LORAIN — The Lorain school board voted Wednesday night to start the process to put an emergency operating levy on the ballot in February in the wake of the Nov. 3 failure of the district’s 6.43-mill levy.

School board members said public input is needed before the final decision is expected at a 6 p.m. meeting Tuesday at the Charleston Administration Center, 2350 Pole Ave.

The board voted to ask the county auditor to start doing preparation work for a levy bringing in $5.7 million a year for five years.

While there is no firm figure yet on the millage, it is expected to be about 8 mills, district Treasurer Dale Weber said.

Jim Smith, the lone no vote in the 4-to-1 tally, said he is leaning against putting the issue before voters again so soon despite a $7.3 million deficit looming next year.

After most of the public left, the board emerged from executive session and voted 4 to 1 — with Smith again voting “no” — to approve a new contract for secretaries and other workers covered by the Lorain City Schools Association of Classified Employees.

According to Smith, the contract has retroactive raises dating to July 1 and would cost the district $200,000 for this school year, which runs until June 30, 2010.

Instead of raises, the district should be talking about freezing wages or asking for concessions in hopes of averting cuts, Smith said.

“What kind of message does that send to voters?” Smith asked of the raises.

During Wednesday’s meeting, school board member Paul Biber asked Superintendent Cheryl Atkinson to prepare “scenarios” about what could happen in the district if a levy passes versus if it fails.

“People like to know what they’re getting for what they spend,” Biber said.

Atkinson told the board that there are “really no good choices” on cutbacks, but she and Weber have “begun having the conversation and are looking at options.”

Even if voters pass a levy in February — or anytime in 2010 — Weber said the additional money will not begin flowing to the district until January 2011.

In the wake of the levy defeat, Weber said the district is required to submit a recovery plan to state officials within 60 days because a deficit is projected for the following school year.

Biber said he hoped for a local solution because if the state takes over the district “they’re going to come in with a chainsaw” to balance the budget.

During discussions on the levy options, talk focused on the need to pass a large levy renewal in the next two years.

Lorain resident Rhoda Lee, education chair for the Lorain NAACP, suggested that the school board consider combining the emergency levy with a large renewal levy that must go before voters in the next two years.

Asking for two levies in one year could be a real challenge and it might help if the district only has to ask voters to approve an issue one time, she said. After the meeting, Lee said she was speaking for herself and was not expressing the policy of the entire NAACP.

The earliest the bigger operating levy could be presented is November 2010, and it is now being collected at an effective rate of 11.53 mills, Weber said.

After the meeting, Biber said he was leaning toward putting the levy on the February ballot because he is “big on solving one problem at a time.”

In other action, the board voted unanimously to enter into a project labor agreement with the North Central Ohio Building Trades for construction of a new 350-student Irving Elementary School on the old Lorain Middle School site and a new 600-student Whittier Middle School on the Southview High School site.

The agreement calls for payment of prevailing wages and gives the district more control over selecting local contractors, according to officials for the building trades group, who said two recent school projects built under similar agreements came in 5 percent under budget.

The district is in the midst of a project to build new schools with help from the Ohio School Facilities Commission thanks to voter approval of a plan to pay the local share. The district still has about $105 million worth of schools to build, said Dan DeNicola, the school district’s chief operating officer.

The school board directed DeNicola to work on site selection issues for the proposed new high school to replace Southview and Admiral King.

No decision has been made on building a single high school, but the district has been in discussions with Lorain County Community College, the Lorain Public Library System and the city on a collaborative project.

Biber pointed out a potential problem, saying, “Since we’re broke, we don’t have any money for land.”

Board member Raul Ramos said the schools might have to turn to its partners for help to purchase the site.

Contact Cindy Leise at 329-7245 or cleise@chroniclet.com.

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