure, Rep. Camille Bennett, D- Lonoke, told the committee.
Bennett also discounted Pulaski County Special district's plan to build a replacement school for Scott and College Station elementaries along the Interstate 440 corridor because of the distances that will be required for student travel.
"That's not a workable plan," Gipson said.
Maumelle Mayor Mike Watson and Sherwood City Alderman Beverly Williams both asked that the state leave the Pulaski County Special district boundaries as they are in their areas so as not to keep those communities from establishing their own districts once Pulaski County Special district is declared unitary and released from federal court monitoring.
Permitting the North Little Rock School District boundaries to extend to the city limits, or creating one district on each side of the Arkansas River, would hinder those plans being made by Maumelle and Sherwood leaders.
The fact that the state has taken over two of the state's largest districts -- Pulaski County Special and Little Rock --proves that bigger is not always better, Watson said.
If North Little Rock district boundaries are extended to the western city limits, Pulaski County Special's Crystal Hill Elementary would become part of the North Little Rock district.
Watson said more Maumelle children attend Crystal Hill than attend the smaller Pine Forest Elementary that is in the Maumelle city limits. Maumelle leaders envision a Maumelle district that would include Crystal Hill as well as Oak Grove Elementary, which is in an unincorporated part of the county.
Maumelle Alderman Preston Lewis said some state-directed marginal changes in boundaries might make sense but he urged the committee to take "bold steps." He said the far-flung Pulaski County Special district is not sustainable because it is pulled in different directions by various entities. Municipalities in the district now can sustain their own districts, which will promote parent engagement in the schools, he said.
Education Board member and committee member Diane Zook of Melbourne on Wednesday urged that after the Education Board committee formulates its report and recommendations to the full Education Board, a second public comment period be held.
A Section on 04/09/2015