File photo Randolph County Superintendent of Schools Dr. Shawn Dilly presented the county Board of Education with information from an online survey.

ELKINS — The Randolph County Superintendent of Schools said he “had hoped for more respondents” to a survey seeking input on potential bond and levy proposals.

“The survey that we sent out for the bond and levy was completed on February 13 and we had 399 respondents,” Dr. Shawn Dilly told the Board of Education during the most recent BOE meeting. “I had hoped for more respondents, but this is kind of sometimes the ongoing challenge.”

The survey has been available on the Randolph County school system’s website since December.

Dilly said responses were split on a survey question about how supportive people would be knowing that a bond or levy would require additional taxpayer dollars.

“Bond and levy are both pretty split and it looks like it’s leaning a little heavier to a bond versus a levy,” Dilly said. “So those are pieces we would have to look at… I feel like we have been very transparent with our position, but again, I’m open to what we can do differently.”

Dilly discussed some of the survey questions, and said residents from throughout the county responded to the survey.

“I felt like we did get a good variety of folks participating in the survey,” Dilly said. “One question we had was about the current state of the school facilities. We had a lot of folks knowing about the facilities and the needs that we have.”

Dilly pointed out there was a “split vote” when it came to what the public felt about the county having safe, accessible schools that met the modern educational needs of its students. He added that many citizens feel there’s work to be done when it comes to maintenance and upkeep of schools.

“We had a very split vote, 211 to 188, just 53% agreed,” Dilly said about the county having safe and accessible schools. “So I think those are some things we can be looking at as we design a potential bond call moving forward.

“Maintenance and upkeep at schools, 142 agree, 257 disagree. So we do know we have some facility needs and insufficient funds to always keep up with those needs. So those are some things we want to maybe think about addressing as we build a bond.”

After discussing several other questions that were highlighted on the survey, Dilly told the BOE that he felt that many people weren’t listening or understanding what was being presented to them.

“I think if you read some of the comments that I provided to you, a lot of people aren’t listening,” Dilly said. “That’s part of the equation or understanding of what’s being presented. So I think they also don’t realize all of the things we have to follow and all the government requirements that we have no ability to change on a local level.”

Dilly also told the BOE it was frustrating that, for some people, the survey was seen as just a way to complain.

“The vast majority of this became basically a place for people to air their grievances rather than answer the questions,” Dilly said. “I did print off all of the responses so you can have every single response for these questions…You will see a lot of complaints and ‘fire all BOE employees’ … you get some grievances in here.”

Dilly said that, despite the negative comments, some good suggestions came from the public.

“There were some things like bathrooms suggested, the gym at Tygarts Valley, CTE classrooms, and some other different things,” Dilly said. “There were suggestions about parking and drop-off at Beverly and a couple other places. Unfortunately, some people had some good suggestions but they didn’t indicate which school.”

The next Randolph County Board of Education meeting will be March 3 at 5:30 p.m. at the Central Office.