By Mark Coddington
mark.coddington@theindependent.com

The Broken Bow school board reduced the amount of the bond from $15 million Monday night.

That project would have included improvements to the district's middle/high school, but the board voted, 5-1, to drop those repairs and put only the elementary school on the ballot. Board President Brian Deakin voted against the motion.

Board member Kevin Cooksley proposed the changes after seeing the district's loss of $174,000 in state aid for next school year.

Cooksley made an impassioned plea on Monday for the district to pass a three-year levy override to build up cash reserves in order to weather state aid's annual fluctuations.

He said it would be irresponsible of the district to pass either a bond or a levy override. Both must be done, he argued.

"I cannot in good conscience sell the public on a $15 million bond issue while knowing that there's a high probability that we can't run the school system with the funds that we have," Cooksley said.

The board did not vote on the levy override on Monday. But Cooksley said the funds built up through a levy override could pay for some of the middle/high school repairs that were dropped from the project.

In a work session before the meeting, Superintendent Timothy Shafer presented a plan to make up for the loss of state aid by not replacing three retiring teachers.

That plan included the closing of Round Hill, a rural elementary school and former Class 1 district, and the reduction of first-grade sections from four to three.

Cooksley then presented figures showing the district's rising education costs and stagnant state aid amounts. That difference, he said, has caused the district to eat into its cash reserves, giving it less cushion for major repairs or emergencies.

"Every year, it seems like all we do is react to what state aid does," Cooksley told the board. "My patience has gotten to the point where I think we need to bite the bullet."

The new school would be built at a site "yet to be determined," according to the board's resolution, and would replace the district's two Broken Bow elementary schools, Custer and North Park. Because it was amended Monday night, the bond's levy amount has not yet been determined.

The district began moving toward a new building after a 2006 study by the Lincoln architectural firm Bahr Vermeer Haecker found serious problems with heating, ventilation, meeting fire codes and handicapped accessibility in the two elementary schools.

Several residents at the meeting urged the district to look at the possibility of repairing Custer and North Park and to look at other options in building new.

"I think every one of us, as consumers, shops," said Don Cain of Broken Bow. "I don't think that changes as members of a public committee."

But board members countered that shopping around at this point isn't feasible. Getting detailed architectural drawings, for example, would cost nearly $500,000, Deakin said.

The board agreed that a new elementary school was necessary, citing its potential space flexibility, efficiencies and the costs of repairing the two elementary schools.

"It'd be irresponsible of us not to do that," board member Don Davis said of building a new school. "We can't do it patching the old schools. It's just not an answer."