Chesterfield boards at odds

Trammell

Some members of the Chesterfield County Board of Supervisors feel frustrated by what they see as a lack of cooperation and ineffective communication with the school administration and School Board in this year's budget process.

They expressed their concerns in a county budget meeting last week.

"There has not yet been a serious effort to itemize what they do or what it costs to run the services they provide," said Midlothian District Supervisor Daniel A. Gecker.

As an example, Gecker said he would like to know how much it costs to run the specialty centers. A comprehensive list would have been useful for the board to compare the cost of school programs with those programs in the county's general fund, he said.

School Board Chairman Marshall W. Trammell Jr. disagrees.

"We have provided an awful lot of detailed information of our programs and our activities," he said.

Trammell said the cost of running the transportation, facilities and technology departments was provided and available on the school system's Web site.

Gecker said in an interview that money is limited and allocation decisions need to be made.

"Which means by necessity looking into operations in the schools and them into ours," he said.

Gecker said he wished to see more representation from the school system in the board's budget sessions. He had hoped that the two full boards could have met to discuss the budget before the School Board had its public hearing on its plan, which already has been approved.

"We missed that window," he said.

Trammell said that he and A.S. "Art" Warren, chairman of the Board of Supervisors, have agreed that the full boards will meet in the spring to discuss the 2009-10 budget and improvements that can be made to the process, among other things. A preliminary meeting of the boards' liaison committee is scheduled for March 19, he said.

The Board of Supervisors is scheduled to adopt its budget April 15.

"I feel that we did not do enough for this budget process," Gecker said, referring to the two boards working together.

Matoaca District Supervisor Marleen K. Durfee, who pushed school leaders during a liaison committee meeting last month for information on what they were doing this year to address the budget shortfall, said that more dialogue should have happened before the school budget public hearing.

"I'm kind of disappointed to go through the entire process and not being able to tell the public that we've had meaningful dialogue," she said.

Bermuda District Supervisor Dorothy A. Jaeckle, said she had noticed during the boards' liaison meetings that school officials realize the need to make long-term changes to meet the financial challenges in the coming years.

Dale District Supervisor James M. "Jim" Holland said both groups provide services from the same shrinking pool of money and that both boards need to work together.

"The School Board and the Board of Supervisors were elected to plan better."

Contact Juan Antonio Lizama at (804) 649-6513 or .