Bath County Schools Employees Getting A Nice Christmas Gift – A Bonus

Warm Springs, VA – Bath County School employees will be getting a nice Christmas gift. At Tuesday night’s Bath School Board meeting, the board voted to give bonuses equally to all contract employees based on full time equivalency. The money is coming from the Education Jobs Fund legislation and it’s available only for salaries or bonuses. The money is offered on a one time basis and Bath’s allocation is $75,217. The Bath Board of Supervisors voted on November 30 to appropriate the money and Tuesday night the school board decided how to divide the money among employees.

Also on Tuesday night, the board did more fine tuning of the Capital Improvement Plan, or CIP. After discussion the board decided to place as the top priority on the CIP a new 65 passenger school bus and a new 77 passenger activity bus with air conditioning and a cargo compartment. A camera surveillance system for main school entrances was put second on the list and high school locker room renovation was moved to third on the list. Those top three projects will be requested for 2011 -2012. Improvements for the high school parking lot were placed fourth on the list, to be requested for 2012 -2013. Those improvements include paving, line painting and lighting.

School Superintendent Sue Hirsh said more research needs to be done on improvements to the high school parking lot. She is concerned about what affect paving the lot might have on water runoff. And the lighting in the lot needs to be addressed also. There are currently 13 BARC Electric light poles on the lot and the board suggested contacting BARC to see if a different type of light fixture could be installed to provide better lighting.

Also as part of the CIP discussion, School Board member Barbara Waldeck expressed concern about the Bath County bus fleet. It is recommended that buses be replaced every twelve years. Bath has one school bus that is 18 years old and four others older than 12 years.

In addition to making the two new buses the top priority for 2011, Waldeck suggested adding two new buses per year to the CIP. The CIP draft already listed one new bus per year through 2015. The school board will make its final approval of the CIP at the January meeting.

The board also agreed that Bath County school buses should avoid a portion of Interstate 64 in Alleghany County that is under construction. The construction area has been the site of a number of accidents.

Finally, the board appointed Joey Crawford as the Millboro Elementary Student Council Association sponsor. And the board accepted the resignation of high school nurse Ginger Lipes.