School District Paints Grim Picture On Cuts Firings, School Closure On Plummer-Worley List

Plummer-Worley School District officials say they’ll consider options for keeping Lakeside Middle School open, though it may mean sacrificing student programs.

“There may be some minor compromises,” Superintendent Bob Singleton said Tuesday. But any changes to the school board’s plan for saving $475,000 will mean more terminations or cutback of student programs, he said.

News of the district’s plans to fire 15 staff members and temporarily close its newest school drew more than 100 patrons to a special board meeting Monday in Plummer.

Concerns about the future of the aging Worley Elementary School and the possibility of seventh-and eighth-graders attending the high school dominated the discussion, school officials said.

The school board pledged to study the feasibility of keeping the middle school open, but pleaded for more community input on where to pinch pennies.

“One comment throughout the meeting was it’s time to get the checkbook out,” said Bruce Lust, Lakeside Middle School principal. Closing the school “is not set in stone. The board set this meeting up to look at options. Unfortunately, no one came up with any $475,000 options.”

Plummer and Worley agreed to consolidate their districts in 1990 and have been getting about $350,000 annually as part of a consolidation incentive program. The end of that financial grace period, combined with dipping attendance levels and federal grant cutbacks, amount to a $475,000 loss. Nine teachers, five classified staff and one principal received reduction-in-force notices last week.

“There’s not one person in the district who won’t be affected to some degree, either by changing jobs or additional responsibilities or reduction in hours,” Superintendent Bob Singleton said Tuesday. “Teachers won’t have the 74-minute prep times they did before.”

More cuts still must be made, however, because savings add up to only $350,000. School officials plan to develop a number of other savings options for the board and community to consider next month.

Plummer High School Principal Kurt Hoffman said leaving seventh- and eighth-graders in the middle school is one option, but art, band, business or agriculture programs might have to be cut to make up additional costs.

Another alternative is to move administrative offices (currently in a rented building) into the middle school and send seventh- and eighth-grade students to the high school.

“Some parents felt junior high kids aren’t ready to mingle with high school kids and I agree,” Hoffman said. “But I think we can survive separately in the same building.”

Junior high students would be in the upper hallway of the school and would have different lunch and break times, Hoffman said. The two groups already mingle some, since high school students walk to the middle school for lunch, and middle school students take electives at the high school.

Singleton said the district has three facilities options - build a new school in Worley, build a new school in Plummer, or build additions at the middle school.

Building any new schools would involve buying land or passing a bond issue - alternatives unappealing to taxpayers, Singleton said.

But adding onto the middle school means shutting down the Worley Elementary School within the next five years - a plan that offers the lowest fiscal impact, but at the highest emotional cost.

, DataTimes MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: WHAT’S NEXT? Another special board meeting for public input is scheduled for May 6. A final decision on budget cuts is expected May 12.