Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, August 26, 1993 TAG: 9308260196
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: By DAVID M. POOLE STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Republicans said the two questions will give voters a chance to take the middle ground in the debate over how members of the county's School Board should be selected.
Meanwhile, the School Board selection process may become an issue in two elections for Board of Supervisors seats.
The School Board now is appointed by a selection panel appointed by the Circuit Court.
A group of teachers and other residents who believe voters should select the School Board gathered enough signatures to put the question on the Nov. 2 ballot.
The successful petition drive prompted Windsor Hills District Supervisor Lee Eddy - who opposes elected school boards - to suggest a second ballot question by which voters could decide if the supervisors should appoint the School Board.
Supporters of elected school boards objected, saying a second question would confuse voters and could throw the county into a legal quandary if both initiatives passed.
Eddy and fellow Republicans Ed Kohinke and Fuzzy Minnix supported the second ballot question. Democrats Bob Johnson and Harry Nickens fought unsuccessfully to keep the second question off the ballot.
Eddy, who faces re-election this year, says he opposes direct election, because it could politicize the School Board and give narrow special-interest groups too much power. He also argues that School Board candidates could not keep campaign promises, because they would not have the authority to tax.
Lee Garrett, his opponent for the Windsor Hills seat, favors elected school boards.
"I think that anytime you can involve the public, you're moving in the right direction," said Garrett, a former county supervisor.
Garrett said there was no reason for the second ballot question, because voters have twice - in 1980 and 1988 - turned down initiatives to give supervisors the power to appoint the School Board.
"I would have to believe that the people are interested in some other direction," Garrett said.
In the Hollins District, Johnson is a vocal advocate of elected school boards, as is one of his two challengers, Charles Millican Jr., an independent.
"If the Board of Supervisors is elected, why shouldn't the School Board be elected?" Millican said.
But Republican Brenda Flora Wainwright sees no need to abandon the county's tradition of appointed school boards.
"I feel like elections would get too much politics in the schools," she said. "It's fine the way it is."
Still, Wainwright said she supports putting both questions on the ballot to give residents as many options as possible.
"My opponent has voted that he did not necessarily feel like they should be given choices," she said.
Johnson replied that he had recommended drafting a single ballot issue in which voters could have selected one of three school board selection methods. The idea was scrapped, however, because state law would not allow such a question on the ballot.
by CNB