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By KELLY RYAN
© St. Petersburg Times, The state Legislature has given school districts until July 1, 2002, to get rid of portable classrooms or invest millions in the temporary trailers so they meet a more strict building code. Pinellas school officials have tried to elude the new restrictions, but with those efforts unsuccessful so far, the school district has set aside $15-million over the next two years to make all of the required changes. The School Board will consider that amount, part of the district's five-year construction plan, during a public hearing on the budget Sept. 11. Pinellas Superintendent Howard Hinesley and other officials regret that they have to spend money to retrofit portables that will be slowly phased out as the district moves to a new form of student assignment in fall 2003. They say that the county's portables are safe already and that the work is likely to disrupt classes. "The only way around it is to try to get some understanding that there needs to be some relief from this," Hinesley said. Pinellas has 744 portables -- the district owns 296, the others are leased -- most of which house classrooms. Of those, 59 are used for special-education classrooms. A handful are used as clinics. Every year, dozens are moved around as the population shifts and as renovation projects temporarily displace students. Among other things, the state is requiring that covered walkways connect the portables and that each one has two exit ramps. Pinellas portables already have fire alarms. The portables would need to be better secured to the ground, and some might need to be put on stilts because they are on a flood plain. After July 1, the state will require its stamp of approval before the portables can be used. Work has not started because the money has not been officially allocated yet. The district facilities staff is working to come up with a game plan to meet the deadline, which is full of logistical challenges. Because the district moves portables often, some work will have to be done and redone. Covered walkways, for example, could be destroyed as the portables are moved. "If you're going to do a covered walkway, you need to do it so it doesn't blow away," said Tony Rivas, the district's facilities director. "Pretty soon you're going to have a permanent facility built around portable ones." Then there's the question of what to do with the students who are in the portables. It is unclear whether most of the work can be done after school lets out for the day or whether students will have to spend days in the cafeteria or media center. The question that has the district most puzzled is what to do about schools like Rio Vista Elementary in St. Petersburg. Rio Vista is on a tiny campus -- 6 acres -- and has 21 portables lined up close together. There isn't room for all of the improvements the state is requiring. Come next summer, then, Hinesley and the School Board could be faced with a difficult decision: Where will those students go? "I'm not sure anybody (at the state level) really understands the impact of this," Hinesley said. Putting $15-million into portables will not cancel other scheduled construction projects. But it could change when the projects start or finish. Details were not available this week because the official in charge of the five-year plan was out of the country. If it's going to be such a hassle and so expensive to do the work, why not just get rid of the portables? Hinesley and other district officials say it's not that simple. For one thing, they say, Pinellas has generally assigned students to schools based on where they live. As the population has surged in the neighborhood around Palm Harbor University High School, for example, the district has piled portables there. Yet there are other schools nearby, such as Countryside High School in Clearwater, with extra seats. One way to fix that would be to rezone hundreds of students from schools that are overrun with portables to those with space. Hinesley said he won't disrupt families that way. "Let's face it, politically and practically, that is not feasible," he said. Another option would be to get rid of them and convert non-classrooms into classrooms -- an approach Hillsborough County is taking. Hinesley is adamant that he won't take that route either. Hillsborough is aiming to trim the number of portables from nearly 1,900 to 973. But Hillsborough couldn't build enough permanent buildings for the displaced students in a year, so cafeterias, multipurpose rooms and computer labs will be used as classrooms. In some cases, two classes will go on at the same time in the same room. So why not build permanent classrooms to fit all of the students? With some school expansion projects under way, Pinellas actually has enough permanent seats for the county's middle and high school students. Those seats just aren't exactly where the students are. At the elementary level, even if students were rezoned to fill in all of the spaces, the district would be hundreds of seats short. The state surveys a school district's population and school space every five years. From that survey, the state decides whether a district needs more schools; if so, the state grants permission. During the last survey, the state said Pinellas didn't need any new schools because the county's enrollment had stabilized. The district got a waiver to build new schools in St. Petersburg as part of its settlement in the federal desegregation case. The next survey is in the 2002-2003 school year. District officials don't know whether they will get permission then to build new schools. Even if that does happen, it takes years to assemble the land, write plans and hire builders. District officials say that when the "choice plan" starts in 2003, giving parents a greater voice in where their children attend school, they will be able to reduce the number of portables. Under choice, the district eventually will be able to control how many students attend each school based on the number of permanent seats. Until then, though, Pinellas officials say they are stuck with portables and the cost to bring them up to code. "If we get some relief, we won't have to spend all that," Rivas said. "We're still not giving up hope."
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