AMERICUS — Doug Goodin, finance committee chairman for the Sumter County Board of Education (BOE), would like to put out a bid for a construction manager to sign on with the Board for 24 months, but Board members Alice and Edith Green don’t like Goodin’s plan.

Goodin argued at Monday’s monthly work session that although Greg Smith, Sumter County School Board’s contracted architect, was doing a bang-up job, with the ailing economy, Goodin doesn’t believe Smith has the time to search for grants available to the county.

“The state has money out there,” Goodin said, “and we need to take advantage of all the opportunities.”

Goodin further argued that with the leadership change coming, it will be that much more important.

Superintendent Dennis McMahon plans to retire at the end of the school term, and the school board is in the process of searching for a replacement.

But, Board member Edith Green disagreed.

“That’s what we have Dr. McMahon for,” Green said. “That’s his job.”

But, Goodin said what he and his committee would like to propose is just to hire a company to do construction, where they seek out grants to maintain buildings.

Moreover, the company wouldn’t even be required to work during the 24-month period of their committed time; they’d only be on hand if the school board needed the company, so the board wouldn’t even have to pay them — they’d only be on hand for jobs the board needed the company to do.

Board member Michael Busman chimed in at that point by proposing that Goodin require only a bid for a 12-month commitment instead of a 24-month commitment.

Also, Busman said that in the long run, by getting a bid from a construction company now, it would save money for the school board by getting a locked-in rate and also by having someone to search for state money for Sumter County Schools.

“The only reason we’d use them is to save money,” Busman said.

Board member Alice Green then said that she agreed with Edith — why hire a consultant when the superintendent should be in charge of the issue?

Board member Michael Mock said it was his belief that the superintendent should be charged with educational issues, not building and construction issues. That’s why a construction manager is important to Sumter County.

Smith has been with the school system for more than eight years and he does work for the Board whenever he’s needed. Smith works for Buckley and Associates in Albany. Goodin said it’s never been in Smith’s job description to search for grants from the state that the county may be eligible for since Smith is a contract worker. If the Board had a full-time construction manager, though, or even a part-time employee, that could be added into the job description.

The Board will discuss the issue more Thursday at its regularly scheduled meeting at 7 p.m. which is open to the public.

The Sumter County BOE will also hold a meeting with state Rep. Mike Cheokas, D-Americus, state Senator George Hooks, D-Americus, members of the Chattahoochee-Flint Regional Education Service Agency and several other school systems in the area at 2 p.m. Jan. 23 to discuss the state’s budget, and to see where Cheokas and Hooks plan to vote to make cuts.

Special Education Director Barbee Cowan also made a presentation Monday to the Sumter County BOE.

She said she was proud to report that Sumter County’s special education students who are taking the high school graduation tests without accommodations were, for math, at 38.3 percent, and the state average for Georgia was at 27 percent, and for reading, English and language arts, 39.5 percent, and Georgia’s state average was 27.2 percent.

But, the issue Cowan was most proud of, she said, was that in 2005, special education students in Sumter County had a drop-out rate of 35 percent, but in 2009, that number was brought down to 4.2 percent of special education students dropping out of school.

Plus, Sumter County the number of special education students in regular learning classrooms in 2005 was at 52.5 percent, but in 2009, that number jumped to 64.6 percent, which is a little more than three percent more than the state average.

“I’m very proud of these kids and my colleagues,” Cowan said.