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Three Parkview candidates challenge district's plan

ORFORDVILLE — The April election could decide the fate of a plan to consolidate Parkview's elementary schools.

Voters will choose between three Footville area school board challengers and three Newark area incumbents.

The challengers say the incumbents' position that Newark Elementary close only if Footville Elementary closes, too, has created an unwise facilities plan for the district.

The incumbents say the consolidation plan is the best option for a district that has been divided for years.

The candidates are:

-- Incumbent Ed Bell, 9502 S. County H, Beloit.

-- Incumbent Craig T. Jones, 7247 W. Beloit-Newark Road, Beloit.

-- Incumbent Eric Stelter, 11504 W. Cleophas Road, Beloit.

-- Steven Haberman, 481 Janesville St., Footville.

-- Charles M. Hagmann, 332 N. Gilbert St., Footville.

-- William Wingerson, 214 Janesville St., Footville.

The school board on Monday night plans to choose a general contractor and set a dollar amount for a referendum on the April ballot. The board voted in late November to close Footville and Newark elementary schools and seek a referendum for an addition at Orfordville Elementary.

Contractors' bids to add 14 classrooms and a three-station gym with locker rooms range from $5 million to $6.7 million. If the referendum fails, the board plans to use district reserves for portable classrooms and move the sixth grade to the junior high.

The district faces an estimated $500,000 deficit in the 2012-13 school year.

All three incumbents up for re-election voted twice since December 2010 not to close Newark Elementary alone, but all three supported the plan to close Newark Elementary at the same time as Footville Elementary.

The challengers say the consolidation can be achieved without spending more than $5 million. They propose the district close Newark Elementary and move the students into Orfordville Elementary. They say Footville Elementary could close as soon as the district's declining enrollment allows.

Here's a bit from each candidate:

-- Bell, who is seeking his second term, said consolidation is needed to help balance class sizes, but a planning committee who met for several months was never able to reach a consensus.

"The only time we started to get a consensus … was when we talked about consolidating both schools at the same time," he said. The plan is the best approach to finally get rid of "many, many years of animosity from one community to another."

-- Jones, who is seeking his fourth term, feels the Newark and Footville schools are important centers to each community. But faced with state budget cuts, consolidation seemed to be the best answer, he said.

For both communities to support a plan, both schools would have to feel the pain at the same time, he said.

"One community wouldn't feel that they're being short-changed," he said.

-- Stelter, who is seeking his second term, is stressing "a unified district." After going through previous attempts to close Newark, he said he learned from the turmoil that the current plan is right.

"I still feel the way to go about it is to be able to close both at the same time," he said. He said none of the board members wanted to react as quickly as they have to get the referendum on the April ballot, but the budget has forced the issue.

-- Haberman said he doesn't see a need for the building project with declining enrollment when the district has another viable option.

"Our goal isn't to have Footville remain open," he said. "Our goal, right now, is that Footville will have to be closed someday, as well, but not to spend all this money."

If the referendum passes, he said, "I don't think there's a lot we can do because the people have spoken." But if it fails, he said, he doesn't want portable classrooms.

-- Hagmann, who is a Footville village trustee, hopes to bring a fresh face to the board with an architectural and structural design background. He said he and his fellow challengers don't want to be seen as "us against them," they only want to bring broader representation.

He said he's fighting portable classrooms and the immediate consolidation of both schools. He also said a new gym would be wonderful, "but that cannot be the focus. It's education."

Closing Footville just so Newark can close is not a reasonable way of looking at it, he said.

-- Wingerson, who ran unsuccessfully for the board in 2007, said the district can't afford the current spending plan.

"There's an alternative to what they want to do," he said.

It wouldn't cost a dime to absorb the Newark students into Orfordville, he said.

People argue about affecting communities, but when students get to high school, they're all one, he said. People "worry about education as one. That's what we want to do," he said.