Norfolk Tax Hike, Ballard and Schools

Norfolk Mayor Paul Fraim wants to raise the real estate tax rate by 4 cents.

Raise taxes? Nooooooo

Presumably, the additional revenue will finance the construction of four news schools – two in predominantly black neighborhoods, Campostella and Broad Creek, and two in predominantly white neighborhoods, Ocean View and Larchmont.

Yet the city only has $45 million in its coffer for new school construction.

So, raise taxes to construct two additional schools. 

According to city estimates, each school will cost $20 million to $22 million. The costs are based on the average cost of a school calculated by the state and not the actual costs to construct the schools.

Presumably, City Council is on the mayor’s side for the schools, the tax hike and a boost in certain fees.  

But the school board has opposed the tax hike, apparently.

Enter construction magnate Steve Ballard – again.

Last year he submitted a proposal to the Norfolk school to build four new schools quicker and cheaper than estimated by the city and the school board.

Ballard said he could build four news schools in four years for $11 million less than if the city “followed a traditional model of seeking designs, then asking for bids, and then awarding a contract to a builder,” according to an editorial in the Virginian-Pilot, dated August 5, 2012.

Ballard has considerable clout in the region and his work is ubiquitous, from the construction of elementary schools in Virginia Beach to such high-profile projects as Old Dominion University’s Ted Constant Convocation Center and University Village.

Even his name has been plastered to one of his projects – ODU SB Ballard Stadium at Foreman Field.

Yet the school board spurned his proposal.

Now it’s 2013 and the school construction issue is back on the table – not raising the educational standards of Norfolk’s children, our future, and the city’s future.

These are the questions that should be asked.

Do we need quality schools?

Who speaks for the children? 

Or do we need quality education even more so?

It is my understanding that teachers are frustrated and upset with some schools whose ceilings leak and with rooms ravaged by mold.

It is also my understanding that two or more of the schools could be renovated using historic tax credits.

Yet we are faced with a tax hike as the only possible solution.

In the months preceding the final vote by City Council of next year’s budget, beginning July 1, Mayor Fraim suggested that the city manage the design and construction of new schools.

Instead of submitting a second proposal to the school board, Ballard submitted one to the city under the auspices of the Public-Private Education and Infrastructure Act.

He sent the proposal to the city with a cover letter, dated March 27.

But the proposal wasn’t opened until April 3.

On April 9, Norfolk City Council approved two ordinances that supposedly set the stage for Ballard’s proposal.

Norfolk City Council approved an ordinance “to adopt procedures for the selection, evaluation and award of design-build and construction management contracts.”

City Council also approved an amendment to the city’s code of the guidelines for proposals under Virginia’s PPEA law.

 No mention has been made of the MGT of America study or the Citizens Task Force Report of Long Range Facilities and the recommendations proposed in 2007 – the year City Council reduced the tax rate $1.27 per $100 of assessed value to $1.11 per $100 of assessed value.