Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

The Selma City Schools Board of Education Meeting on Tuesday was short, but filled with plenty of information. The meetig covered significant issues during the first month of summer for the district.

Several main topics were discussed during the meeting, including an update on the renovations of R.B Hudson Middle School and Edgewood, The Child Nutrition Program and the selling of the Old Central Office beside the School of Discovery.

During SCS Superintendent Zickeyous Byrd’s update, he spoke about a concern surrounding the Child Nutrition Program. The total revenues of the school from SY 2022 was $ 2,579,578.16, while the total expenditures was $2,290,265.65. That left a surplus of $289,315.56 which was used to pay CNP. Byrd went on to say that there were seven schools in the district that needed to have their equipment replaced as some of the equipment had not been replaced since 2012 according to Child Nutrition Program Director Aelia Adams. Board Members Danielle Wooten, Phylis Houser and Brenda Randolph- Obomanu questioned why this was not something that was brought up before. Wooten said that the slides that were being shown did not have enough data to show what the board needed to know to make an informed decision on the superintendent’s recommendation. After more discussion, it was decided that the recommendation would be tabled until next year so that Byrd and Adams

Selma City School holds informative meeting could provide more data to the board.

“CNP is a vital part of the school district and we want to ensure that we continue to provide our scholars and employees with the very best. At the same time, we have to be cost-efficient,” Byrd said. “We will continue to explore innovative ways to address some of our existing needs with equipment and also seek additional sources of revenue to supplement the costs for staff that are not funded by the state, especially in our smaller schools that only qualify for 1 CNP worker although we employ 3 to cover the needs.”

Byrd moved on to the renovations to R.B Hudson showing a video of the progress and the work still to be done at Hudson.

The Board had several questions for Operations Director Joe Peterson as to some of the things that were seen in the video that had not been addressed. Things like the blinds or the chipped paint. Byrd said that those things will be addressed. Peterson followed up by saying that most of the renovations will have to wait until July due to summer school taking place.

After the Superintendent’s Update the board came back to a topic that had been around for several board meetings dating back to the end of 2022. The Old Baker Building,  the Old Central Office was up for a vote for the second time in two months to determine if the board would sell the building to the Lathan Group.

Board Memeber Tanya Miles requested back in May that the vote be tabled so she could talk to a representative of the Lathan Group about the project. She told the board what they had discussed and she felt better about the situation after their discussion. Obomanu urged her fellow board members to not let this pass for the safety of the children. The vote came to a 2-2 tie which translated to the motion failing. Miles and Board President Johnny Moss III voted for and Obomanu and Houser voted against. Wooten abstained from the vote.

With the district now stuck with the building the question now became what would or could the district do with it?

“It’s my hope that we can continue the discussions regarding the Baker Building,” Byrd said.