Guilford County commissioners will approve a 4.5-cent tax hike and Sheriff B.J. Barnes will get more guards for the new $100 million jail, though not as many as he requested.
Funding for GCS will remain at $175 million in operating costs, though Commissioner Billy Yow has a better idea:
Yow said that, if it were up to him, he’d do the only thing the board really can do when it comes to reigning in school spending: make significant funding cuts and let the schools sort it out. Yow said he was in favor of slicing the school’s operating budget by $15 million to $20 million, which, he said, would force the schools to make cuts somewhere.
The problem with that approach, other commissioners point out, is that the schools would likely cut teachers to create a public outcry, and school officials would then point their fingers at the commissioners and say, “Those are the villains who are cutting teachers from the classroom.”
Not to mention staging another Mo’s Million Kid March. I understand that finger-pointing is part of politics, but I simply don’t understand why school boards —-at least Guilford’s—–are exempt from any sort of political heat. That’s why many want to keep school boards nonpartisan– to shield them from making difficult decisions that could result in political payback.
We go to the polls and elect school board members. That automatically makes it political.
