Howard County School Board Votes Against Disclosing Potential School Sites

The Howard County school board voted last week against disclosing the sites where it is considering building a new school to accommodate overcrowding that has forced children, in some cases, to sit on the floor for class.

The decision is under public scrutiny because planning officials have presented one option to the board since August when the discussion began, a site where CSX may build its intermodal rail facility nearby.

The board voted to acquire that land on Coca Cola Drive on Oct. 7 for its “land bank” of property for the school system to have at its disposal. The board did not vote on whether to designate the property on Coca Cola Drive as a school site, and has stalled since it was made public that an intermodal facility could be built within .5 mile of the site.

“We’re gagged,” said school board member Allen Dyer, who made a motion to tell the public the top three other school sites at the April 28 meeting. His motion failed due to lack of majority.

Board members Ellen Flynn Giles, Sandra French, Cindy Vaillancourt, and chair Janet Siddiqui voted against the motion. Acting superintendent Mamie Perkins abstained. Frank Aquino and Brian Meshkin were absent. Dyer voted for disclosure.

Vaillancourt, who voted against disclosure, later said it was because two board members were not present.

Others opposed disclosing information about prospective school sites for different reasons.

“While I’m sure the public would appreciate hearing about that now, I’m not sure it would help anything,” said Ken Roey, director of facilities for Howard County Public School System. “This is a very sensitive issue, obviously.”

Disclosing locations could drive up the asking price or “prevent people from coming to the table,” said Roey, who wasn’t eligible to vote on disclosure, but whom board members consulted before making their decisions.

“I think it’s wrong,” said Elkridge resident Jill Bateman, of the fact that the public is not given any information or alternative.

“Our expectation and understanding was that we would be presented with several sites,” said Bateman, who said she was told as much by school officials last summer during a closed meeting between school board members and the Greater Elkridge Community Association (GECA). “But the only site presented was the Oxford Square site.”

Overcrowding adds urgency to need for new school

Currently, Bellows Spring and Elkridge Elementary are bursting at the seams.

was built for 662 students; it has 851.

was designed to serve 779 students; it has 847.

PTA members at Elkridge Elementary said the lunch lines are so long that some children are not able to eat. In some cases, children have to sit on the floor for class due to lack of space.

Elkridge citizens are not confident any progress is being made in the search for a new school site, said Vaillancourt at the April 28 school board meeting. “There’s a real question of ‘Is there actually anything in the pipeline?’" she said.

Board of Education Chair Janet Siddiqui said that in January, the school board met with GECA to keep residents abreast of the school site issue.

GECA reported in its meeting minutes that there were no sites under consideration other than Oxford Square as of February 2011.

Oxford Square, a site on Coca Cola Drive in Hanover, has been riddled with issues since it was first presented at an Aug. 19 school board meeting, where Columbia residents demonstrated outside to protest putting a school near a railroad.

The following month, Elkridge residents testified before the school board that they were concerned the site was “inadequate" and "unsafe.”

In October, a of the property, a case that wasn’t settled until January 2011.

In February and March, the came into play.

“We feel confident that [an intermodal facility] will not impact the operation of the school,” said Roey at the Feb. 24 meeting of the Board of Education, where “approval of new northeastern school site” was an agenda item.

Dyer made a motion at that meeting to have staff search for elementary school sites in the northeast with expediency and present the runner-up at a future meeting so the board could have options. 

“We would need 30 days and a public hearing,” said school board member Sandra French, claiming that presenting a new site at this point would take too long. Dyer’s motion failed.

“I am sorry we don’t have more choices,” said Roey, “but if you don’t go forward with the planning, you won’t have any choices.”

Developer Preston Partners offered the school system a donation of 20 acres on Coca Cola Drive in April 2010. The parcel of land was part of Oxford Square, what was slated to be a residential and commercial development. 

If the county built a school there, Preston Partners said it would provide $4 million toward a school built by 2013.

On Oct. 7, the board accepted the land donation into its “land bank." It put off voting on whether to designate the site as the place for the northeast elementary school site.

Karen Watsic, vice president of Preston Partners, declined to discuss the status of the project.

The date for the board's decision to determine whether to designate Coca Cola Drive as the site for the new elementary school or to present other sites is now indefinite, according to Patti Caplan, spokeswoman for Howard County public schools.

Editor's note: This article has been updated. An earlier version incorrectly stated that there was not a land bank prior to the Oct. 7 decision to acquire the Oxford Square donation.