Divided over rezoning issue, board shows signs of healing

Board of Education members say an enhanced spirit of compromise pervades discussion of rezoning Nashville’s public schools.

“I think if you look at our last meeting, the study session… There was a sense of people listening to each other and concessions being made,” said Ed Kindall, a board member who vehemently opposed passage of the rezoning plan during the summer. “The reason [that’s] been missing, to be honest, is because we’d never really had a serious discussion about rezoning, as a board. I think this gave us an opportunity to look at the details in terms of what it means.”

Alan Coverstone, a new board member who took over former board chair Marsha Warden’s seat in August, said the board’s most recent discussions of rezoning have been positive.

“Board relations, I think, are very strong,” Coverstone said Friday. “I feel like we all speak very freely, and really understand where each other is coming from. … I’ve been really pleased with how everyone has worked together.”

The friendliness may be tested in the coming weeks as implementation of the recently passed rezoning plan continues to be discussed. And the apparently improved board dynamic doesn’t mean there’s any less ire among community members who have been opposed to the plan since it was passed.

Marilyn Robinson, president of the local chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), said the matter is still a high priority for her organization. The local NAACP meets on a regular basis, monitoring the situation.

“We’re still not happy,” Robinson said. “We’re still making plans. We’re going to take it to the end. Their whole premise was flawed. We’re supposed to be saving money, but really, [we’re] just shifting children.”

Robinson has said her organization is working with the national NAACP to assemble information that could contribute to a possible lawsuit related to the plan. There will likely be no legal action, Robinson said, until implementation of the plan begins.

It was a motion to begin discussion of implementation that apparently paved the way for a more unified board. Kindall made a surprise move three weeks ago, when he asked the board to meet with school district administrators and pin down plan logistics. Kindall had publicly stated, previously, that he had intended to move to rescind the plan.

His decision instead to move forward with implementation was met with support from all board members. It passed unanimously, and one of the board members who voted in favor of the rezoning plan — Karen Johnson — was the individual to second Kindall’s motion.

Division had consequences

Division among board members over the summer was closely linked to division within the community.

Some of those opposed to the plan said at the time that they objected not only to the plan itself, but the way in which it was passed. The five-to-four vote — marked by significant protest from former board member George Thompson as well as Kindall, and even Kindall’s decision to leave the board table while the meeting was still taking place — left rezoning plan opponents saying they felt the plan had been muscled through.

In the weeks that followed, there was little sign that ill feelings might dissipate, until Kindall decided in September to move for discussion of plan implementation rather than a rescinding.

The most contested portion of the plan recommends that students no longer be bused from low-income MetroCenter neighborhoods to Bellevue’s more affluent Hillwood cluster. Students in those neighborhoods are considered residents of “choice zones,” and can choose whether to enroll close to home or at Hillwood schools.

Supporters say the change brings Nashville closer to neighborhood schools, and improves opportunities for parent and community engagement. Opponents call the plan resegregation, noting the decrease in percentages of African-American and economically disadvantaged students at Hillwood schools, as well as the slight increases in these populations at some Pearl-Cohn cluster schools.

Changes brought about by the board’s summer rezoning decisions won’t go into effect until the 2009-2010 school year.

Interpretations of savings mixed

While both supporters and opponents of the plan have said they are pleased with improved board relationships, and with the implementation details initially discussed, there remain differences in how cost savings of the plan are interpreted.

According to initial estimates from Metro Nashville Public Schools, implementation of school improvements promised by the plan could cost about $4.7 million. Savings to the district as a result of the plan are estimated at $1.2 million.

That number is lower than what had previously been anticipated, and Kindall said the need to pin down numbers is one reason he objected to passing the plan over the summer.

“We needed a realistic figure. We kept hearing everything from saving $4 million, to $2 million, and it turns out we’re really talking about [approximately] $1.2 million,” Kindall said.

Over the summer, the task force members who proposed the plan discussed the importance of efficient use of buildings and transportation, rather than dollar savings, and the value of shifting expenditures way from busing students out of their neighborhoods to paying for further enrichment within those students’ classrooms.

“One key is the idea that we are hoping to be more efficient with our funds,” said board member Mark North, task force chair, on Friday.

The details of plan implementation — including the fact that transportation will be provided for every student who chooses to continue attending schools in noncontiguous zones, as well as the district’s apparent commitment to not opening renovated Wharton and Madison schools until the facilities are in excellent condition — are apparently palatable to both opponents and supporters of the plan.