Rapid construction of houses for the past 30 years, with most occupied by families from the Washington area, has led to overcrowding in Jefferson County schools.

Even with crowded local schools, the county has been consolidating. This year all 9th graders were centralized in one 9th grade school, and all 6th graders were moved from the nine local elementary schools to three regional middle schools.

Building roads and schools for the new residents is a significant drain on county and state taxpayers, since there are not enough new businesses to take up the load. Teaching each new student costs about $2,500 from local taxes and $4,500 from state money per year, plus about $17,000 of school construction.

Virtually all the new homes pay much less than that, so they are subsidized by existing taxpayers and businesses. The voters strongly defeated a bond issue for a new school in 2000, partly because they were fed up with paying for new schools for new developments.

The state allows, but does not require, the county to charge new developments for the cost of new schools. The county is charging part of the cost, starting in January 2004. Furthermore, large developers in the county seat of Charles Town have agreed to pay both capital and operating costs of expansion.