CCSB Splits Vote on Kingsland Move

RISON - A request by Cleveland County Head Start to move all of its operations at Kingsland School to the Rison School campus failed Monday after the Cleveland County School Board voted 3-3 on the request. Superintendent Jerrod Williams told the school board during its regular monthly meeting Monday night that Head Start was asking the district to move all of its Kingsland operations back to Rison now that space is once again available at the building Williams referred to as the 4th-5th grade building, which is where the Rison Head Start program was once located. When the request came up for a vote, the six board members present for the meeting were split. Board member Tony White was not at the meeting. The vote was split along the geographic lines with the three board members from west of the Saline River - Helen Browning, Kelly Tayor and Sheila Towery - voting against the request, while the three board members from east of the river - Harrell Wilson, William King and first-time board member Nick Bennett - vote for it. Since there was not a majority vote if favor, the request failed. Currently, a portion of Kingsland School is being used for Head Start students from both Rison and Kingsland. Alicia Wilkie, who is serving as the interim director for Cleveland County Head Start, said the program is currently serving about 43 students from Rison and about 10 to 12 from Kingsland. Rather than transport a majority of the students from Rison to Kingsland each day, Wilkie said Head Start preferred to have the operations at Rison since that is where the majority of the students are from. Head Start made the decision to move its Rison program to Kingsland after the Cleveland County School District decided in 2019 to close Kingsland Elementary and move the students there to the Rison campus. While the Cleveland County School District serves as the administrator of Cleveland County Head Start, the federa...