ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1995, Roanoke Times
DATE: Wednesday, December 20, 1995 TAG: 9512200052
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-2 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
DATELINE: DUBLIN
SOURCE: PAUL DELLINGER STAFF WRITER
State Sen. Malfourd "Bo" Trumbo, R-Fincastle, got an earful Tuesday from Pulaski County officials on state funding cuts for education.
County Administrator Joe Morgan said an estimated $400,000 in state money will be lost to county schools in 1995-96 because of the composite index on which funding to localities is based. It would take a 5-cent increase in county real estate taxes to make up for that, he said.
"Eighty percent of the state is facing the same problem we are," Superintendent Bill Asbury told Trumbo. The composite index includes such factors as numbers of students, which are decreasing in rural areas, and real estate values which dropped in the richest 20 percent of the state.
"What we're seeking is not to take anything away from Northern Virginia," Asbury said, but to find ways to increase educational funding to keep localities like Pulaski County from losing ground.
"Four hundred thousand dollars will just let us stay where we are," said Supervisor-elect Charles Cook. "That's not what we want. We want to go up."
Trumbo noted that Gov. George Allen had proposed certain funding increases for kindergarten through high school as well as for higher education.
"There's flaws within the composite index and we have been trying to fund Trumbo said. Initiatives of that kind might at least help localities free some money to put into school operations.
"The only concern some of us have is that some of the initiatives also require matching money," Asbury said. "It's still money that we have to come up with from somewhere."
Another problem is that counties like Pulaski often have aging school buildings that cannot handle some of the new technology without expensive upgrades.
Trumbo told the county and school officials and representatives of Pulaski Town Council it was doubtful that additional funding would make up for the $400,000 being lost here, although Allen had said he wanted to fully fund educational Standards of Quality,
Pulaski County has been working on educational initiatives of its own, such as reducing class sizes so pupils in lower grades get more individual teacher attention. "We're at the point where we can't lower the classes anymore, even though we want to, because of the lack of space," Asbury said. "So we're facing capital needs."
Trumbo said there was talk of using proceeds from the state lottery for education, and that perhaps it could be tapped for new buildings. Repayments on such loans would have lower interest, and the money saved could go toward operations.
The problem there, Asbury said, is that the urban areas with rising numbers of students are likely to grab any such money for new buildings of their own.
The county's other priority is more money for roads. But Trumbo said he doubted that money would be forthcoming unless there was an unexpected push to increase the gas tax.
A gas tax would hurt Southwest Virginians because they must travel greater distances to work, school and elsewhere, he said, but they also need paved roads to do that traveling. "It's not so much roads as bridges" that are wearing out and have to be replaced, he said.
Trumbo predicts the two political parties will work together in the 1996 General Assembly, rather than having administration-legislature conflicts resulting in such things as the federal budget impasse.
"I think that we will act as adults," he said. "I think what's going on up in D.C. will act as a warning to us all that you all don't want that kind of garbage going on in Virginia ... I think we'll be able to work all that out."
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