I can. But I really doubt CMS wants the help.

The entire purpose of Pete Gorman’s $100m. in budget cuts is to inflame the community so that a 10 to 20 percent property tax hike — via the reval — by Mecklenburg County can by “earmarked” for CMS.

Anyway. Start with all CMS staff making more than $150K per and who are not principals — across the board 25 percent salary cut. What? Are they gonna leave? CMS spent the first half of its budget show telling us things are bad all over and the cuts it wants are unavoidable. Take them at their word. For once.

Next, find out from whence came the funds for the flat screen TVs recently installed in multiple schools and redirect that money toward middle school sports. Next, outsource security. CMS dearly loves in its in-house police force but it is gold-plated. Next, outsource transportation — at least some of it, as suggested by the Gantt Commission almost five years ago now. Next, outsource food service — at least start the process, another Gantt Commission suggestion. And stop all litigation and legal work aimed at fighting charter schools and lay off half the in-house legal staff. It is unclear to me why CMS needs more than a lawyer and a secretary.

How many millions we got for middle school sports now? Do we have roughly $12,000 per school for 30-odd middle schools yet? Don’t like this approach?

OK — booster clubs. Booster clubs and/or $200 pay to play with scholarships. Community athletic groups do it all the time. Union County allows middle school booster clubs. But not “equity” obsessed CMS.

As you can see nixing middle school sports is nothing more than a Washington Monument closure gambit from Gorman and his co-conspirators on the board, some of whom just do not know any better. But there is just no disputing that a paltry $400,000 keeps dozens — if not hundreds — of kids entering a dangerous inflection point in their lives focused and engaged in school life in ways that would melt away without the sports lure.

So of course a bureaucracy that values self-preservation above all is perfectly willing to strap middle school sports to the tracks in a cynical game of chicken.

Update: Another way to look at it — a student activity fee of $15 on 29,500 middle school students would raise $442,500.