School board names new member

A new board member was approved unanimously by the Douglas County School Board on Wednesday and was the only person applying for the position left open since Connie Wennhold died in March.

Thomas Moore lives in the same Ruhenstroth neighborhood as the Wennhold family and said he hoped to honor Connie Wennhold's memory by filling the vacancy in District 6.

"I was disappointed to find I was the only person to put in for the position," Moore said.

Moore has lived in the area for 13 years, the last seven in Ruhenstroth, and has worked as a principal traffic engineer with the Department of Transportation for 11 years.

Moore said he has flexible hours as a state employee that will allow him to participate in school board functions. He was informed that his term expires in December and Moore said he is willing to run for election.

Moore is married to school district secretary Carolyn Moore and the couple have two children, a son who is a junior at Douglas and a daughter who is a freshman at the University of Nevada, Reno.

Thomas Moore said his family has always been involved in school activities and issues of education.

"My kids are why I applied for the position," he said. "They enjoy school and we talked about it with them. We're involved as a family and they were very supportive of me doing this."

The school board also approved two new principals for Douglas schools.

Keith Lewis will be the new principal at Pau-Wa-Lu Middle School in the position vacated by the retirement of Robbin Pedrett.

Lewis has been vice principal at Carson Valley Middle School since 2005 and has worked within the Douglas County school system since 1995 in the capacities of physical education teacher and summer school and reading/math camp administrators. He was also the Douglas boy's basketball coach from 1998 to 2005.

Lewis is licensed in Nevada for school administration.

Clark County educator Paul Zona was approved as the new principal of Meneley Elementary School. Current principal Brian Frazier becomes Dr. Janice Florey's replacement as director of grants, assessments and special programs.

Zona was assistant principal at two Clark County schools from 2000-03, coordinator of K-12 Leadership Development and since 2005 has been principal of Richard Bryan Elementary School in Las Vegas.

Zona holds elementary teaching and professional administrator K-12 school administrator licenses for Nevada.

The school board adopted the final budget for the 2007-08 Douglas County School District school year.

The actual enrollment for the current year is 6,609 with the district anticipating a decrease in next year's enrollment to about 6,414 students.

"I read somewhere that a budget is your statement of priorities," said board member Sharla Hales. "After the budget was explained to me by Holly (Luna) and Nancy (Bryant), I left wishing we had more money but that we are doing the best with what we have."