Hunt for Money: Bond funds build classrooms, but equipping them is another matter

Bond money builds classrooms, but it doesn't furnish them and it doesn't pay for technology in older parts of schools getting additions.

In the past, the Winston-Salem/Forsyth County school system paid for furnishings and technology from state capital funds and other sources. But those sources are drying up, in some cases because of the economic downturn.

At the moment, school officials are looking at creative ways to pay for $16.5 million in furniture, equipment and technology for capital projects under way. And, because of higher-than-expected costs for a storm-water system at the site of Kennedy Learning Center, which is scheduled to become the new home for three schools, they're also looking at a potential $1.3 million shortfall for that project.

The good news is that federal stimulus money and savings from earlier projects could provide some of the $16.5 million needed. In 2006, Forsyth County voters approved $250 million in bonds for school projects. From the $200 million spent so far, the school has about $7.6 million in savings not yet committed elsewhere.

"We're dealing with a surplus, which is good," board member Buddy Collins said recently.

Bond surplus money also has been used to buy land to bank for future projects, such as a high school in the southern part of the county built on land across Ebert Road from the Kimmel Farm Elementary School and Flat Rock Middle School to use one day. Using land-bank money could free up another $1.5 million.

A couple of other potential sources would require some help from the county commissioners.

When the city and county were wooing Dell, the school system spent about $1 million in road and other improvements at Glenn High School.

"The DOT (Department of Transportation) required these changes, and they all related to the Dell project and us being a good corporate citizen doing our part," said Donny Lambeth, the school board chairman.

With the Dell plant closing and Dell having repaid the $7.9 million the county spent on the project, school board members are considering asking for that $1 million back. They readily acknowledge that county commissioners may have other ideas -- Commissioner Gloria Whisenhunt has suggested using the refunded Dell money to lower the county's property-tax rate -- but they think that it can't hurt to ask.

Commissioners also could give the school system the $6 million that the county could potentially save on interest by paying for 2006 school capital projects with zero-percent-interest money available through Qualified School Construction Bonds, a federal economic-stimulus program. Although the actual interest rate is more likely to be 1.5 percent because banks charge to handle the loans, that would still be less that the county is likely to pay otherwise.

"It's just like refinancing your mortgage," said Darrell Walker, the assistant superintendent for operations. "The hope is that $6 million would then come back to us."

"It would make sense that that money remain with us," Superintendent Don Martin said. "I think they are both very legitimate requests."

School officials have already talked informally with county staffers and plan to make a presentation to commissioners about those possibilities in the next month or two. It may be that commissioners support helping the school system with finding the necessary money, Martin said, but want to find other ways to do it.

"There are a lot of different moving parts," he said. "It doesn't matter how it happens."

Another source of the money could be the $3.2 million now available to the school system from the state's Public School Building Capital Fund. However, doing so could create other problems because that money is usually used for roofs and heating-and-cooling systems. Collins already sees long-term maintenance as a significant challenge for the coming years.

"As buildings age, there are things that need to be done," he said. "To me, that is the area I don't see a funding source for."

Board member Jeannie Metcalf said that she thinks that finding all the necessary money could be a problem.

"Money is tight everywhere," Metcalf said. "We are depending on too many things that are all iffy. I'm not optimistic that it's going to work out."

The $1.3 million potential shortfall at the Kennedy site could disappear if bids come in low enough on two not-yet-bid projects -- renovations for new administrative-center offices on the north side of town and a new Career Center at Kennedy.

Those projects are being paid for with $38.5 million from $62 million in bonds that voters approved in 2008 to enable Forsyth Technical Community College to expand into the buildings on Miller Street that are currently home to the Career Center and to the school system's administrative offices.

The Kennedy site is also becoming home to a new building for Carter Vocational High School, which serves students with mental, physical or learning disabilities, is also being built at the Kennedy site. When it opens in time for the 2010-11 school year, the word "vocational" will be dropped, and it will be renamed C. Douglas Carter High School. The school system is also opening a new career-technical high school in the Kennedy building.

The $16.5 million for furnishing and technology could be reduced by scaling back plans for technology. For instance, $2.7 has been budgets for upgrading older classrooms in schools that are getting additions. If that were cut, though, students and teachers in the older classrooms could find themselves without the technology available to students and teachers just down the hall.

Lambeth, for one, would like to keep seeing the school system continue providing new technology.

"I am a supporter of technology and continually upgrading the resources available in the classroom," Lambeth said. "We have seen tremendous value in the learning environment from technology."

With state money being so tight, a more-immediate worry for some board members is coming up with all the necessary operating money for coming school years.

"With the slowdown in the economy and potential shortfall in available state revenues," Lambeth said, "it is highly likely that our local schools will be faced with even deeper and more-drastic cuts in funding. It is irresponsible to keep asking for the local county commissioners to bail us out and make up those differences.

"Forsyth County has been very supportive of our schools and has been creative in funding new schools, renovating schools and expanding programs. So we have to be prepared and stretch our limits of creativity to think about how we are going to educate kids with even less resources."

kunderwood@wsjournal.com

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