Better late than never.

That’s what people say, anyway, and the Guilford County Board of Commissioners has just found out that on Thursday, Jan. 10, the board will finally get some new information regarding the status of a $1-million school facilities study.  The Board of Commissioners paid half the cost of the study, so it has a vested interest in the results.

Several Guilford County commissioners have for months been expressing dismay since they were supposed to see the results of the study in September, but hadn’t heard anything other than some preliminary findings in one October committee meeting.

Guilford County Schools and the Board of Commissioners hired Tallahassee-based MGT Consulting Group in early 2018 to conduct the study that’s expected to provide guidance on school construction, repair and security needs and to also provide information on which schools are overcrowded and which are underutilized.

Commissioner Jeff Phillips said this week that a Jan. 10 meeting was now scheduled and that he anticipates Board of Commissioners will get much of what it’s been looking for at that meeting.

“I think we will see MGT’s version of the results,” Phillips said.

Phillips said that will be the beginning of the process not the end.  He said the study will no doubt precipitate a lot of discussion in 2019.

“I don’t expect we will have time to absorb everything in a two- to three-hour meeting,” Phillips said, “but I hope we’ll have a better big-picture summary to begin to consider going forward.”

Several commissioners said this week that they were glad to finally see some movement on the study results after what had been a long time.

Commissioner Henning said he didn’t know what the hold up was – whether the consultant was taking a long time to complete the study or whether the school system officials wanted to tweak the information before it made its way to the county commissioners.

At a Thursday, Oct. 11 joint committee meeting, school board members and county commissioners were given information regarding the study, but they were told several times during that presentation that those were incomplete and preliminary findings.