Montgomery County Public Schools Superintendent Joshua Starr is recommending a 9 percent — $129.7 million — increase to the school system’s six-year construction budget, despite efforts by both the County Council and County Executive Ike Leggett to cut construction spending in the county. The increase is necessary to address increasing enrollment that has created overcrowded schools, as well as schools that are badly in need of modernization and repair, Starr wrote in a letter to Board of Education President Christopher Barclay.
In the last four years, enrollment has increased by 9,000 students, and it is projected to grow by another 9,000 in the next six years, said Starr. “That is enough students to fill up six Montgomery Blair-size high schools or 36 elementary schools.”
In order to accommodate tight budgets, Starr has recommended delaying several projects, including construction of the new Clarksburg/Damascus Middle School and modernizations of Wheaton High School, Eastern Middle School, Tilden Middle School, William Farquhar Middle School, Wootton High School, Thomas Edison High School for Technology and Seneca Valley High School.
Other projects, such as making sure school facilities comply with Americans with Disabilities Act regulations, cannot be delayed, said public schools spokesman Dana Tofig. Heating and air conditioning systems are severely outdated, as well, and with growing enrollment comes the need for more buses and a larger bus depot.
The Montgomery County Council of Parent Teacher Associations said Starr should have prioritized projects that directly affect students — like school expansions and modernizations — over those that don’t, said Steve Agustino, the head of the organization’s committee on the subject. The group will be making its own recommendations for ways the projects should be prioritized within the same budget constraint.
Agustino also noted that the school system should be taking advantage of low construction costs, rather than cutting back.
However, the recommendation defies Leggett’s request that Starr cut about $34 million from his construction budget. Both Leggett and the County Council have begun efforts to reduce construction budgets across the county in order to relieve some of the county’s debt obligations and strengthen its credit rating.
“There’s no way that we can decrease capital spending for all the county agencies if the school system, which has the largest share of that, doesn’t decrease,” said Leggett’s spokesman, Patrick Lacefield.
Though the school system has needs, not every need will be able to be met in this tough economy, said Councilwoman Nancy Navarro, D-Eastern County, who chairs the council’s Government Operations and Fiscal Policy Committee.
“There’s a lot of things that we wish we could do, but we can’t do given the fiscal constraints,” she said.
The Board of Education will discuss Starr’s recommendations on Wednesday, but will wait until after two public hearings to make an official budget request, said Barclay.
