The coastland times. [volume] (Mnateo [i.e. Manteo], N.C.) 1947-1959, 1952-04-25
SCHOOL SITE ON
HATTERAS ISLAND
UP BEFORE COURT
Question to Decide: Who Has
Authority; The Board in
Raleigh or The Board
of Dare County

Sometime ago the Board of Ed
ucation and other interested par
ties entered into an argument to
bring Friendly Suit" to de-
termine who had the authority
to locate a school building,-The
State Board of Education in Ra-
leigh, or the Dare County Board
of Education.
The question grew out of the
States refusal to erect modern
consolidated school on Hatteras
Island to serve the people of sew
en- villages, at the spot chosen by
the Dare County Board of Edu-
cation, Avon.
Because of the block in plans
for the erection of the building,
the children of this area have
been the losers, and they have
also lost by the subsequent in
flation of values, a good 35 per
cent of what their money would
have bought in construction costs
two years ago.
Here is what the News and
Observer had to say about the
case before the courts, in its issue
of April 18th:
The courts were called in yes
terday to settle that months-old
squabble over the location of an
Outer Banks high school.
The Dare County Board of Ed
ucation, determined to see the
school built at Avon, appealed to
the courts to remove a big road
block. That roadblock happens to
be the State Board of Education.
For months now, the Dare
Board has huffed and puffed for
Avon without so much as NOV
ing the State Board an inch. Yes
terday, Wake Superior Court
was asked for an injunction that
would clear the way for a con-
solidated high school at the Avon
site. ...s s
The State Board based its firm
refusal to go along with Avon
on the advice of its engineers.
Those engineers have long con-
tended that the Avon site is too
much exposed to the gales aI
waters of the Atlantic, hardly ~
stones throw away.
The site is too dangerous for
the State to sink the taxpayers
money into regardless of what
the Dare Board contends, the Ra-
leigh officials have held.
At one point, the State Board
sent a committee of three of its
members to the outer banks to
examine all the proposed sites
two at Avon and one at Buxton.
The committee returned to re-
port that neither of the Avon
sites would do.
Said Committee Chairman
Claude Farrell of Elkin: 'The
Dare Board is determined and
of one mind to place this school
at Avon. We did not see single
thing that would bring our think
ing in line with theirs; we could
MT see eye to eye at ALL"
After that the board promptly
adopted a motion disappearing
the ALLEGATION of State funds for
the construction of a school bull
ding at Avon" The vote was
unanimous.
The board let it be known sew
eral times that it would approve
the safer site at Buxton.
The opposition claimed repeat
edly the State Board has no legal
authority to dictate a building
site in the face of stony opposi-
ton from the county board of
education involved. The board
replled that 1t certainly had an
obligation to spend State money
wisely. To build school on an
exposed site at exposed Avon
wouldn't exactly constitute wis
dom, its members held.
One Alternate
At one point the Dare Board
offered an alternate" site to the
one originally proposed at Avon
The original site is the present
location of the Avon school. The
alternate happens to adjoin the
school
The State Board committee
said it got conflicting testi-
mony" on the Outer Banks as
l. Il a