At yesterday’s meeting, Guilford County Board of Education member Dot Kearns said she would consider nixing the airport-area high school and middle school form the proposed $450 million bond. That’s a pretty bold statement from an influential board member, considering the fact that it would cut a big chunk out of the bond, $106 million to be exact. It’ll never happen, though. The rest of the board wouldn’t support it and, if they did, they would find new projects for the money.
The next question is whether or not High Point-area parents will support the bond considering the redistricting issues they’ve been through the past few years. Fellow board member Garth Hebert said he “knows of several hundred parents who will support the referendum because of a decision to allow parents to opt out of a 2006 reassignment plan.”
I’m not so sure. Hebert reasoned that the High Point-area parents had “been through enough controversy,” but a school bond vote isn’t the same type of controversy as board decisions on redistricting because parents have a direct say in the outcome of the bond vote. Remember, too, that the board passed Hebert’s choice plan by a narrow 6-4 vote. You’ve got to believe High Point-area parents will keep in mind the four board members who voted against it when they walk into the voting booth.