A Balancing Act for School Funding (NC)

July 8, 2010

State funding for education doesn’t look as dire as first forecasted earlier this year as local educators have had time to review the General Assembly’s approved budget for fiscal 2011.

Gov. Bev Perdue signed into law June 30 the General Assembly’s spending plan for 2010-2011. The approved budget allows school districts to use up to $63 million combined in education lottery receipts to help pay classroom teachers’ salaries and fund college scholarship programs, according to the N.C. Association of County Commissioners.

Lenoir County Schools isn’t eligible to use these lottery receipts to pay for classroom positions because the district’s lottery receipts are used to pay the school construction bond debt. Greene County Schools officials have expressed interest in using lottery receipts to help pay for classroom positions.

The approved state budget calls for a 3.7 percent cut in K-12 education funding, which is a lower cut than proposed by the governor. The state plans to spend nearly $7.1 billion on education for public schools.

“The budget certainly will offer us some relief for this coming year,” Lenoir County Schools Superintendent Terry Cline said. “We anticipated that the overall impact would not be as drastic this school year as we prepare for the loss of federal dollars next year. This allows us to save valuable jobs and keep our student-teacher ratios in line with previous cuts that we absorbed until we hit th e cutoff next school year.”

Greene County Schools Superintendent Patrick Miller expressed some optimism for the 2010-2011 school year.

“The budget is about as good as it could be, considering the limited resources the legislators had at their disposal,” Miller said. “There are still very deep cuts to K-12 education and other state agencies but we are grateful that we were not cut any deeper than we were.”

Jones County Schools Superintendent Michael Bracy said he was concerned about the federal stimulus funds running out for the district at the end of next school year.

“The stimulus money is going to be gone,” Bracy said. “We are going to have to find a way to continue to meet our high expectations.”