Dalton voters could be asked to dissolve the school system

Here’s a look at what’s happening in other parts of Northwest Georgia and Northeast Alabama:

Officials with the League of Women Voters of the Dalton Area makes plans to gathering signatures.

DALTON — Dalton voters could be asked to decide next May whether to abolish the Dalton Public Schools system.

Officials with the League of Women Voters of the Dalton Area made plans last week to begin gathering signatures for a petition to place a referendum on the May 2018 general primary ballot that would call for the city school system to give up its charter.

“We will need 25 percent of the registered voters in the last city election,” said League board member Jevin Jensen. “That’s roughly 3,000 voters.”

Under Georgia law, if the League gathers enough signatures the Dalton City Council would have to put the measure on the ballot.

Georgia law says “only qualified voters residing within the municipality or district for six months prior to the election shall vote” on the measure.

“It’s the city’s school system,” Jensen said. “If the city drops the charter for the school system, the county is legally obligated to take over.”

League President Helen Crawford said the group has supported consolidation of the two school systems for almost 20 years.

“Years ago, before I came to Dalton, the League did a study on the consolidation of the governments with an emphasis on the school systems. They decided at that time they would support consolidation, and we are still working towards that,” she said.

League member Debby Peppers said it would be good to move quickly now because Dalton Public Schools is searching for a new superintendent.

“It could be more difficult once someone gets in there,” she said.

Dalton resident Cathy Holmes, who spoke at the meeting, said the prospect of a combined school system might make it easier to land a high-profile superintendent.

Holmes presented results from the latest Georgia Milestones tests that all public school students across the state are required to take. According to that data, a majority of students in third, fifth and eighth grades in Dalton Public Schools read below grade level.

“It would be easier to focus our efforts on improving one school system than two,” said former Dalton mayor David Pennington.

Whitfield County Schools Superintendent Judy Gilreath says any merger would take time, probably years. “We’ve got a little over 13,000 students. They have over 8,000,” she said. “And we’ve got some differences. They don’t have their own buses.”