At a school board candidate forum Thursday night, all three District 6 hopefuls expressed strong support for the $427 million bond package on the Mecklenburg ballot in November. The reason? Money. The South Charlotte-South Meck area would receive between 20 to 25 percent of that total for badly needed new schools, the candidates agreed.
And the lack of close-by middle schools and crazy-quilt school assignments was pretty much topic A, B, and C for the three dozen or so county residents who attended the forum at Providence Spring Elementary.
One area where Liz Downing, Ken Gjertsen, and Larry Bumgarner differed was on the question of impact fees. Downing emphatically said she favored impact fees and noted that some of the national builders who scream bloody murder about paying them locally have no problem paying them in Seattle or San Diego. Gjertsen said he didn’t think impact fees would solve CMS’ problems, but also spoke foundly of his experience in Florida where “developers built schools” and school boards had taxing authority. So that’s a No with a footnote. Bumgarner came closest to utterly opposing impact fees, noting the harm they’ve done in other jurisdictions.
And speaking of bonds, that brings us to the bonds debate next week hosted by the League of Women Voters. The event is scheduled for Thursday, October 13 at 7 p.m. at the Char-Meck Government Center on Fourth St.
Lindalyn Kakadelis of the North Carolina Education Alliance will be among the participants.
