The Telegraph-courier. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1888-1946, 1915-11-25
COMM TTEE WILL INVESTIGATE
Members of Kenosha County Board
Tell Racine Visitors That They Are
Favorable" to Plan But See No
Reason to Close Deal at This Time.

The question Of kenosha county Join
ing with Racine county in the opening
OF Joint county training school for
teachers is to be held in allegiance until
the January session of the countv
board. Members of the Kenosha board
on Tuesday after a long discussion of
the matter held that the plans for the
school were little too indefinite to
permit the Kenosha board to 90 on
record IN the matter The members of
the Racine board who had taken the
matter up with the Kenosha supervisors
were advised that the local men were
favorable" to the proposition but
there were a lot of matters to be SET
tied before final action was taken. The
proposition included a two years. agree
ment for the use of the Union Grove
High School building and the members
of the local board raise the rather per-
tinent question as to how this county
could withdraw from the agreement
provided it did not prove satisfactory.
District Attorney Drury held that the
law provided no way for a withdrawal
without the consent of the two counties.
The members of the Racine board had
70 ets1p into tlle Get ss~~.ssof Is law and
when the committee !, sent to Keno
sha they had the belief that The school
could be opened the first of January
and claim state aid. The district at
torney pointed out to the members of
the two boards that in keeping with the
provisions of the state law the school
must be in operation for at least ten
months before state aid could be OBJ
tanned and it was shown that it would
be impossible to open the school with
the certainty of state aid until in July
of 1916. Before the committee of the
Kenosha board reported an investiga.
tion was made as to the division of the
cost of maintaining the school and this
showed that the people of Racine would
be forced to pay two-thirds and Keno.
She county one-third of the cost. The
law provides that the division of the
cost should be in keeping with the
assessed valuation of the two counties.
1t was shown that the cost for the
first year including the payment of the
teachers salaries which must be adj
vanced by the two counties, with the
understanding that the state will rebate
the amount at the end of the school
year, would be $4,000. Of this amount
Racine county would pay $4,000 and Ke-
nosha county $1100. The Racine county
board made no appropriation to meet
these payments before its adjournment
and it was declared that if the school
was opened the amount Of money neces-
sary to it's maintenance would be
drawn out of the general fund of Ra-
cine county. The members of the Ke-
nosha board were agreeable to follow
ING this plan but the members held that
it would be plenty early to make a final
decision in the matter at the January
session. Superintendent Zimmerman
of the Racine county schools explained
that all the expense that would be nee
cessary at this time would be the ex-
pense of fitting no the school rooms
with desks and other equipment TIE
held this could be done for an expendi-
ture of $500 and that regardless of the
action of the Kenosha county board the
rooms would be fitted up. He explained
that this would be the thirtieth of these
training schools in the state and that
this was the full limit of the number of
schools as fixed by the present state
law He declared that unless the law
was amended it would be impossible for
Kenosha county to build a training
school in the future He declared that
there could be no objection to the two
counties cooperating in this matter for
many years to come and that Racine
eou. cy had not considered the possibil-
ity of giving up the school after it was
started.
After the full consideration of the
matter Chairman Spartz named com
mittee composed of Supervisors Epson
of Bristol, Martin of Brighton and
Hensgen of Kenosha to take up the
matter and report at the January ses-
sion and in the mean time the district
attorney was instructed to take the
matter mp with the attorney general and s
get an opinion as to just what the work
ing5 of the law in regard to the train
ing school would be.