Garfield sale to close June 24

One piece of surplus property has been sold, but so far Jay Schools has no bidders on another.
Closing is set for June 24 on the purchase of the former Garfield Elementary School building by Chris Fennig and MyFarms for $82,000.
“Everything’s ready to go,” attorney Phil Frantz told the Jay School Board Monday.
The 1947 building at 404 E. Arch St. in Portland has not only served as an elementary school but for many years was the home of the school corporation’s administrative offices.
Meanwhile no bids have yet been received on the former Beacon Drive-In property south of Jay County High School. Bidding opened June 11 and will close at 11:30 a.m. July 15. The minimum bid for the 15-acre property, which has frontage on Indiana 67 and county road 75 South and abuts Sheffer Acres to the west, is $129,150, which is 90 percent of its appraised value.
Fennig’s bid on the Garfield building was also 90 percent of the appraised value and was the only one received. The purchase will allow MyFarms, a firm that provides precision agriculture management services via the Internet, to move from rented locations in Portland.
The Beacon property, which was the site of a drive-in movie theatre during the 1950s and early 1960s, was donated to the school corporation by Anthony “Skip” Mallers more than 25 years ago.
Sale of the surplus properties is yet another step being taken by the Jay School Board to improve the school corporation’s cash position, which has deteriorated in recent years because of declining enrollment.
As a result of ongoing reductions in spending, business manager Brad DeRome now projects the year-end cash balance in the general fund to be $1.8 million.
“We could do a little bit better or a little bit worse depending on enrollment,” said DeRome.
DeRome said his cash flow estimate includes a net loss of seven certified teachers and three support staff at the end of the 2014-15 school year.
Board members gave unanimous approval Monday to borrowing $489,000 from First Merchants Bank of Portland to purchase five new school buses. The loan, which will go into effect in 2016 after the current bus purchase loan is paid off, will have a term of four years at an interest rate of 1.709 percent and a fee of $500.
DeRome said the First Merchants proposal was the lowest in terms of interest rate and net fees.
“It was very competitive,” he added.
Proposals for the bus loan were received from Bank of Geneva, Citizens State Bank, First Bank of Berne, and MainSource Bank in addition to First Merchants.
The loan will be paid off through the school corporation’s debt service fund.
Board members also gave unanimous approval to renewing property casualty insurance with EMC Insurance at a cost of $176,749 and getting workers’ compensation insurance from IPEP at a cost of $82,888.
Combined, the two insurance packages will cost $259,637, DeRome said, an increase of about 7 percent from last year.
In other business, the board:
•Hired Ashley Austerman as an art teacher for East and Bloomfield elementaries, Dennis Dwiggins and Ted Habegger as driver education instructors, Rebecca Bailey as a library instructional assistant at Bloomfield Elementary School, Brad Horn as a physical education and health teacher at Jay County High School, Chelsea Guggenbiller as a guidance counselor at JCHS, Ashley Cosner as a family and consumer science teacher at JCHS, Tim Clegg as a business teacher at JCHS and Cori Vormohr for one of two open teaching positions at East Jay Middle School.
•Accepted the retirement of Florine Golden as family and consumer science teacher at JCHS and Martha Woodward as an elementary library instructional assistant.
•Accepted the resignations of Lisa Vogler as special education secretary, Aaron Daniels as a sixth grade social studies teacher, Autumn Rodeffer as an eighth grade special education teacher and Courtney Daniels-Clay as a business teacher.
•Transferred Amy Hollowed from a half-time Read 180 teacher to a sixth grade English teacher at East Jay.
•Approved extracurricular assignments for Amber Yadon as assistant student council adviser at JCHS, Brea Burcham as cheer coach at West Jay Middle School, Bryttani Knight as assistant cheer coach at West Jay, Bart Brandenburg as boys’ basketball coach at Judge Haynes Elementary School, Liz Lawson as fine arts academic coach at JCHS, Adam Daniels as boys’ soccer coach at JCHS, Leah Wellman as cross country coach at JCHS, Andrea Oswalt as cheer coach at East Elementary School, Christy Shauver as girls’ basketball coach at East Elementary, Eric Myers as seventh grade football coach at East Jay, Jeff Heller as assistant seventh grade football coach at East Jay, Amy Grady and Mitch Snyder to assist with the summer band program, Josh Selvey as assistant baseball coach at JCHS, Kristen Selvey as assistant cheer coach at JCHS, Butch Gray as golf coach at JCHS, Craig Teagle as head of the physical education department at JCHS, Renae Laux as assistant girls’ soccer coach at JCHS, Terry Robbins as assistant football coach at JCHS and Ashley Loucks as assistant cheer coach at JCHS.
•Accepted the extracurricular resignations of Amy Dillon as eighth grade volleyball coach at East Jay, Nichole Myers as swim coach at East Jay and West Jay, Eric Myers as assistant seventh grade football coach at East Jay, Eric Hemmelgarn as sixth grade boys’ basketball coach at East Jay and as basketball coach at East Elementary, Amber Yadon as assistant student council adviser at JCHS, C.J. Yoder as thespian club sponsor at JCHS, Kathy Ayers as student council sponsor at East Elementary, Christy Shaver as cheer coach at East Elementary, Joni Aulbach as Honor Society sponsor at JCHS, Zachary Keller as student council adviser at JCHS and Travis Theurer as freshman football coach at JCHS.
•Approved a trip by the JCHS and West Jay archery teams to the world finals in Nashville.
•Approved bus requests from the Jay County Girl Scouts and Jay Community Center.
•Heard David Golden of the Jay Classroom Teachers Association urge progress on eliminating the $1 health insurance benefit for several administrators.
•Heard superintendent Tim Long say that a project to promote the use of 529 college savings plans is moving forward.
“We’ve got all the forms out to parents in kindergarten through third grade,” Long said.
•Learned that 120 kids are taking part in the KiPS (kindergarten prep school) program at Jay County Public Library in partnership with Jay Schools.
•Approved recommended textbooks for chemistry, physics, biomedicine and dual credit public speaking and music.
•Approved the middle school student and parent handbook with no changes from the current year.
•Adjusted the textbook rental and fee charge for third grade to $133 to reflect a change in textbook price. That is an increase of $3.