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07/07/2007
Bertha Vos parents consider pulling outTRAVERSE CITY — Parents frustrated by a plan to close Bertha Vos Elementary School are organizing an effort to defect to Elk Rapids Public Schools. Acme Township Clerk Dorothy Dunville has joined with other parents in researching how to transfer not just their children, but the entire community from Traverse City Area Public Schools to the Elk Rapids district. "We're trying to make (Acme) a town, but if you don't have a school, why would you want to put housing here,” Dunville said. "I love my school and I love my community and when it's threatened you get desperate.” If requested by one of the school boards, or by two-thirds of the people who own and reside on the land to be transferred, the board of the Traverse Bay Area Intermediate School District would be asked to make the transfer, according to guidelines published by the Michigan Department of Education. That decision could be appealed by any affected resident to the state Superintendent of Public Instruction. If the transfer involves more than 10 percent of TCAPS property tax base, the transfer would have to be approved by a vote of the entire TCAPS school district. Dunville said many parents are supportive of the break-away notion and she's talked to quite a few who have already registered their children to attend Elk Rapids' Mill Creek Elementary School located in nearby Williamsburg. John Kerkhof, a lifelong Acme resident, said he "absolutely” supports the property transfer effort. "I attended Bertha Vos and I had hoped my children would, as well,” Kerkhof said. "Now I have enrolled my son at Mill Creek.” Dunville said they have just started researching the process and have yet to formally approach Elk Rapids. "It may not be easy, but I think it could be possible,” she said.
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