Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, October 14, 1995 TAG: 9510160021
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-1 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: BRIAN KELLEY STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: CHRISTIANSBURG LENGTH: Medium
The three candidates included two in the same race - incumbent Joe Gorman and challenger Curtis Cox in Blacksburg's education-conscious District G - and challenger Robert Goncz. Goncz is opposing incumbent Nick Rush in District B, which includes the Ellett Valley and northern Christiansburg.
None said they would vote to raise taxes reflexively; all said it would have to be shown that an increase would definitely help the schools.
Two candidates, Rush and Richard Gordon, said they would do their best to improve schools without raising taxes. Gordon is opposing incumbent Ira Long in District E, which covers the northwestern corner of the county, including Prices Fork and McCoy.
Another, unopposed candidate Mary Biggs said the county has to consider the larger issue of what happens once federal and state budget cutbacks force the local government to make up the difference in other areas beside schools. She is seeking to represent the Hethwood and Laurel Ridge area, District F.
The six candidates spoke at a Thursday night forum sponsored by the Montgomery County League of Women Voters and three other civic groups. Though the forum for county School Board candidates isn't until next week, schools seemed to dominate the two hours of low-key, issues-oriented discussion before a small crowd of about 60, many of them educators or candidates for other county offices.
Only one of the candidates for the four supervisors seats on ballots this fall failed to appear for the forum - three-term Supervisor Ira Long of Prices Fork. His absence was unexplained.
The tax issue was the first question from the audience and has particular relevance this year, when the Board of Supervisors decided to maintain the same effective tax rate rather than approving an increase to pay for new school-spending requested by the School Board as a result of the lengthy FOCUS 2006 community study of the schools.
Goncz, though a School Board member for nine years, said any tax increase should fit into a longer-term plan of school improvement. "If it's spending for spending's sake, that's ridiculous," Goncz said. "I would not raise anything or lower anything unless I determine that there's a return on that investment that makes sense to me. That's why we put together FOCUS 2006, so we have a framework for decisions for today."
Rush cited past School Board budget proposals that would have required massive tax increases. The Board of Supervisors has increased its major revenue-producing levy - the real estate tax - only once in the past four years, and then in a nonelection year. "Over the past four years the Board of Supervisors has held the line on taxes while advancing the county," Rush said. "I'm not a big advocate of raising taxes. It's going to have to be proven to me that it's needed."
Aside from the question of support for a tax increase - a perennial dilemma in a usually fiscally conservative county - the candidates addressed how the supervisors will interact with an elected School Board and the future of Blacksburg Middle School. One question put Rush on the spot for his recent votes against a plan to build a large new elementary school to serve the Riner area.
Rush said he opposes the plan because he believes a 700-student elementary school is too large. Moreover, he said, parents of Bethel Elementary School students weren't given sufficient input into the plan. Bethel, located on Virginia 177, is slated to be closed under the new-school plan.
Goncz said the recommendation for the Riner school came about through a community-involvement process and he supported it.
On Blacksburg Middle School, Cox said he would favor keeping the current building over replacing it both for the emotions involved and because he favors keeping neighborhood schools. Gorman, his opponent, said the School Board is now looking anew at renovating the middle school because of direction from the Board of Supervisors. Whether it will actually save money over building a new school is still under study, he said.
Rush said he supported renovation. Goncz said it should be a question of how would renovation fit in with other long-range plans.
by CNB