When Atlanta residents go to the polls Tuesday to vote on a $513 million sales tax that would go toward improving and building schools, the Buckhead cluster will have a lot at stake.
School officials and parents argue that classes at the eight schools in the cluster are overcrowded and that several of the schools' tiny footprints makes it impossible to expand.
"The overcrowding in our cluster is out of control," said Joleen Neel, who has kids in elementary, middle and high schools in Buckhead. "It is a good thing, because people are coming back to the area. But we need help over here."
On Tuesday, if voters pass the special purpose local option sales tax (SPLOST), schools in Buckhead as well as across Atlanta and the region will get much needed money for upgrades. Buckhead would not only get millions to expand and renovate schools. The region would also build a new elementary school and a new high school, helping relieve overcrowding while accommodating continued growth in the area. Midtown has also been targeted for a new middle school.
“There are some truly older schools that meet code, but barely, that we have to upgrade,” said Atlanta Public Schools Superintendent Erroll Davis. “North Atlanta continues to grow, so we need a new school there."
Atlanta is one of three independent school systems and five counties that have multi-million dollar sales tax referendums on the ballot. If SPLOST IV is approved, it would mark the third time the tax has been renewed since it was created in the mid-1990s.
Residents in Cherokee, DeKalb, Fulton, Gwinnett and Henry counties, as well as those in Atlanta, Buford and Decatur will vote whether to fund their specific projects.
According to census figures, Buckhead has grown significantly over the last decade, drawing an estimated 80,000 people who have been attracted by restaurants, shopping, neighborhoods, new condos and good schools.
“We are victims of our own success,” said Cynthia Briscoe Brown, who has lived in Buckhead for 17 years. “We have worked so hard for the last decade to make the community aware of our wonderful public schools. I regularly get cold calls from people who want to buy my house, because they want to be in our school district."
According to figures released Friday by APS, five of the eight schools in the Buckhead cluster have enrollments higher than the recommended capacity. With 1,311 students, Sutton Elementary is 271 over capacity. More than a dozen trailers are scattered about the campus. Garden Hills Elementary School is 133 students over capacity, while Bolton Academy, the largest elementary school in the area, is 138 under capacity.
But E. Rivers Elementary School, a nearly 60-year-old facility located in the Peachtree Battle area, would be a major benefactor if the SPLOST passes. It has been playing catch-up for years. None of the projects that were proposed the school, targeted by SPLOST III funds, were ever done.
The school, completed in 1952, is busting at the seams with 203 more students that it should normally handle.
APS had to refund $48 million in SPLOST money to Fulton County after county officials failed to file a form that accurately reflected enrollments of the city and county school systems, resulting in an overpayment to Atlanta. As a result, APS was forced to delay several construction projects.
Originally, $5 million had been allotted to E. Rivers in SPLOST IV, but that figure was revised to $10.2 million to make up for SPLOST III.
To address the overcrowding, the school re-configured the auditorium into four classrooms. The auditorium classrooms have walls, but high ceilings, which makes it difficult to hear.
PTA Vice President Christianna McCaleb said with no dedicated auditorium, the school has eliminated all class and school performances, including the traditional “Nutcracker,” and moved meetings to the cafeteria or a church across the street.
“It is not a good learning environment,” said McCaleb, whose second grade son’s classroom is in the auditorium."We are going to have to get these improvements."
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