Statewide bond referendum grabs attention of Public Education Steering Committee

The NCACC Public Education Steering Committee met March 13 to discuss the possibility of a statewide bond issue to aid struggling school systems with their construction needs. Association General Counsel Jim Blackburn told the group that the N.C. House would likely have a budget prepared by the end of April, and input on the issue would be critical sooner rather than later.

Ed Dunlap of the North Carolina School Boards Association briefed the committee on the proposed bond issue. The “Education: Everybody’s Business Coalition” is campaigning for a $2 billion bond issue for capital construction and technology. A formula for the distribution of this bond has not yet been fully worked out, but it would likely involve a large portion of the proceeds going to schools based on average daily membership, and the rest going to schools in high growth and low wealth areas. Dunlap noted that it is expected to be a formula similar to the bond the state issued in 1996.

Two days after the meeting, Sen. David Hoyle (Gaston) filed legislation that would put a $2 billion statewide bond referendum on the November 2007 ballot. Hoyle’s bill, S852, allocates the proceeds of the bond based on a formula that considers Average Daily Membership (ADM), high growth, and ability to pay.

“We have and continue to stress support for a bond issue,” Blackburn said. “However, we as an Association decided that we would accept a bond issue or a local revenue option.”

At the NCACC’s Legislative Goals Conference in January, membership adopted a priority goal to “support legislation … through a statewide referendum on a bond issue and/or through authority for counties to raise additional revenues to meet school facility needs.”

Blackburn said that the NCACC Board of Directors is keeping focused on Medicaid relief this session.

“We need to focus on targeted relief in the short term for poorer counties,” he said.

According to Blackburn, the Association would support a bond issue for schools, or the idea of a local option land transfer tax, which would be shared with municipalities. The tax would benefit growing counties, which tend to have more infrastructure needs, such as new school buildings.

Although this idea might at first receive opposition from real estate developers, the additional money from the tax would allow cities and counties to improve infrastructure, which would, in turn, increase the value of the properties being sold. The land transfer tax works, Blackburn said, because “it matches where the growth is.”

In February, the Board of Directors endorsed a strategy that would tie together Medicaid relief and a land transfer tax.

“We want to help the poor counties with Medicaid while we are helping growing counties with new school construction,” said Blackburn, who added that the Association has received a positive response from legislators on the options.

“For a state that has always performed well in higher education, it’s time we catch up with K-12,” said committee Chair Kitty Barnes, who quoted from an article in The Wall Street Journal that declared “states that emphasize K-12 education will see the best benefit in economic development in the long term.”

The Public Education Steering Committee has tentative plans to meet again in May to discuss school funding issues.