Pool Is Cut In Revised School Plan

But Cost Still Exceeds Commissioners' Budget

The Charles County Board of Education proposed $10.4 million in savings this week on a controversial plan for a new high school, but the latest proposal would still cost $12 million more than the budget put forth by the county commissioners.

Eliminating the swimming pool from the school's site plan -- a possibility frequently suggested by commissioners and school board members over the past several months -- cuts $7.1 million from the project's price tag, which original plans put at $97 million. In response to a letter from the commissioners last month requesting a less expensive proposal, school officials outlined the potential savings in a meeting Tuesday.

"This has been an extremely difficult process; we have reviewed all construction aspects of the school," Board of Education member Charles E. Carrington (Pomfret) said in presenting the cost adjustments. "Our strongest desire is to approve the high school as originally designed."

The proposal and meeting between the commissioners and the school board came after weeks of squabbling between County Administrator Paul W. Comfort and leaders of the county's teachers union over school funding. In a series of letters to the editor published in The Washington Post and the Maryland Independent, union leaders debated Comfort about whether the county's education funding level is sufficient.

Comfort has emphasized the increase in school funding over the past several years, saying that Charles has the highest average annual percentage funding increase for education -- 8.2 percent -- of any Maryland county over the past seven years. But school officials have countered that education funding has grown more slowly than funding for public safety and general government expenses, and that county officials have misrepresented data from the past several years.

"It is this judicious selection of facts that misleads the public and propagates the myth that public schools receive over half the county's revenues," Meg MacDonald, chief negotiator for the Education Association of Charles County, wrote in a letter to The Post.

At Tuesday's meeting, the Board of Education requested a total budget of $302.7 million for fiscal 2009, which begins July 1. That represents a 7.1 percent increase over the current year's budget, which Superintendent James E. Richmond said is mostly attributable to increases in health care, transportation and utility costs, as well as cost-of-living pay adjustments for employees and the opening of Mary Burgess Neal Elementary School.

The new high school, which initially had been slated to open in 2011, was put on hold in March after the state Board of Public Works declined to provide funding that would have launched the several-year process of planning and constructing it. Under the funding formula that governs school construction, the state would be responsible for about $42 million of a $97 million school.

At Tuesday's meeting, Charles Wineland, assistant superintendent for supporting services, said that he hopes a series of cost-cutting moves will make the school palatable to the county government and to the state. Charles education officials are increasingly anxious to begin work on the new school because all of the county's existing high schools have enrollments exceeding official capacity.

In addition to eliminating the swimming pool, Wineland proposed cutting some of the "green building" environmental features that would save money over time but incur significant additional costs upfront. Deleting a rainwater harvesting system and a solar-powered hot water heater would save nearly $700,000, he said.

The biggest design change presented at Tuesday's meeting involves transforming the school from its current layout, with two two-story wings, to a single four-story building. Project architect SHW Group estimates that the change would save $730,000 because it would require only one roof, although some county commissioners raised doubts about whether that estimate took long-term costs into account and whether climbing three flights of stairs would be feasible for all staff members.

"I'm not sure it's even worth doing it," Commissioners President Wayne Cooper (D-At Large) said. "I'm just trying to make wise decisions here."

The commissioners said they plan to discuss the high school again at a future work session; a date has not been set.