In a special called meeting Wednesday night, the Loudon County Board of Education met to discuss hiring a new person to handle purchasing orders from the county schools.

The school system recently decided to send all purchasing requests through the county purchasing office and stop the decades-long tradition of giving funds directly to the schools, a practice that is always written up by state auditors. 

The meeting began with local citizen Pat Hunter questioning the need to hire anyone to handle the purchasing requests when the board had decided in 2007 the Central Office didn't need to hire such a person. 

"What has changed with the new board?" she asked.

Director of Loudon County Schools Wayne Honeycutt answered saying Central Office personnel have met with County Purchasing Director Leo Bradshaw and Director of Accounts and Budgets Tracy Blair, who have both taken on new personnel in their offices in anticipation of the change, and they had said they were willing to try a new procedure "that is in compliance with the law."

Board member Bobby Johnson, Jr. questioned the proposed job description that calls for the new hire to oversee not only purchasing requests from the schools, but also insurance compliance and to aid the director with other projects in any remaining time.

Honeycutt agreed saying the job description could be tweaked and the new person was expected to be very busy at the beginning of the school year. He said a new person would also help with his efforts to see Central Office personnel are cross trained so they can help out in other areas of operation when another employee is out.

"I like the cross-training idea," said board member Gary Ubben adding it would help if there is an overload of purchasing requests or to fill in for missing people. Honeycutt agreed saying the current staff in the Central Office works hard and has, "no extra time. It's not a position that's going to be extra by any means."

Board member Scott Newman asked how the plan to take one position from the Central Office and move it to the special education budget would make hiring the new person "a wash."

Honcycutt answered the salary of the person moving to the special education department would be paid out of federal money - not from stimulus money or money budgeted for Central Office staff.

Newman said he wasn't necessarily opposed to creating the position but he feared the board was "jumping feet first" in a hire when they still didn't know how it was going to be handled. He suggested the board consider hiring a part-time position and wait and see if they would be needed full time.

Board member Van Shaver reiterated his position he could not support hiring any new people when the budget was yet to be determined and in the face of what is likely to be less money from local revenues and the state. 

Shaver said in the private sector a new hire should generate twice the income their salary is costing.

"Handling a budget doesn't make one an expert on budgets," said board member Bill Marcus.

He also questioned the wisdom of applying the rules of the private sector to the school system which has a goal to educate children not make a profit.

Board member Craig Simon agreed you "can't kill your horses" by overworking them but he felt there had to be a way to handle the transition. 

Marcus said if you are opposed to the plan then come up with a better plan. "Evidently you've not been in a school enough to understand how they operate," Marcus said.

Board Member Lisa Russell suggested the board consider making the new position part time "until we see how things go."

Ubben said while that was an interesting idea some potential employees might not be interested in a part time position. He added Central Office workers are already working extra hours off the clock and the office was currently short staffed.

Honeycutt's executive assistant Joan Lovelace spoke up saying she worked in the purchasing department of the Monore County School System, which is about the same size as the Loudon County system and she found just doing purchasing was more than full time and after she left that job a part time position was created to supplement the full time job. 

Simon said he recalled Bradshaw coming to a board of education meeting and saying he had hired a new person in his office to handle the procedure change.

Marcus said Bradshaw meant on his end not for the Central Office needs.

Several board members seemed uneasy about voting to create a new position when the salary is unknown. "If you create it you never lose it," warned Shaver.

Ubben pointed out the salary couldn't be know in advance since the new person would be in the salary scale and their salary would depend on their experience - something that could not be determined until the search has been narrowed down. 

The board voted in favor of Johnson's amendment to limit the responsibilities of the position to purchasing and insurance only. They then voted on the motion to make the job full time at the outset, which failed.

Shaver suggested the board wait three months to see if a full time person was needed. Russell said she feared the staff in the Central Office would feel the board was dumping on them when they are already stretched to the limit. "The kids and teachers will be suffering," she said. 

Simon again said, if he remembered correctly, Bradshaw had said his office was ready to handle the change.

"As was pointed out to you he (Bradshaw) cannot manage our operating budget. It's not his responsibility," Marcus replied. He went on to say he recalled Bradshaw warning the board if they didn't take care of keeping the purchasing requests in order before they came to his department he would give complaining parents the board members' phone numbers and let them deal with them.

Honeycutt agreed it is important for the school system to have it's own record of purchase requests. He said the purchasing department's responsibility was to get the best deal not to keep up with the requests from individual schools. They don't keep up with line items," he said.

Johnson said under the old system it was difficult for the board to keep up with how money was being spent and a new system through the Central Office would create a better paper trail if any purchasing request was questioned. 

With the discussion at an apparent stale mate the board opted for Honeycutt to come to the next meeting with a revised job description and bring Bradshaw so the board could get clarification on how much of the workload he anticipated his office handling.

They agreed to meet July 2 at the Tech Center in Lenoir City for a special called meeting.