WHAT NEXT?: CAPE BOARD CONSIDERS FUND NEEDS

Cape Girardeau Board of Education members aren't ready to take "no" for an answer.

One week after voters rejected a proposed $25 million bond issue and a building fund levy hike, school board members Tuesday talked of drawing up a new capital improvements funding plan to submit to voters.

School board member Pat Ruopp said voters can count on seeing some school funding issue on an election ballot in the not-too-distant future.

"We really don't have a choice," he said. "We don't have the choice of shoring up these old buildings."

The bond issue and levy hike would have funded construction of a new elementary school and a middle school, renovated existing schools and allowed the district to close three of its aging school buildings.

School officials are now talking about possibly dividing the package.

"We may have to ask for the maintenance issue first and the buildings next," said board member Ed Thompson.

School board members said that despite the election defeat the district's building and maintenance needs still must be addressed.

School board members voiced their comments during and after a Tuesday morning meeting at the Board of Education office. It was held to reorganize the board and officially accept the election results.

Board members Kathy Swan and John Campbell, who were re-elected April 6, began their new terms Tuesday, and newly elected board member Steven Wright began his first term. All three were sworn in during the 8 a.m. meeting.

Swan and Campbell had been outspoken supporters of the proposed bond issue and levy hike.

Wright, a first-time candidate who had maintained an "undecided" stance toward the measures, finished second in the field of four candidates.

Wright said voters felt the price tag was too high. But he added, "I definitely think something needs to be done with the schools."

He declined to say how he had voted on the bond issue and levy hike.

Thompson, who ended his tenure as board president and was elected vice president, looked to the future. "I would think that this isn't the end; this is the beginning," he said.

Thompson said the bond issue received support from 43 percent of the voters who cast their ballots. School supporters just need to "bring around" another 14 percent of voters to win passage of such an issue, he said.

Campbell, who was elected board president, said, "I think we are all disappointed basically about the election results."

But he vowed, "We will come back (to the voters) with something."

Campbell said the message from the voters appears to be that "we asked for too much."

That view was echoed by Cape Girardeau businessman Harry Rediger in a subsequent interview Tuesday.

"I don't think it was a vote against the school district, or a vote against education, or a vote against Cape Girardeau," said Rediger, one of the leaders of the campaign to pass the school funding measures.

Rediger chaired the school finance committee, which last June recommended the school board consider putting a capital improvements funding package before the voters.

He said the finance committee had discussed the possibility of seeking voter approval of a capital improvements plan in stages.

At a school board meeting last June, Rediger suggested that school officials seek voter approval of an elementary school first rather than tie it in with a middle school plan.

Ruopp said Tuesday that school proponents had anticipated turnout of about 6,000 voters on the basis of a 1988 school tax election in the district. Instead, about 8,700 turned out.

Both Thompson and Swan said last-minute "negative misinformation" by opponents was partly responsible for the election defeat.

Exit polls showed that low-income residents as a group voted heavily against the school funding measures.

"With a lot of low-income people, education is not a priority," Thompson said.

Swan said the talk of possible state and federal tax hikes probably also contributed to the defeat.

"The reality of the situation is that the people lost," said Ruopp. He said they lost in terms of cost savings that would have been realized from low interest rates on the bonds.

And, he said, "They lost from an educational point of view."