Highlights of the 2009-10 state budget, the first year of a two-year spending blueprint North Carolina legislators were scheduled to vote on Tuesday and Wednesday:
TAXES
- Increase sales tax rate by one penny through July 2011. $803
million
- New surtax on state taxes paid by individual taxpayers for tax
years 2009 and 2010. $172 million
- Create temporary corporate income tax surtax. $23.1 million.
- Higher cigarette and alcohol excise taxes. $68.8 million

SCHOOLS
- Cut to public schools. The State Board of Education shall
apportion the cut among 115 school districts based on enrollment.
$225 million.
- Reduced funding for school bus maintenance and salaries. $15
milliion.
- Increase dropout prevention grants. $13 million.
- Reduce funding for More at Four, which provites free preschool
for at-risk 4-year-olds. $5 million.
- Fund 8 percent increase in community college enrollment. $58
million.
- Meet projected enrollment growth at University of North
Carolina system campuses. $44.2 million

HUMAN SERVICES
- Reduce funding for Smart Start early childhood program. $16
million.
- Cut AIDS drug assistance program. $3 million.
- Provide grant to six regional food banks. $1 million.
- State takes over the last of county obligations for Medicaid
cost-sharing. $253 million.
- Increase allowance for projected Medicaid growth. $155
million.
- Cut Medicaid rates paid to doctors and other healthcare
providers. $76 million.

RALEIGH, N.C. – The Take Wake Schools Back political action committee (PAC) has made its endorsement decisions for the October Wake County Board of Education races. The PAC endorses Chris Malone in District 1, John Tedesco in District 2, Deborah Prickett in District 7, and Debra Goldman in District 9.

All four candidates passionately advocate Take Wake Schools Back’s mission of bringing common sense back to the Wake County Public School System (WCPSS) on behalf of children and families; focusing on community schools, system accountability, flexibility, transparency and excellence.

“Our PAC is thrilled to support four dynamic candidates who have the right ideas and approaches for improving the quality of education in Wake County and better serving the needs of families and taxpayers,” said Dennis Berwyn, a founding member of Take Wake Schools Back. “District 2 was a difficult decision for our PAC, because we believe that Cathy Truitt also has the expertise, forward-thinking ideas and leadership qualities that the WCPSS desperately needs. We hope Dr. Truitt will be a valuable asset to the WCPSS in another capacity.”

Take Wake Schools Back is actively raising money to support Malone, Tedesco, Prickett and Goldman. The members of the PAC are also volunteering their time to help individual campaigns. Those who wish to support the PAC’s efforts can do so at www.takewakeschoolsback.com. The PAC also encourages people to volunteer to help the candidates in their campaigns, especially those who live in one of the four districts up for election.

WASHINGTON  – President Barack Obama wants to see 5,000 failing schools close and reopen with new principals and teachers over the next five years.

Education Secretary Arne Duncan says kids have only one shot at a good education. He said Monday that chronically underperforming schools need a new start.

Obama doesn’t have authority to close schools himself. That power rests with local school districts and states.

Duncan said the idea is to be “more targeted and more strategic.”

“We really want to put a laser-like focus on those schools that have historically under-performed,” Duncan said in an interview with The Associated Press.

The administration’s goal is for the lowest-performing 1,000 schools – about 1 percent of schools nationwide – to close and reopen each year for the next five years.

But the president will have unprecedented money to offer schools from a federal school-turnaround fund. And states have an incentive to act in the federal economic stimulus law, because they must help failing schools improve to be eligible for the dollars.

Combined with the budget plan released last week, Obama could have as much as $5 billion to facilitate school turnarounds, which could translate to $1 million for every school that is closed and reopened.

The federal school turnaround program gets about $500 million a year, and the stimulus legislation boosted funding to $3.5 billion. Obama’s budget would add another $1.5 billion by shifting dollars away from traditional formula programs.

The plan for failing schools is part of an effort to fundamentally change perceptions about what works in education.

The president has already channeled an unprecedented amount into the traditional formula-driven infrastructure that funds elementary, middle and high schools in his economic stimulus law.

But Obama also plans big boosts for newer and, some argue, untested ideas, plowing more money into school-turnaround programs as well as merit pay for teachers.

“Here’s a chance to do something dramatically different,” Duncan told the AP. “I don’t want to lose that opportunity.”

Efforts to penny pinch in the Senate’s $20 billion state government budget for next year, Democrats are an attempt to limit pain in the classroom for the public schools during the deep recession.

PROMISES, PROMISES: Saving teacher jobs tough
WASHINGTON  – President Barack Obama promises his economic stimulus law will save hundreds of thousands of teaching jobs, but some states could end up spending the money on playground equipment or wallpaper – and the president might not have the authority to stop them.

Obama says nearly all of the education money in the Recovery Act, which will start going out to states this week, is designed to retain teachers.

Education Secretary Arne Duncan threatens to “come down like a ton of bricks” on anyone who defies the administration’s plans to bring relief to states like California where 26,500 teachers have gotten pink slips. Across the country, 9 percent of teachers – about 294,000 – may face layoffs because of budget cuts, according to a University of Washington study.

But plans for the money are pulling in other directions, particularly in states with Republican governors:
- Hawaii Gov. Linda Lingle wants to fill a budget gap.
- Idaho Gov. Butch Otter wants to hold the money in reserve.
- South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford wants to pay down debt; he’s been turned down by the White House budget office and is threatening to refuse some of the money, as is Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin.

There are loopholes in the stimulus law for both states and school districts.

Of the $100 billion for education in the stimulus bill, $40 billion comes as part of a fund to stabilize state and local budgets that has fewer strings attached. As the bill made its way through Congress, lawmakers decided not to prohibit states from using the stabilization money to replace precious state aid for schools. That means instead of getting extra help to weather tough times, school districts could wind up with the no additional state aid even as local tax revenues plummet.

State lawmakers and governors in Kansas, Rhode Island and Texas are among those seeking to use their federal stimulus dollars to replace state aid, rather than add to it.

In addition, the law was written so broadly that most of the stabilization dollars can be spent on just about anything – carpet, wallpaper, playground equipment, even new school construction – which may bother Senate moderates who insisted on dropping a new school construction program before they would vote for the bill.

That’s because school districts can spend the money as federal impact aid, a relatively small program for poorly funded districts. By contrast, most federal education dollars are supposed to be spent on teacher salaries or academics.

“Congress opened a Pandora’s Box to allow districts to use the funds for impact aid,” said Michael Brustein, a Washington attorney who represents several state education agencies. “How you enforce against that is anyone’s guess.”

Santa Ana, Calif., English teacher Isa de Quesada is waiting to hear whether the stimulus dollars will bring her and 10 other teachers back to their school this fall. If not, class sizes at her school and others could swell, hurting the emphasis on quality education.

“Right now, I have 40 in two of my classes; we could go to 50 to 55 next year,” she said in an interview.

Recently, de Quesada had the chance to ask Obama about it in person when the president visited for a town hall meeting: “How are we going to make sure that money comes to our districts?” she said.

Obama replied that “the lion’s share” of the money is to keep teachers on the job.

Duncan said he can come down hard on states that don’t comply because he is releasing the money in installments, and because he will award billions of dollars in competitive grants later this year.

“And if we see an instance or two, or whatever it might be, where folks are not operating in good faith,” he said, “we will both withhold that second set of money, and we will eliminate them from any possible competition to receive these billions of dollars in discretionary money.”

Duncan also said last week he is looking for ways to force money to states where governors have said they would refuse it.

The administration could also face intense political pressure from members of Congress if stimulus money for their states is withheld.

“The jury is really still out on how forceful the Obama administration is going to be on this,” said Amy Wilkins, a lobbyist for Education Trust, a children’s advocacy group.

“We’ve heard a lot of secretaries of education talk about rigorous enforcement and, `We are really going to hold them accountable,”‘ she said. “We rarely get that.”

The administration lobbied successfully to attach other strings to the money. In their applications, states must show improvement in teacher quality, data systems, academic standards and tests and supporting struggling schools.

Applications for the stabilization dollars will be available this week, and two-thirds of the money for education, $27 billion, will be released within two weeks of an application’s approval. K through 12 dollars are another reason why it may be tough to keep teachers from losing their jobs.

That money goes to states through a formula tied to state spending. The less a state spends on education, the less federal money it gets – and that works against states in the worst financial shape.

A glance of stimulus dollars for education

State    Stimulus dollars
Ala.     1,110.5
Alaska   189.1
Ariz.    1,442.0
Ark.     692.6
Calif.   8,564.4
Colo.    1,051.0
Conn.    765.7
Del.     209.0
D.C.     153.8
Fla.     3,936.9
Ga.      2,279.9
Hawaii   274.7
Idaho    346.8
Ill.     3,077.0
Ind.     1,475.1
Iowa     666.6
Kan.     648.3
Ky.      1,003.1
La.      1,113.4
Maine    296.4
Md.      1,250.3
Mass.    1,483.8
Mich.    2,458.8
Minn.    1,135.2
Miss.    757.7
Mo.      1,336.9
Mont.    231.2
Neb.     421.8
Nev.     550.1
N.H.     289.8
N.J.     1,923.9
N.M.     512.3
N.Y.     4,846.7
N.C.     2,057.7
N.D.     168.8
Ohio     2,683.2
Okla.    862.2
Ore.     818.2
Pa.      2,820.0
R.I.     255.2
S.C.     1,045.9
S.D.     205.2
Tenn.    1,415.7
Texas    6,052.6
Utah     654.6
Vt.      155.2
Va.      1,696.6
Wash.    1,400.9
W.Va.    419.3
Wis.     1,273.9
Wyo.     143.9

Source: Department of Education.

ROCKY MOUNT, N.C. – Congressman G. K. Butterfield will visit two schools on Friday to talk with students about the importance of community service.

This week the House approved the Generations Invigorating Volunteerism and Education (GIVE) Act, which seeks to launch a new era of American service and volunteerism.

The GIVE Act would more than triple the number of volunteers, from the current 75,000 to 250,000, and increase the education reward they receive to $5,350 for next year, the same as the maximum Pell Grant scholarship award. The education award would also be linked to match future boosts in the Pell Grant scholarship in order to keep up with rising college costs.

It would create a new national Call to Service campaign to encourage all Americans to get involved in service and would encourage Americans to observe September 11th a National Day of Service and Remembrance.

The legislation would also provide new incentives for middle and high school students to volunteer in their communities. It would create a Summer of Service program to engage students in service and allows them to earn a $500 education award to be used for college costs.

Butterfield will be visiting D. S. Johnson Elementary School and Rocky Mount Senior High School where he will meet with classes taught by teachers placed by Teach for America.

“The Teach for America program exemplifies community service at its best,” Butterfield said.

RALEIGH, N.C.  – Supporters of a bill requiring all North Carolina school districts to adopt detailed anti-bullying policies have started their push to get it through the Legislature this year.

A coalition of education, health and religious groups joined legislators Wednesday at a news conference to discuss the proposed School Violence Prevention Act.

The measure failed to pass late in last year’s legislative session amid opposition to a provision that lists the characteristics of a person who could be susceptible to bullying, such as sexual orientation. Bill opponents argue the list should be removed.

House co-sponsor Rep. Tricia Cotham of Mecklenburg County said the state needs to ensure all schools are a safe environment for children.

WASHINGTON- President Barack Obama is announcing a wide-ranging education policy that embraces merit pay for teachers and a longer school day and year.

He’s also urging a plan that would remove limits on charter schools. He calls “the relative decline of American education” unacceptable. He says what’s at stake is “nothing less than the American dream.”

The proposals are seen as the heart of Obama’s vision of 21st century education reform. They’re sure to raise criticism, particularly from teachers’ unions. Unions have long opposed merit pay in public schools.

RALEIGH, N.C. – North Carolina voters give the public schools system in the state a “C” grade when asked to evaluate the performance of public schools according to a new poll released today by the Civitas Institute.

According to the live caller poll of 600 voters in North Carolina, 42 percent of voters gave a “C” to North Carolina Public Schools; 26 percent a “B”; and 11 percent a “D.”  Only three percent of voters gave the schools an “A”, identical to the percentage of voters who gave it an “F.”  

“North Carolina voters think our public schools are fairly mediocre,” Executive Director of the Civitas Institute Francis De Luca said. “If my children came home with these grades, we’d be having a serious conversation about making significant changes, not continuing on the same path and hoping for better results.”

When asked about the most pressing need for the state’s public schools, voters selected discipline within the classroom as their top choice (23%).  Increasing teacher salaries (22%) and lowering the dropout rate (20%) closely followed.

“The public feels there are significant problems in our public schools,” De Luca said.  “Unfortunately, teachers unions and their powerful allies in the General Assembly keep meaningful change from occurring.”

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       Full text of questions:
“What grade would you give the public schools in North Carolina?”

A- 3%
B- 26%
C- 42%
D- 11%
F- 3%
Not sure- 15%

“What grade would you give the public schools in your local community?”

A- 9%
B- 31%
C- 35%
D- 10%
F- 4%
Not sure- 11%

“In your opinion, what is the most pressing need in the public schools of North Carolina?”

Improving test scores- 12%
Reducing overcrowding- 17%
Lowering the dropout rate- 20%
Raising teacher salaries- 22%
Classroom discipline- 23%
Not sure- 6%

The study of 600 registered voters was conducted Feb.16-19, 2009. All respondents were part of a fully representative sample of registered voters in North Carolina. For purposes of this study, voters we interviewed had to have voted in either the 2004, 2006 or 2008 general elections or were newly registered voters since 2008.

The confidence interval associated with a sample of this size is such that: 95 percent of the time, results from 600 interviews (registered voters) will be within +-4% of the “True Values.”  True Values refer to the results obtained if it were possible to interview every person in North Carolina who had voted in either the 2004, 2006 or 2008 general elections or were newly registered voters since 2008.