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to protect her investment. She said that if the quality of their schools go down, so will the property values. She asked the County Commissioners to please raise her taxes. Mia Burroughs is a CHCCS parent. She said that it is true weariness to watch the budget process. She said that she has come to see this budget process as a dance. She encouraged all parties involved to find ways to make the budget mare collaborative and less combative. She asked the County Commissioners to raise her taxes or to da whatever is necessary to fully fund both school systems. Kate Kennedy is the IT Faculty Ca-Chair at Seawell Elementary and a Gifted Education Specialist. She is also a spouse of a Special Education Inclusion Facilitator and the mother of a child with severe autism. She said that they are faced each year with these cuts and it affects morale. She asked the County Commissioners to fund both schools' budgets. Lynn Lehman is a CHCCS parent and President of the Chapel Hill-Carrboro Public School Foundation. She expressed support for fully funded school budgets for both districts. She said that the citizens and the local government of Orange County have a social responsibility to provide adequate annual funding far those that need services, including funding for quality education services for all. She said that the proposed budget does not even come close to meeting the school districts' mandatory casts. The budget has the schools digressing and not moving forward. She said that for some students school is the safe place to land and the only place that they can turn. She said that the importance of after school programs, school counselors, specialists, and Schaal security has never been greater; yet these are the very positions an the chopping black if the schools are not funded. She said that the cost of raising the taxes will be a lot less than the long-term casts of not funding the schools. Joe Kennedy is a teacher at UNC. He made reference to the comments about the unfunded State mandates and where Orange County ranks statewide in county support for public education. He said that this is the Triangle and the nature of this area is to attract highly educated high wage earners who can afford to put their children in private education. He said that he understands that school is expensive and the education budget may seem extravagant, but it is the nature of the economy that the public school children need to be competitive. He said that the most substantial and reliable protection people have against hardship is a decent job. Far people living in this area, the gateway to the jobs will always be a good education. He said that fully funding the schools is the mast progressive thing that the County Commissioners can da. Rebecca McMillan is Vice-Chair of Parent Governance Committee at Mary Scroggs Elementary School. She presented a petition of 240 people that were in favor of fully funding the CHCCS budget. She said that Mary Scroggs is one of the mast crowded schools -with 700+ children in a school built to accommodate 575. She said that they are deeply concerned that the proposed budget farces CHCCS to choose between quality education and growth. Shell Brownstein said that she has been a taxpayer in Orange County for 14 years and she is a CHCCS parent. She has also served on a Superintendent's Ad Hoc Budget Committee this year. She testified that during that process every effort was made to trim the budget. There was a long list of items of possible cuts. She said that none of these cuts are tolerable. She said that the CHCCS budget cuts will hit the elementary schools particularly hard. She urged the County Commissioners to adopt bath school budgets without cutting out the heart and soul of the schools. She encouraged the Board to initiate long-term cooperative planning between the Town, County, and the state and federal governments for a smarter budget process, smarter land development, and alternative revenue services. Faith Nager is Vice-Chair of Chapel Hill Recreation Commission and she thanked the Board for recognizing the need for more recreational opportunities and in actively participating in the building of facilities that will provide year-round swimming, much needed playing fields, playgrounds, and other recreational opportunities. She said that as a parent of a CHCCS child and as a participant on the CHCCS Special Needs Advisory Council, she implores the Board to