Orchard officially pulls out of consolidation talks

Heeding the resistance of its voters, Orchard has officially pulled out of talks involving a five-school merger and construction of a new PK-12 facility at an unnamed location.

Not having a location for the school ­— which if approved by the Nebraska Department of Education would have consolidated Orchard, Clearwater, Neligh-Oakdale, Ewing and Elgin — was an obvious sticking point during the meeting Monday afternoon that was held to go over community survey results.

Kristi Schutt asked Nate Schwager, who represented Orchard at the most recent meeting between the five schools, where the new cornfield school would be built. She asked if it would be centrally located between the furthest location of the Neligh-Oakdale district and Orchard’s furthest location.

Schwager sat silently before answering, “I was told by one of the representatives there that location won’t be discussed until we are a consolidated district.”

Although laughter could be heard in the back of the room where 18 people sat, the Orchard Original Board simply moved on and eventually voted unanimously to discontinue Orchard’s involvement in the current multi-school consolidation discussions.

Schwager told the board in reviewing the numbers presented at the June 22 meeting, he “already threw out the Elgin scenarios” from the merger discussion. Schwager said, “Elgin’s current levy is already 33 cents, so to bring them into this situation is pretty odd to me. I can’t imagine them spending another 18-20 cents to build a school that’s not in their town.”

He said in his mind, that left Orchard, Clearwater, Ewing and Neligh-Oakdale to discuss a potential merger, if the Orchard voters gave direction to be part of those talks. To assist in that decision, a six-question survey was sent to the 699 registered voters in the Orchard district. Principal Cathy Cooper said 307 were returned, or 44 percent. She said 3.5 percent were returned as non-deliverable.

Results of the survey were publicly read at the meeting and streamed live on the Antelope County News Facebook page.

Fifty-three percent said they did not support research into a multi-school district consolidation (43 percent in favor), 77 percent said they did support adding additional schools to the unification (19 percent were not in favor). Currently, Orchard, Clearwater and Verdigre are unified.

In regard to constructing a new school, 59 percent did not support the construction of a new facility outside of Orchard. Voters could check multiple answers in terms of location, and 26 percent were in support of a new facility within 0-8 miles of Orchard, 25 percent within 8-15 miles and 11 percent within 15+ miles of Orchard.

In regard to levy, 55 percent said they were not interested in consolidation or construction of a new facility. Results showed 25 percent supported a merger that saves between 0-.10 on the property tax, 26 percent if it saves more than .10 on the levy, 20 percent if levy raises the levy 0-.10, 1 percent if the merger adds more than .10 on the levy.

Following discussion of the surveys, Orchard spend much time discussing how to word its motion to discontinue involvement in the current multi-school consolidation discussions.

Board members repeated multiple times during the meeting that they wanted to stay open to other scenarios and wanted their motion to reflect that and only state they wanted to discontinue the five-school merger talks.

“Safety and transporting kids was always somethign that was brought up, but now it doesn’t seem to be an issue,” Hoke said. “We certainly heard from our public and have no reason to believe that abandoned buidings in all of our towns is a good decision. Not that we can’t be move forward and be open minded and try new things to cut property taxes. I just think there’s a better way to do it.”

​Orchard will no longer send representatives to the merger talks with Neligh-Oakdale, Clearwater, Ewing and Elgin; however, the board formed a subcommittee of Teri Hergert, Schwager and Hoke to meet with various districts about joining the unification or co-oping activities.

VOTER SURVEY
1. Moving forward, do you feel that the Orchard administration, faculty, staff and school board will continue to offer a quality education to the students of the Orchard school district?
Yes - 87%
No - 9%

2. Do you support the concept of unification?
Yes - 87%
No - 10%

3. If the schools involved in unification were to change, would you support adding additional schools to unification?
Yes - 77%
No - 19%

3. If the schools involved in unification were to change, would you support adding additional schools to unification?
Yes - 77%
No - 19%

4. Do you support further research into a multi-school district consolidation?
Yes - 43%
No - 53%

5. Do you support further research into constructing a new facility outside of the community of Orchard after consolidating school districts? (check all that apply)
0-8 miles within Orchard - 26%
8-15 miles within Orchard - 25%
15+ miles within Orchard - 11%
I do not support construction of a facility outside Orchard - 59%

6. I would be in favor of a multi-school consolidation and construction of a new facility if ... (check all that apply)
merger saves .0-.10 on levy -- 25%
merger .10+ on levy -- 26%
merger adds .0-.10 on levy -- 20%
merger adds .10+ on levy -- 1%
I am not interested in consolidation or construction of a new facility --  55%