MEADOW HEIGHTS OFFICIAL RESIGNS

PATTON -- Tom Waller resigned as superintendent of Meadow Heights School District Wednesday after the discovery that he may have reported inflated enrollment figures to the state education department.

Much of a school district's state funding is based on those average daily attendance figures.

The discrepancy in attendance figures provided the final straw that pushed him to resign, Waller said Wednesday afternoon, but wasn't his primary reason for leaving. He said he has tired of the battle at Meadow Heights.

"When folks really have their stingers out for you, where do you go?" he asked. "How long will that last? It's a tough business."

The Board of Education accepted Waller's resignation Wednesday at a special closed-door meeting that lasted 90 minutes.

The board also appointed Cheri Fuemmeler interim superintendent. Fuemmeler has been elementary school principal at Meadow Heights since 1991.

Waller's resignation comes less than three weeks after the school board gave him a new three-year contract.

He has been superintendent for seven years. The school district had an enrollment of 544 students last year.

Board member Millie Yates, who has spent much of the past four years trying to get Waller ousted, was silent after the meeting Wednesday. She has agreed not to discuss Waller's resignation and to allow the school's attorney to release details.

Waller didn't attend Wednesday's meeting and had cleaned out his desk. His wife Kay, who had worked as his secretary, was in the office Wednesday.

Board President Roy Allen said Waller submitted his letter of resignation on Tuesday, and that the special meeting was called Wednesday morning to discuss the matter.

A regular board meeting had already been planned for Monday at 7 p.m. Allen said Monday's meeting will be held.

"We are planning to move forward as soon as possible," Allen said. "We hope to move forward in a positive way."

He wouldn't discuss Waller's resignation and asked the school's attorney to prepare a written statement releasing information.

Attorney Melanie Gurley Keeney of the firm Peper and Martin in St. Louis attended the meeting and wrote a release saying the possible irregularities were discovered during a district review.

Waller said he didn't know how the discrepancy was uncovered.

He thinks the attendance figure was inflated during the 1990-91 school year.

"The thing that they're talking about is a matter of reporting to the state more students than we actually had in average daily attendance," he said. "I felt like it had been corrected the year after that."

The education department allows schools to report attendance using one of two methods: the previous year's actual attendance or an estimation of the current year's attendance.

"I have no idea if it was an estimated amount or the actual amount," Waller said.

Estimates, he said, are adjusted from year to year to reflect the actual enrollment.

Woody Fitzmaurice, director of school data for the education department, said the department is photocopying Meadow Heights' average daily attendance records from 1989-90 through 1991-92 at the request of a lawyer.

Fitzmaurice didn't know any specifics about the situation at Meadow Heights but said errors in attendance figures are found annually in school districts across the state.

An inflated average daily attendance would cause an overpayment in state money to the school district.

If the education department learns of an error it asks for corrected figures and recalculates the state money, Fitzmaurice said. The difference is subtracted from a future state payment to the school district.

Waller said he has been thinking of resigning for a long time.

"You can probably guess the main reasons I am leaving," he said.

Over the years, Yates has raised questions about finances and Waller's leadership. She initiated a petition drive calling for a state audit. Auditors made several recommendations for improvements.

Yates and other Meadow Heights residents brought their questions to William Hopkins, Bollinger County prosecuting attorney, who called for a special investigation and named Ian Sutherland, an assistant prosecutor for Cape Girardeau County, special prosecutor for the school district.

The Cape Girardeau County Sheriff's Department and Missouri Highway Patrol looked into a transfer of school district funds from a Bollinger County bank to two Cape Girardeau banks. Sutherland said Wednesday afternoon the investigation had uncovered no criminal conduct nor reason to refer the case for prosecution.

Yates has rallied a group of people who regularly attend board meetings and videotape the proceedings. At the May and June meetings, a sheriff's deputy was on hand to keep the peace.

At the June 27 board meeting, a petition with 302 signatures was given to school board members calling for Waller's resignation. The board went into closed session and gave Waller a new three-year contract. Yates and board member Dennis Mouser voted against the new contract.

Waller recommended Fuemmeler as interim superintendent. The school district's other administrator, high school principal Rick Chastain, wasn't aware Wednesday afternoon that Waller had resigned.

Waller has no specific plans and said he isn't sure if he will remain in education.

"I don't have anything but praise for Meadow Heights," he said. There are a lot of good people there -- good students, good parents. I think the future is bright."