Hoping to get the Warsaw School Board to stop the push toward closing four schools and building two, a group of Kosciusko County residents is now circulating a petition to begin the remonstrance process.

Headed by spokeswoman Becky Thomas, the group's goal is to create a committee of representatives from all the elementary schools in the district to take time to study the issues involved and to make recommendations.

"It's not that we're against a building project," Thomas said. "Let's just look at the overall situation - current facilities, the tax situation, what's best for all the children.

"We just want it looked at by the public - representatives from each school equally, not handpicked by the superintendent or the board."

The remonstrance is a reaction to a resolution passed by the board at its June 16 meeting. In that resolution, the board voted to add on to and/or renovate Claypool Elementary and build a new school to replace Jefferson Elementary.

That resolution was different from the proposal originally made at the May school board meeting by Dr. Dave McGuire, superintendent. On May 19, McGuire proposed closing Atwood, Claypool, Jefferson and Silver Lake elementaries and building two new four-section schools - one in Prairie Township, to replace Atwood and to help relieve the overcrowding at Leesburg and Harrison, and one in Winona Lake to replace Jefferson.

However, at a June 9 meeting in Claypool, McGuire changed his proposal to a renovation or addition at Claypool Elementary, along with the new Jefferson school. The enlarged Claypool school also would include the students from Silver Lake.

McGuire's revised proposal makes the remonstrators unhappy for two reasons: it doesn't address the problems at Atwood, Harrison and Leesburg, and they're afraid that he'll change his mind again.

"It would've made a difference if we felt he was upfront and honest and truthful," Jennifer McCloughan, one of the remonstrance coordinators, said of McGuire. "But you can't believe a word he says. He says one thing and two weeks later says another."

While many of the remonstrance coordinators are from Atwood, they said the remonstrance is not just for Atwood School. "It's to reconsider the entire situation," McCloughan said.

"Look at the Jefferson situation - they're solving a problem that doesn't exist, fixing something that isn't broken," she said. "They're not looking at solving the problem. Harrison and Leesburg still will have a problem."

In reaction to the news about the remonstrance, school board president Craig Allebach said, "We just did what we thought was right at the time, and if there's a remonstrance, we'll have to react to whether that's positive or negative at the time. We still have some time to bide in the meantime, so we may still have to cut some programs to make ends meet."

McGuire said at a public meeting at Atwood Elementary that a remonstrance would delay the project, which he does not want to do. There is no remonstrance process for closing schools, and if the remonstrators win, Atwood, Claypool and Silver Lake schools still could be closed by a simple majority vote of the school board. In that case, sixth-graders would be moved into middle schools, he said.

"If he punishes us (for the remonstrance) by closing the three small schools, we're not any worse off," McCloughan said. "It's a couple years earlier, but we're not any worse off."

McGuire said he was proposing the close-four-build-two program for financial reasons only.

"We are being drawn down by the small schools," McGuire said at the May 19 meeting. "This has nothing to do with the quality of programs in those schools. It is simply an economic fact of life."

Economics also is a concern of the remonstrators, only they're afraid the building program will end up costing taxpayers, though McGuire and Rande Thorpe, WCS business manager, said the new debt would simply replace debt that is now being paid off, and won't raise taxes.

"My big concern is that right now we don't know what is ahead of us (concerning property taxes)," Thomas said. "This is going to affect our overall community."

Allebach said it will be some time before that happens.

"When this tax reassessment comes out in November - there isn't anything we've done that's going to be on that bill in November," he said Thursday. "The earliest it'll be on is May of 2004, and this new project, it won't even be on until 2005 or beyond that."

McCloughan, who has four children, said if the situation continues as is, she will put her children in private school. "And I've talked to at least five other families who will do the same."

Allebach, who agrees something should be done with the Atwood-Leesburg-Harrison situation, still thinks the public should trust the board to make the best decisions.

"In this particular remonstrance, I don't like it in the sense that you're kind of pitting people in one area against the others," he said. "People are elected to make those decisions and you've got to respect their judgments. ... I don't really want to cut any programs or move kids around, but if that's what we have to do, that's what we have to do."

• School board member leads remonstrance

One of the leaders of the remonstrance is a Warsaw School Board member - Ron Yeiter.

"I said during the school board meetings that I would support a remonstrance," Yeiter said recently. "I realize it puts me in a precarious situation, but I really have no choice."

Yeiter, who represents the Atwood area, was elected last November and took office in January. He and Gene England, of Silver Lake, voted against the proposed program at the June 16 meeting.

At that meeting, Yeiter said he opposed the program because of how quickly it was being pushed through, because the proposal "doesn't allow for equitable distribution of educational resources" and because the property tax results of the reassessment are so far unknown.

This week he said one reason he supports the remonstrance is to make sure all sides are heard by the school board and to get all the information about the project before the public.

Will there be repercussions for a board member that opposes a board action?

Yeiter shrugged. "A lot of other board members won't talk to me, but they don't already. There's minimal communication," he said. "I just feel like I see a lot more people losing on this whole thing than winning."

• Specific rules govern process

Any remonstration against Warsaw Schools' proposed building program must follow a specific set of rules prescribed by state law.

According to Indiana state code, after the school corporation gives formal notice that it intends to start a building program, which it did in the July 4 Times-Union, a petition starting the remonstrance process must be signed by at least 250 property owners in the Warsaw Community Schools district and filed with the Kosciusko County Auditor within 30 days of the notice.

The auditor then has 15 days to verify that the signers of the petition are indeed property owners in the correct area. Once that is verified, the school corporation must advertise notice that the petition process has begun.

The remonstrators and supporters of the proposed building project have 30 days after WCS' published notice to organize and to marshal their forces. Then the race begins. Both sides have 30 days in which to circulate their own petitions, either for or against the building project. After those completed petitions are turned in to the auditor and again verified, the side with the most signatures wins.

If the remonstrators have the most signatures, the school corporation would not be able to issue bonds or enter into a lease agreement for the proposed project for one year. [[In-content Ad]]