School Board member Keith Liner withdrew a proposal that would have allowed improvements at several high school athletic facilities to move forward at Tuesday's meeting.
Liner withdrew the motion after several other members expressed concerns that they were unable to attend the meeting of the subcommittee that made the recommended improvements and that the board was moving too fast and needs more time to consider the list and ways to fund the prioritized projects, which were estimated to cost $4 million.
The proposal was based on a list of prioritized facilities' needs athletic directors from the schools had made at a meeting of the School Board's Athletic Facilities Subcommittee on Monday. Implementation of the improvements also would have been contingent on finalization of proposed ways to fund the projects, which included possibly borrowing money from the district's reserve fund and paying it back over 18 months and using money from bond surplus.
Board member Wesley Hightower and Chairman Rosemary English both said they had wanted to attend the meeting but were unable to.
Hightower also said that in the nine years he has been on the board he did not recall a member calling a meeting to talk to teachers directly about what they needed to fund academics.
"That really kind of concerns me," he said. "I appreciate all the efforts on athletics, but the thing that bothers me is that we as a board voted against $770,000 two weeks ago and tonight we're being asked to vote on a motion for $4 million."
At the board meeting on March 10, members defeated a motion that would have allowed North Augusta High School to replace natural grass with artificial turf at a cost of $700,000 with money from the school district's Five-Year Facility Plan. After denying that motion, the board voted to form the subcommittee to look at athletic facilities needs.
Several members said they need more time to consider the subcommittee's recommendations before going ahead with the proposed improvements.
Ronnie West said, "I feel like we need to let this soak in a little bit. It's a big step."
"We need more time," board member Cecil Atchley said.
Liner, however, said the board has had at least two month to make a decision.
"This is what the athletic directors said their needs are," he said before withdrawing his motion. "Doggone it, this is what they said they need. This is what they brought to us as their priorities."
After the discussion, which lasted about an hour, the board decided that the subcommittee on athletic facilities would meet again at 5 p.m. March 31 before a special called budget workshop meeting. Any action on the proposed improvements could be a potential item on the meeting's agenda.