JACKSON SCHOOL PROPOSAL APPROVED

JACKSON -- Overflowing classrooms won't be a problem in Jackson R-2 Schools much longer.

Voters Tuesday approved a $7.8 million bond issue that will fund construction of an elementary school, an addition to North Elementary School and a math and science addition at the high school.

The proposal passed 2,335 to 1,220. A four-sevenths or 57 percent majority was needed for approval; it received 66 percent of the votes.

Property taxes will increase by about 20 cents per $100 assessed valuation in the district as a result of passage. Only one proposed bond issue has ever failed in the Jackson R-2 School District.

Superintendent Dr. Howard Jones tabulated results telephoned from the Cape Girardeau County Courthouse. About 50 people gathered at Jackson Middle School to await results.

"This is a significant difference from the ones I had in Sedalia," Jones said of the bond issue. "I had been optimistic from what I'd heard, but in the back of my mind I had memories of tough elections with strong opposition."

Tuesday's election was Jones' first bond-issue vote in the Jackson district.

In the last five years the district has grown so quickly that school officials have had little time to keep up, let alone plan for more growth. Enrollment has increased by almost 10 percent in just the last two years.

Because of that growth some classrooms have been meeting in partitioned areas of hallways or storage closets because there was no available space.

"It will be so much nicer to start school Aug. 21," said Debbie Lusk, president of the Jackson Community Teachers Association. "What really excites me is that we will finally be updating the science labs so they are suitable to today's technology."

Revenue from the bonds will pay for an elementary school to serve a growing population in the south section of town. It will be at Boehme Lane and Highway 25. Additions at North Elementary School at Fruitland and Jackson High School will add classroom space and shift other classes from their crowded quarters.

But the overcrowded conditions won't disappear before classes begin; it will take about two years to complete the elementary school but additions to North Elementary could be finished in time for the 1997-98 school year.

Some of the groundwork can be done in September depending on weather conditions, said Marvin Adams, president of the Jackson Board of Education.

The school board didn't really talk about contingency plans in case the issue failed. "It's something that the district needs," Adams said. "Eventually we'd have to deal with the growth."

Seventeen precincts in Cape Girardeau County are in the school district's 550-square-mile boundary. Most are entirely within those bounds, but some include only small pockets of land. The first precinct to be counted was Oriole, where the issue was defeated 9-4.