Buncombe County committee corrects scoring error, recommends 'scenario five' to spread early-learning grants

A Buncombe County committee meeting to finalize early-learning grant recommendations on a special call corrected a material scoring error and voted to recommend "scenario five," a funding approach that spreads partial awards and directs an $83,000 remainder to priority applicants.

Rachel, a county staff member who presented the scoring data, told the committee it had discovered "a significant or material error in the scoring data" used at last week's meeting: five zero-score rows had not been removed from the averages, which "falsely lower[ed]" the scores of five applicants. She said staff updated the scoring sheet, kept the original tab for transparency, notified affected applicants, and confirmed the YWCA Empowerment Child Care request is $100,000 (correcting earlier inconsistent entries).

The corrected entries that moved into higher ranking included the Verner Center for Early Learning and the YWCA Empowerment proposal; Montessori Learning Community, Christine Avery Learning Center and a second YWCA proposal were also identified as affected. Staff emphasized that the recommended full/partial/not-recommended percentages were calculated with the correct denominators and did not change—only the overall applicant averages were corrected.

Committee members reviewed four prebuilt funding scenarios (and asked staff to add more options). Scenario 1 would fully fund projects until money runs out; Scenario 2 funds projects with at least 50% of members recommending full funding (then funds others at 75%); Scenario 3 uses a 75% threshold; Scenario 4 applies Scenario 3 logic with an additional 20% deduction for projects where 20% or more of scorers recommended no funding. Several members objected to penalizing projects with small numbers of "no" votes and proposed sorting by unanimous or majority recommendation first.

Heather (committee member) proposed considering a Scenario 5 that would use Scenario 4's allocations and assign the $83,000 remainder to a project such as the YWCA Empowerment Child Care. After procedural clarification from Amy (legal counsel) that motions on the floor must be addressed before new motions, the committee voted to add Scenario 5 to the set of scenarios under consideration. The chair then asked each committee member for a single preferred scenario; staff reported Scenario 5 as the plurality choice (reported as 6.5 in the committee's weighted count), with Scenario 4 and Scenario 2 receiving fewer weighted votes.

A motion to accept Scenario 5 as the committee's recommendation was made, seconded and approved by the group. The committee did not record individual tallies in the transcript for that final motion; members expressed appreciation for staff's transparency and work in correcting the error during the meeting.

Diana Sierra, CEO of the YWCA, used the public-comment period to thank county staff (Rachel and Angeline) for communicating about the scoring changes, to thank the committee for approving Scenario 5, and to offer follow-up clarification on the YWCA application. Staff said they would forward the committee's recommendation to the county budget office for inclusion in the county manager's proposed budget to the Board of Commissioners, expected to be shared in May. The committee scheduled its next extended working meeting for May 5, noon–2:30 p.m.

What the committee decided: the group recommended "Scenario 5"—a plan that preserves the committee's scoring adjustments, favors distributing funds more broadly via partial awards, and uses the $83,000 remainder to prioritize a project the committee specifically identified. The recommendations will go to the budget office and then to the county manager and Board of Commissioners for consideration.