Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, October 29, 1993                   TAG: 9310290204
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: A1   EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

ELECTED BOARDS: A FEW QUESTIONS FREQUENTLY ASKED

\ Q. How many places in Virginia have voted to change from appointed to elected school boards?

A. Last year, 42 counties, cities and towns approved elected school boards. The issue has passed in every locality where it appeared on the ballot. On Nov. 2, 36 localities - including Bedford, Botetourt and Roanoke counties and Montgomery, Giles and Floyd in the New River Valley - will vote on the question. Pulaski County approved an elected School Board last year.

\ Q. So how are elected school boards working out elsewhere in Virginia?

A. No one knows. The law says school boards can't be elected until 1994. Cities begin electing school boards in May; counties that have passed referendums will elect members in November 1995.

\ Q. What if a school board member's appointed term doesn't coincide with a supervisor's? Say a school board member's term is up in 1996, and the supervisor's term ends in 1995?

A. Then the school board member has to run a year early. School board elections have to conform to those of the governing body - either the board of supervisors or the city council.

\ Q. In Montgomery County, the Board of Supervisors has seven members, and the School Board has nine. What happens to the two additional School Board members?

A. The size of the School Board will remain the same. As to when those additional School Board members - who are at-large members from Christiansburg and Blacksburg - will be up for election, that's a good question. Nobody knows for sure. That's one of the loopholes in the new law yet to be closed.

\ Q. How will having an elected school board influence school finances? Will it raise or lower taxes?

A. Financially, the present system will continue - the school board will propose the school system's annual budget, but the financial decision still rests in the board of supervisors' hands. In other states, school boards have independent taxing authority to raise revenue for schools. Virginia law doesn't allow that.

\ Q. What if the voters change the process and then decide it doesn't work?

A. It can be put to another vote in four years.