Orange County NC Website
CHCCS world language program serves as a model for the entire country and is recognized for <br />its continued effort to provide quality instruction to the students. She asked the Board of County <br />Commissioners to approve the budget that CHCCS proposed. <br />Mark Peters read a prepared statement:: <br />"I kindly ask the County Commissioners to adopt a new policy. We have a SAPFO to <br />guarantee that we have sufficient number of classrooms, but what we also need is a "SAPFO <br />for operating expenses." Parents should not have to come by the hundreds or thousands every <br />single budget year just to keep the school systems from laying off teachers and canceling <br />programs. We need to insure that programs will be continued from year to year at the starting <br />point of the budget. The budget should not start every year by going backwards and cutting <br />school programs. The school budget should start like the County's budget did this year for its <br />own employees, which keeps all County staff, gives them a pay raise, and hires new employees <br />to keep up with growth. Why aren't we doing the same for the schools? This dichotomy <br />troubles me greatly. <br />We can call this new proposal the "School Funding Continuation Ordinance" or maybe <br />the "Schools Lose No Ground Ordinance" or maybe the "Keep Our Teachers Ordinance." This <br />policy would require the County Manager to propose a budget every year that continues the <br />programs that currently exist, even with growth. The school districts would report the costs <br />associated with continuing current services. New programs would be listed separately. The <br />Commissioners would still have the right to question the items in the continuation budget, but <br />the starting point will be much more fair to our children and their future, rather than being a <br />calculated negotiation ploy to make parents happy with any increase just to keep the districts <br />whale. <br />Both districts lost a significant amount of funding last year and stand to lose even more <br />ground this year. It is not right to make parents fight every year just to keep the school systems <br />whole. It is not right to force the school systems to cannibalize themselves to give teachers <br />raises. It's not fair to the teachers to face losing their job every year. I think it is great that we <br />have these new facilities in the County, but there is a cost associated with them. A year when <br />County construction is at an all time high and the state continues to try to bring our teachers' <br />salaries up to par is not the year to fund construction by laying off teachers instead of increasing <br />taxes. <br />I invite the Orange County Schools parents to join us in support of fully funding both of <br />our districts' requests. We would love to have you June 4`" and we will do our best to make you <br />feel right at home at the Stone Center. <br />Please fully fund our schools. <br />I ask anyone who agrees with this proposal to please stand." <br />Ray Martin is President of Chapel Hill-Carrboro Association of Educators. He said that <br />this is a 300+ member association of bus drivers, bus monitors, custodians, cafeteria workers, <br />maintenance workers, clerical staff, teacher assistants, media center assistants, education <br />specialists, teachers, assistant principals, principals, district-level specialists, directors, and <br />executive directors. He said that he represents the family of educators that is entrusted with the <br />children. He said that the Orange County Board of Commissioners is truly an educational Board <br />of County Commissioners and has the best two school systems in the state. He said that he <br />would like to give the County Commissioners achallenge -cut services or raise taxes. He said <br />that, even with an increase, there will be cuts. He made reference to page 12 of the Manager's <br />Recommended Budget PowerPoint, and increasing new County staff resources. He said that <br />this number is low because there will be a new high school opening this year and the new <br />middle school will need to be fully staffed this year. He said that a lot of teachers get their <br />salaries from the County funding. He thanked the County Commissioners for the opportunity to <br />speak. <br />