County Schools —For the school board electors: Obey the

County Schools

—For the school board electors: Obey the laws of the Commonwealth, particularly provisions' of Virginia’s Freedom of Information Act. Meeting secretly and taking votes only behind closed doors gives the impression of shady backroom dealing.

—For the school board: Bite the bullet on capital outlay. Years after acknowledging that RCHS is drastically overcrowded, we are still no closer to a permanent solution to space needs. No one wants to propose a tax increase, not even to finance quality education. It’s unpopular everywhere, especially in Rappahannock where citizens have the fourth lowest true tax rate in the state. But the alternatives are few. If facilities aren’t expanded, then it’s either continue with an overcrowded / cafeteria and bathroom, limited class offerings and classes meeting in hallways, audio-visual rooms and clinics or buy a succession of expensive, temporary trailers.

Delay is costly. We have only to look at neighboring Fauquier County. Without a square foot of space being added, the price tag on proposed school construction there increased by $2.4 million in a little over a year.

Don’t Rush

—For the supervisors and the planning commission: Stop rushing to set public hearings to accommodate developers, be they local or from outside the county. In two commercial rezonings granted this year, the planners held special sessions to meet the timetable set by the applicants. The public hearings for the board of supervisors were scheduled just a few days after the planners’ meeting. If the planners had needed more time or additional information to decide on a recommendation, the supervisors would have had to either reschedule their meeting with a waste of two weeks worth of paid advertising or acted without the planners’ advice.

In addition, the rush to consider