Consolidation hearing delay doesn't dampen Mason spirits

Consolidation hearing delay doesn't dampen Mason spirits
May 14, 1998

Gazette Online

By Tara Tuckwiller
PUTNAM COUNTY REPORTER

POINT PLEASANT - Hours after they claimed victory in the Mason County school board race, consolidation foes were back in the courthouse Wednesday for an injunction hearing to kill a proposed consolidated high school.
Their spirits weren't dampened when Circuit Judge Clarence Watt sent them all home, continuing the hearing until May 20 after school board lawyer John Teare filed a surprise motion early Wednesday.
"I'm still on a high from last night," said New Haven retiree Dorothy Roush, who worked to replace incumbents with anti-consolidation candidates Peggy Huff and Shirley Gue. "I wanted to go through town blowing my horn, but I've gotten this far without getting arrested and I don't want to start now."
Most of the courthouse spectators have been fighting consolidation for years. They lined up to support Gue in her injunction lawsuit this spring after school board members started pushing for a consolidated high school north of Point Pleasant.
Gue only named Mason County school board members in her lawsuit, but Teare's motion says that the state school board and School Building Authority should be defendants, too.
There's one problem with that motion, said Mason County board President David Morgan. The school board never discussed it, much less decided to do it. "I walked in this morning and they had filed their motion," said Morgan, who has voted in the minority on the board against consolidation. "They must have had a meeting last night that I missed."
Morgan lost in Tuesday's election, but anti-consolidation member Darrell Hagley will remain on the board. Together with Huff and Gue, Hagley will be able to outvote member Amanda Clark and new member Jo Hannah Rorrer, who are seen as favoring the consolidated high school.
Morgan said he suspects the election results scared the consolidation advocates on the board, and they want to bring in the state as a defendant in an effort to get the case moved to a Kanawha court.
"I'm no lawyer, but that's a problem for me," Morgan said. "We're supposed to be his clients, and I don't know whether this is good for us or bad for us. I think it's something that should have been discussed. It's major."
Superintendent Larry Parsons, who has worked to push consolidation through, said it's not out of the ordinary for a school board lawyer to act without consulting his clients.
"The board is not consulted routinely by the law firm," Parsons said. "That's the decision the law firm made, and the firm has the latitude to do that."
Parsons said Wednesday that if the new board starts voting against consolidation, he will just switch gears and do what they tell him.
"If the board changes and the direction's different, I'll work just as vehemently for that board," he said. "My job is to work for the board."
Gue's lawyer, Barry Bruce, asked for the continuance so he could review the opposition's argument. As he did two weeks ago when testimony started, Watt told the school board not to move forward on the consolidation plan until the lawsuit is resolved.
Watt, who had postponed the remaining testimony until after Tuesday's election, joked about the outcome with the crowd. "I notice among the spectators some bloodshot eyes. What were you doing last night?" he said. "I take it that there are winners and there are losers. Somebody has said that's all we've got left, is elections to decide things.
"Now go home and get some sleep."