House Republicans blame cities and counties for low school funding

by Doug Clark, Greensboro News and Record, August 9, 2013.

North Carolina House Republicans are circulating a fact sheet that debunks the "outrageous claims" about school funding cuts.

I won't use the word "outrageous," but one line of reasoning takes a startling new direction in explaining why our state ranks so low in K-12 education funding:

"In other states, education is funded primarily by local governments — with property taxes and bonds — and not with state dollars, as we do in North Carolina. The fact remains that our county and city governments could choose to spend more on educating our children, but they don’t.

"Why is this important? It’s not really, except to say that when the media casts blame on the General Assembly for not spending enough on our children’s education, there are many other significant factors to consider. And of course, it’s easy for the media to point fingers, especially at Republicans."

Oh, poor Republicans!

Actually, this is important. Why does the state have primary responsibility for funding public education in North Carolina? Because our state constitution says so:

"The General Assembly shall provide by taxation and otherwise for a general and uniform system of free public schools, which shall be maintained at least nine months in every year, and wherein equal opportunities shall be provided for all students" -- Article IX, Sec. 2 (1).

And:

"The General Assembly may assign to units of local government such responsibility for the financial support of the free public schools as it may deem appropriate. The governing boards of units of local government with financial responsibility for public education may use local revenues to add to or supplement any public school or post-secondary school program" -- Article IX, Sec. 2 (2).

The emphasis is mine: The General Assembly shall ... Local governments may.

Blaming local governments for not kicking in more is, frankly, a new one for me. Of course, local governments -- generally counties, since few cities have their own school system anymore -- do contribute substantial amounts of money to public education. Yet, the Republican House says you should blame them if it's not enough.

That's unfair. Not so much to the larger or wealthier counties, but what about the poor, rural counties whose economies are downright depressed? One reason we have big disparities in public school quality in North Carolina is that poor counties already can't afford to supplement state appropriations with any significant amount of money. It sounds to me as if the House Republican strategy -- casting more responsibility to the counties -- would exacerbate that problem.

Is that really their message? I doubt they would say that directly to Republican commissioners around the state. But they don't have any problem pointing fingers at their new favorite target -- Asheville, which is politically all Democratic:

"The legislature sets the base pay for public school teachers in North Carolina," the GOP fact sheet says. "The actual pay level for teachers is determined at the local level. Local governments can always decide to pay teachers more.

"But local governments seem to have other priorities than our teachers. For example, in the City of Asheville, the unelected school board gave its retiring superintendent a gift of $175,000. City school board members were under no obligation to pay him anything (he wasn’t owed a buyout payment because he quit his job). That $175,000 gift for a retiring administrator (that’s on top of his generous monthly pension) could have equated to an additional $875 in pay for every teacher in Asheville. (Note: most school superintendents in North Carolina make in excess of $100,000 in annual salary, not including benefits and pension.)

"Curiously, also in Asheville, its City Council just voted to give $2 million to a non-profit group that runs a local art museum. That $2 million could have been spent giving every one of Asheville’s teachers an additional $1,000 annual pay raise — every year for the next ten years.

"Local governments could do more, but they don’t. And they escape accountability in the media by blaming Raleigh."

The Asheville school board didn't "escape accountability" in the local press. The Asheville Citizen-Times reported that the board was not obligated, as it said, to buy out the final three years of its superintendent's contract for $175,000. That was a terrible, irresponsible move.

As for the $2 million given to the nonprofit group that runs the (city-owned) art museum in downtown Asheville, getting the money depends on that group's ability to raise $24 million in private funding.

Ironically, Asheville could answer: Hey, legislators. Why don't you compensate us for all the tens of millions of dollars we've put into our water system that you're trying to take away? Then we could give some real money to the schools!

But that's still beside the point.

It's funny that the House Republicans are so riled by criticism of their budget that, in turn, they want to criticize and cast blame somewhere else. Is this going to be the pattern from now own? For example:

* Instead of hiring more police officers, Greensboro, why don't you hire some teachers for Guilford County Schools?

* Don't blame us, Thomasville, if you have to lay off teacher assistants. Raise your property taxes!

* Rockingham County, don't complain to us if your school spending per pupil is less than Guilford County's. No one's stopping you from spending 10 times as much if you want!

There have been countless examples during the past two General Assembly sessions of the legislature exerting its authority over local governments. Yet now, the House Republicans are actually attacking cities and counties for not digging deeper into their own tax revenues to fund their schools and relieve the state of its constitutional responsibility.

These are the same legislators who are boasting of providing the largest tax cuts in state history.

How many cities and counties can say they just passed the biggest tax cuts in their history? I doubt a single one anywhere in North Carolina.

Well, the state constitution says what it says. Funding public education is the General Assembly's responsibility. While it has not done all it should under Democrats or Republicans, this is the first time I can remember that it is trying to hand down its obligation to local governments, with a big finger of blame to boot.