The Birmingham age-herald., 1916-05-21

[ Bil mingham, with the exception of the 1 Ensley district. These pupils are wei provided for in the Ensley High school
 In the fall accommodations for 500 new ! pupils coming to high school from the | elementary schools will be necessary | This will far exceed the number with 1 drawing and graduating. This problem ! of high school accommodations has been | a serious one almost ever since Central was built. when it was expected to relieve
 the conditions existing before that time. | During the past six years, with the ex- | ception of a four-room building at Central | Park, Birmingham has not built a new l school building, nor improved the equip l ment in any of the old ones. The im- provements made have been the work of i principals, teachers and school improve
 ment associations, and to these generous credit is due for the interest and loyalty 1 they have demonstrated
 | Commissioner Hornady says:
 During this period of six years the population of the city has been more than doubled by the annexation of the suburban towns. In most of these towns the school buildings were poor ly constructed. While some of them served fairly well for time under original conditions, they are now en- tfrely inadequate and ir many in stances they are insanitary and unsafe. Many of them have their foundations buttressed and their cracked walls iron pinned in order to make them safe enough for the children to stay in. In such cases it is not a matter of com fort but of bare physical safety Many of these are old frame structures with timbers that are rotting and walls | that creak and tremble under heavy winds. They have been patched and bolstered up from year to year until they are beyond responding to fur ther temporary repairs.
 Remodeling or enlarging these ob- solete buildings is out of the question, as an architect or a building inspector points out. They are now in use and the logical and safe plan is to discard them and build modern. adequate schoolhouses in their places. For the present, to care for the increased at tendance the schools are using cloak rooms, storage rooms, poorly lighted and worse ventilated basement rooms. The board of education has during the past four years, erected temporary frame structures for 53 classrooms. It
 has converted old. dilapidated resi- dences for the use of 28 other class rooms and is paying rent for churches, halls and residences for the use of 31 more classrooms. More than 5000 chil- dren in Birmingham are housed in 112 temporary classrooms, either cheaply constructed or leased for the purpose
 and more than 200 other classrooms should be condemned"
 MT. Hornady, whose work on the board of commissioners embraces health and education. has made care full survey and study of the schools
 He knows school conditions all over
 the city and is prepared to say just
 what is needed. what must be had for
 actual safety and what Birmingham
 should do for its schools.
 More than 12,000 children in Bir-
 mingham," continues Mr. Hornady, "are
 in need of better school conditions to-
 day. Next year, with compulsory at
 tendance laws enforced, conditions will
 become intolerable. Out of the 56
 school buildings now used to house
 2S,000 children of the city not more
 than one-fourth will pas,s inspection
 as to size, safety and sanitation. The
 responsibility of these conditions
 should not rest upon the few. We
 stand daily in the presence of serious
 impending possibilities. It is only by
 the greatest vigilance combined with
 good fortune that our city has thus
 far escaped the horrors that have so
 rudely awakened other communities.
 The people of Birmingham should pro-
 vide adequate facilities for their chill
 dren-buildings where their lives may
 be safe and their health protected.
 "As to the ability of the city to care for this bond issue. there can be no se- rious question. While Birmingham is cramped Financially in many ways it is amply able to provide the interest on this bond issue. The interest and redemption fund. which absorbs 50 cents on every dollar paid in taxes is sufficient to care for this issue with out imposing any additional burden upon the taxpayer. On an assessment of $100,000, ,00O, which is considered the minimum for 1917, $500,000 will go into this fund yearly. The money in this fund cannot be used for general pur- poses and when it goes for interest it does not cripple any department of the city or curtail any activity in which the city is now engaged.
 "The board of education and the board of commissioners have made a most painstaking survey of the entire situation and have given the fullest deliberation to the plans. Every co., tingency has been taken into consid- eration and we are unanimously of the opinion that the best results can be ob- tained only by following the pro- gramme which has been outlined"
 This programme provides for the erection of high schools and elemen- tary schools that will adequately ac- commodate the school children of Bir- mingham and that will be in keeping with the grade of work and the stan dards maintained in the schools at DreSent