Montgomery County Schools Superintendent Jerry D. Weast plans to add security cameras to all county middle schools and will begin scaling back the use of portable classrooms, under a six-year capital improvement budget released Monday.
The plan, which outlines Weast’s vision for the direction of the schools, asks county officials for $258 million in fiscal 2009 and requests more than $1.4 billion for capital improvements during the next six years.
That total represents a $279 million increase — nearly 23 percent — over the current approved plan.
The money is necessary to pay for improvements to aging facilities, expansions at nine elementaries and the reopening of one, McKenney Hills, to ease crowding at other schools, Weast said in a statement Monday.
He could not be reached for further comment.
Edwards said the cameras, which would be added to all middle schools and updated in the county’s 25 high schools, are needed to ensure safe learning environments.
The proposal also calls for the installation of a visitor management system in all schools and the addition of visitor access systems at all elementaries.
County Parents and Teachers Association President Jane de Winter said the new security measures were likely to be a topic at its Thursday board meeting.
She also said she was concerned about Weast’s school renovations plans keeping pace with his proposal to reduce the number of portable classrooms from the 462 currently in use to 260 by 2013.
“We’re very concerned about modernizations and repair,” de Winter said. “So, I say that we hold those as just as important as reducing portables.”
Council Member Phil Andrews, a member of the education committee, said it was “too early to say” whether the county might approve the funding increase, especially in light of Gov. Martin O’Malley’s prediction of a $1.7 billion budget deficit.
Andrews said he had not read enough of Weast’s plan to comment on its particulars.
Weast chief of staff Brian Edwards said the proposal also includes studying the needs and costs of constructing a new middle school to serve Clarksburg, which community members have sought to solve crowding in the growing area.
