CAROLINA FOREST, SC (WBTW) – In four years, the Horry County Board of Education went from redistricting attendance areas to help deal with overcrowded classrooms to looking to spend around $30 million on a brand new school.
On September 30th 2011, more than four years ago, the Horry County Board of Education first discussed redistricting.
Nine months later on May 30th the talks became reality when a “district wide committee” was created.
The nineteen person committee was made up of community members as well Chairman Joe Defeo and then-Vice Chairman Neil James
They would be tasked with developing the redistricting plan.
During the discussions, the committee looked into attendance line changes for the Carolina Forest attendance area.
In Carolina Forest there are two middle schools:
Ocean Bay Middle School, which was forecasted at having more than 200 kids over its capacity during the 2014-2015 school year and Black Water Middle School, which was forecasted to be nearly 300 kids under capacity for this year.
In June of 2013, the district committee made no decision for redistricting.
Instead, they put the task into the hands of four newly created site committees that would look at each redistricting area (including Carolina Forest) and then give a recommendation.
It took the site committees four months to come up with a plan.
On October 29th at a special meeting, the site committee proposed its plans for redistricting to the original district wide committee.
Only five people out of the 19 person original district wide committee members were in attendance. The redistricting plans were still approved.
Less than two weeks later the Board had first reading on the proposed redistricting.
During the meeting, there were so many Carolina Forest residents in attendance, who were opposed to the redistricting, public input was limited to only a select few speakers; who all said they did not want their kids to go to Black Water Middle School.
Within a few weeks, redistricting was off the table.
Finally on January 13, 2014, then-Superintendent Dr. Cindy Elsberry suggested adding more to the district’s building plan.
Then-executive Director of Facilities, Matt Dean, told the board, schools that would reach 100% capacity within five years were included on the school’s building plan list.
It is important to note that neither Dean nor Elsberry work for the school district any longer.
Carolina Forest attendance area made the list for a new middle school.
Even though according to the district’s numbers Black Water Middle school would only be at 72% during this current school year.
Now in 2015, four years since the original discussion, there is no relief to overcrowded classrooms.
New schools have not started construction; and when they do, will take around two years to build.
As well, Horry County allows its students to attend any school within the district, even if they do not live in the attendance zone.
That means there is no reason a new Carolina Forest middle school will not have the same under capacity issues as Black Water Middle School.
So what changed from the idea of redistricting to now; spending $30 million on a new school
“The district office wanted to redistrict; the Board did not,” said Chairman Joe Defeo.
Defeo says even though the Board wanted to build immediately, they still wanted to hear what the district had to say.
He says numbers the district provided late during the process showed redistricting would only be a temporary fix.
In the end they still chose to build, it took them three years longer to go with their original decision, but Defeo says it was not a waste of time.
He says if he knew what he knows now, he would have at least built one of the schools years ago.
However, he says because of the delay, building schools now has the possibility of saving millions.
The district is in the process of choosing who they deem the best architectural company to build five new “green energy schools” including a new Carolina Forest middle school.
The total cost of all five schools will be around $150 million dollars, but Defeo says the schools could save millions in energy costs each year.