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Arlene Furman: My name is Arlene Furman, and I'm a parent of two children in the Orange County schools. And I actually had a speech prepared, but I'm going to speed things up a little. I think there have been some really great speeches in support of merger. I ditto those speeches. And I leave the educational fate of my children in your hands. Thank you. Libbie Hough: I am Libbie Hough, a parent of two children in the Orange County school system. I'm a member of the Orange County Board of Education. Before I say anything else, however, I will say that I'm sharing my personal opinion, not a formal position of our school board. I'm glad that throughout Orange County people are talking about equity in education. For some time, I've perceived this as merely a revenue issue. I looked to the Chapel Hill district tax as the source of the disparity, and therefore it seemed logical to have our own tax. But there is so much more to this picture. It is not my job to address residential growth patterns, balance commercial development, while maintaining a rural landscape; however interrelated they may be to this entire issue. It is my jab to advocate for the educational needs of the children of Orange County. I believe that as long as there are two school systems in our County, the bigger, faster growing system will always win. The bigger system gets a larger share of the budget pie, and I understand that. But what I cannot understand is when the bigger system's supplement, which is factored into the equation at budget time creates inequity of any sort that mare people aren't saying, "Enough is enough, let's break down the walls." It has been proposed that an Orange County district tax would take care of our problem. However, I believe that it can only go sa far in challenging the mechanisms we have in place that foster inequity. Even if by some fluke a district tax were to pass, some could say, "Well, we fixed that," and move on. But even if we had a tax, inequity would exist; it would just be a little easier to ignore. Bottom line - a district tax is short term thinking when what we really want is a long term solution guaranteeing that all children in our County have access to the resources they need and that teachers are more adequately supported to do their jobs. With regards to collaboration within our current framework, I sadly admit that I am a skeptic. I suspect that collaboration looks more attractive now that merger is being seriously discussed and supported, and I suppose that is human nature. But if it's human nature to resist working together when we perceive you have the choice not to, wouldn't it also be human nature to pull away from such an agreement once the perceived threat of something much worse has past? If you think that all I'm talking about is having more money, then perhaps I need to clarify. I believe our County must focus an challenging any practice or policy that creates inequity or perpetuates belief that within one County, any community is self- contained, just because people are different, that they don't value education, or that some children have more potential or are more worthy than others to realize their dreams. Which leaves me with the following questions: Which option promotes a true countywide approach to education, maximizes tax dollars appropriated for this purpose, encourages to take a new lank at how we're meeting the educational needs of our children no matter where they reside, challenges our preconceived notions of those who are different from ourselves, and invites us to change institutional practices that have the unexpected outcome of creating inequity? Forme the answer is merger.