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

DATE: THURSDAY, November 4, 1993                   TAG: 9311040172
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C-1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: LAURA WILLIAMSON STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

PETITIONERS HIT POLLS IN SALEM

While Virginians in 34 localities were casting their overwhelming approval of elected school boards Tuesday, five Salem residents were busy gathering signatures to put the measure on their city's ballot next November.

"We got the majority of what we need," said Aaron Smith, a member of Salem's Virginia Referendum Advocates, an organization that failed to gather enough signatures last summer to put the issue to a vote Tuesday.

"Working the polls was working a lot smarter."

Smith, who filed his intent to circulate a petition in August, has until May 11 to gather the required 1,214 signatures from registered voters to secure a referendum. Under a new law, petitioners have nine months in which to gather their signatures.

That gives Smith yet another Election Day - May 3 - to make his pitch to people he knows are registered voters.

Smith would not say how many signatures he has, but he thinks he'll be well ahead of the game by May's City Council elections.

"Hopefully, we'll have what we need, and May 3 will just be gravy," he said.

With the exception of Salem, Franklin County and Roanoke, every locality in the Roanoke metropolitan area and New River Valley has passed a referendum allowing popular election of school board members. Like Salem, Franklin County failed to get the measure on the ballot this year. No one in Roanoke tried.

Donna Hodges of Rocky Mount said she and her husband will try again next year to get the measure on Franklin County's ballot. They are hoping to start circulating petitions in January.

Virginia cities that passed the referendum will begin electing school board members in May; counties cannot start until November 1995.

Smith said his group isn't pushing for elected school boards, only for giving Salem residents a chance to vote on the issue. He disputes the notion that simply putting the question on the ballot will assure its passage, as it has in each of the 76 Virginia localities that have had an elected school board referendum.

"Salem's different," he said. "If any place votes to keep it the same, it would probably be Salem."

by CNB