A 14-day tutoring contract extension — priced at more than $21,000 — was approved in a split vote of the Dollarway School Board on Tuesday night.
Meeting in regular session, the board debated the proposal with Director Gene Stewart denouncing the fee as “much too much.” A female student protested and said no charge on a program that helps students learn and perform better on tests should be considered excessive.
Stewart cast the lone nay while Directors Joe Blanks II, Efrem Elliott, Cathy Hunt and George Stepps supported a motion to approve the expenditure to continue the program. The vote followed an assurance by Superintendent Dr. Bettye Dunn-Wright that the district’s current budget includes funds to cover the cost.
Stewart questioned the decision in light of an earlier disclosure by Dunn-Wright that the Arkansas Department of Education has indicated that the district could be placed on fiscal distress status if it doesn’t comply with guidelines as listed in a recent financial review.
“For at least the past three years, I’ve been asking the superintendent about the district’s financial status,” Stewart said. “I’ve been told it’s OK, but now we’re told we’re on the verge of fiscal distress.”
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He asked that Dunn-Wright and other appropriate district personnel “figure out how we can avoid that.”
Dunn-Wright reported the fiscal distress possibility after she had announced that the ADE had concluded it would not overturn a March decision to discontinue a $1.8-million grant to the district. The grant’s suspension was based on the district’s failure to satisfy qualifying requirements.
“What can we do to eliminate the loss of any more grants?” Stewart asked. “We lost a $1.1-million grant about five years ago. I’m saddened by the loss of this grant. I’m not happy.”
“None of us are happy,” Stepps, the board president, said, adding that the “biggest problem” with the most recent grant was “miscommunication with the state.”
“The ultimate responsibility is with us,” Stewart said. “I’m not so certain we don’t need a monthly update on existing grants.”
He suggested that a board task force be organized to oversee the matter.
Stepps disagreed.
“I don’t know if a task force is necessary,” he said. “We don’t want to micro-manage.”
Additional details of the meeting will be published in tomorrow’s edition.