The idea of creating an east-side school district has hit a new snag — Midvale wants no part in it.
And the city, with feeder schools and low-income students, is an important piece to a recommended four-city district.
"Never — I wouldn't do it in a million years," Midvale Mayor JoAnn Seghini said Wednesday. "Because I know how you run a school district. I did that for 36 years. You've got this cry that the east side doesn't want to build schools on the west side of the valley. They don't know what they're stepping into and how hard it is."
The former Jordan School District assistant superintendent said Midvale wants to stay put. The blue-collar city of 27,000 is currently a part of Jordan School District, the biggest district in the state.
On Tuesday, Mike Bennett of Bennett Educational Consultants Inc. presented results of an information-gathering study to the Cottonwood Heights City Council. The city hired Bennett for $9,500 to determine the best route for Cottonwood Heights to take if small school districts start forming around them.
His conclusion: a four-city district with Cottonwood Heights, Sandy, Draper and Midvale would be the most economically feasible and create the least amount of disruption to current school system. Numerous feeder schools, primary schools that send graduates on to attend the same secondary school, currently cross boundaries in several cities.
The roughly 32,000 student district, if it were formed by the four cities, would have an estimated funding projection of nearly $217 million.
"Midvale shares boundaries. Sandy city shares several schools with Midvale and. . . if three cities went — Sandy, Draper and Cottonwood Heights went — then Midvale's feeder system would be disrupted," Bennett said. "Midvale is left with Hillcrest (High School), with half its population."
Cottonwood Heights officials pitched the four-city idea to Bennett, he said, because they did not want an elitist split by excluding Midvale. "They didn't want to leave out a city that has more than its share of poverty."
Keeping the integrity of those boundaries, Cottonwood Heights Mayor Kelvyn Cullimore said, was the reason he wanted Midvale in on the study.
In addition, cutting Midvale out of the equation means the new district would lose about $3 million in federal funding. Three Midvale schools receive Title I funds. Those funds are allocated by the federal government to school districts with a high percentage of low-income students.
"I was so mad at that, I wanted to scream," Midvale's Seghini said. "What that says is we'll take the poor people from Midvale and give their money to Draper. I don't want Midvale to be included."
That money is not transferrable anyway, Seghini noted, because it must stay with the low-income students.
If east-side cities were to switch to local districts, it could be a double-edged sword, she warns. Many cities jumped in on early discussions of creating smaller school districts because so many schools were closing on the east side of Salt Lake County.
However, with a new district, "they'd end up keeping their schools open in declining child populations," she said. "If you don't have the critical mass to do that, you're going to be closing more schools rather than keeping them open."
If Midvale doesn't want to consider the new district configuration, Bennett said, a study he has been commissioned to do for Sandy involves just three cities: Sandy, Cottonwood Heights and Draper. Those results will be presented on August 8 to the Sandy City Council.
Shortly after that presentation, Cullimore said, the cities involved will conduct numerous meetings with each other, Jordan School District and their residents to discuss future options. Further details with the current law still need to be resolved. But Cullimore said he would be surprised if it actually made it on the November ballot.
"This is one of those things that you really have to measure 10 times and cut once," he said. "You really don't want to do it wrong."
A law passed earlier this year allows cities to ditch large school district and create their own small school districts. The idea is being explored in several communities, including Cottonwood Heights, Holladay, South Salt Lake, Sandy, Lindon and Orem. According to a Deseret Morning News and KSL statewide poll, a majority of Utah residents said it's a good idea to create smaller school districts and give local residents more say over public education.
E-mail: astowell@desnews.com