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The Dent County Commissioners met for their regular meeting Thursday at the Dent County Courthouse. Presiding Commissioner Darrell Skiles was not present so Gary Larson acted as Presiding Commissioner for the meeting. In the road report, District One Commissioner Dennis Purcell said that workers would be screening gravel and also hauling brown rock. He said that they would be cutting brush on Dent County Road 5420 and working on tractor #5. District 2 Commissioner Gary Larson said that brush was going to be cut on Dent County Roads 2010, 2115, 4283 and 4285. Larson said that some brown rock would also be hauled. Dent County Clerk Angie Curley said that since the budget was adopted Monday night, over $174,000 has been spent on bill payments. Curley indicated that all certifications of elections have been received from all the entities in preparation of the April election. Phone bids were taken for fuel and MFA Oil had the lowest price on 1,000 gallons of unleaded fuel at $2.635 per gallon, and also for 7,000 gallons of diesel fuel for $2.837 per gallon and was awarded the bids. Alice Ripley from ETIS, Inc. came in to discuss some updates about the ankle bracelets for tracking prisoners as their company has gone through some changes. She said that the programmable bracelets where they monitor everything about the prisoner is $12 per month per unit, otherwise the county could do all the tracking on their own and pay $9.00 per month, per unit. She said that they use a three-way cell phone system on the ankle bracelet that works with the CPU in keeping track of the prisoners through a caseworker, and ETIS is the only one to have this technology at the time. The commissioners said that she needed to visit with Sheriff Rick Stallings and Prosecuting Attorney Brandi Baird and give them the updates on the bracelets as well. The next meeting of the Dent County Commissioners will be Monday morning at 9:00 and the meeting is open to the public.

The Salem R-80 Board of Education held their monthly meeting Thursday evening at the district administrative offices boardroom. After approval of the agenda, including program evaluations for the At-Risk/Alternative program, Parents as Teachers program and federal programs, Superintendent Cindy Rumpf reported that S.N. Ball and David Dittman, representing the Judson/Young Foundation donated $40,000 to the school district. Items requested for purchase include new scoreboards for the high school gym, a new fence and miscellaneous supplies for the high school baseball field and technology upgrades. The Judson/Young Foundation was setup back in 1963 have donated money every year since. Salem R-80 has been selected to participate in a two-year Growth Model Pilot Project sponsored by DESE and the team will consist of Cindy Rumpf, John McColloch, Melanie Wisdom and Amy Major. Salem R-80 will also be part of a consortium in the writing of a K-6 Math grant from DESE. The award of the grant will be for up to $500,000 each year for three years and will be used to create a model for mathematics professional developing focusing on applying mathematics concepts to the real world. In old business, the Board previously participated in a Promethean Board demonstration and after a lengthy discussion and numerous questions were asked at the time, the Board asked to table the idea until those questions and more information could be answered. A lot of information was obtained since that time and a lengthy slide presentation was presented to the Board. After more discussion, the Board approved letting out of bids for the Boards and those sealed bids are due February 10^th. The decision at that time as to the best board, price, maintenance agreement and training package of those bids would be decided upon. Rumpf did report that she had contacted the school attorney and learned that per board policy, any purchase over $25,000 was to be obtained by sealed bid. A six-month budget comparison was then presented and showed that year-to-date revenue was at $5,016,828.26 with expenses at $5,057,440.00 leaving an excess of expenses over revenues of $40,612. It was noted that some Title money and SPED money had not been received yet and there was a 0.5% increase this year for retirement. The rural schools have agreed to try out a junior high football cooperative since their facilities do not offer the sport. No games or anything will change, and they will provide their own transportation. The Varsity Cheerleading Coach Joannie Bobbit will be stepping down at the end of the season. The Board then voted not to go with the Reading Recovery Consortium contract again as it cost $5,000 and R-80 received no help after paying the money. The Board decided instead to go with Lebanon on a yearly basis. They will be looking at other avenues for future use. The Board then voted to go into Closed Session for the purpose of discussing protected disclosure by law and personnel.

Congratulations to the officers elected to the student council for the 2011/2012 school year. The President of the student council is Madison Auten, Vice-President is Crystal Prince, Secretary is Mitch Lo and Treasurer is Alexis English. Congratulations students!!!

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