Thought I’d roll the entire play-by-play offered by Mecklenburg County Commissioner Bill James. Pay particular attention to the part where NASCAR and the CIAA are more important to a majority of commissioners than veterans. Take it away, Bill:

In a slight of hand, the D majority (6-3) voted to create an extra $9.5 million in new revenue by revising the ‘estimate’ of sales tax collections for the upcoming year, ignoring County management’s statements that to do so would be foolhardily and fiscally dangerous.

Once the ‘new revenue’ was created there were some winners and losers as the additional $12.6 million was parceled out. Of course, they didn’t raid fund balance or PAYGO so that is a good thing.

SCHOOLS: CMS got $6 million more. They wanted $30 million more but I suspect they are happy. Whether they fire all those teachers and TA’s is unknown.

LIBRARY: The library which wanted $8 million to avoid branch closings (but would have settled for $5 and then planned on going to the City and Towns for $3 million) only got $3.5 (and their estimates of unemployment costs were at least $2 million or more).

Net result: Expect lots of branch closings even with City/Town money. This will set up a street fight between the Towns who will have to ‘pay to play’ and will require that their branches be saved over others. It will be a nasty fight. Towns that don’t pony up may have their library closed (if they have one).

City branches will close (most are in the City) and the Towns will not allow their money to be used to prop up smaller City ones (Myers Park for example). No one is sure what conditions the City will put on their money (if they agree to add it back) but they could require that specific branches are spared taking the decision away from the library board.

I made several motions including one to take money from CMS (after they were given an extra $6 million) to fund the remaining $1.5 million in the library’s $5.0 million request. Request denied !

It seemed to me that the City and Town’s can’t be expected to agree to their ‘portion’ of the library’s request (the fair share plan) if the County which funds most of that budget only funds 70% of our share.

VETS: On the Vet front, I made multiple motions to put back the $400 to $500 thousand. One motion was to take $400,000 that was ‘left over’ and spend it on Vet department restorations. That failed and the ASC (arts) and COA (Council on Aging) were the winners instead.

Another was to take $200,000 from CMS and give it to the Vets. Request denied !

A third was to take the CIAA and NASCAR money ($260,000 or so) and move that over to the Vets. Request denied !

PARKS: On the Parks front an extra $1.1 million or so was added but efforts by Commissioner Bentley paid off, adding back about $183,000 while cutting out several existing non-profits:

* Latin American Coalition $95,000 defunded
* Coalition for Social Justice $68,000 defunded
* Community Building $20,000 defunded

The Parks are so under water however in terms of cuts that there will still be massive layoffs.

DSS ADDITIONAL CUTS: $1.5 million in additional cuts were taken from DSS in this process taking a $4.5 million budget cut under the Manager’s recommendation to $6.0 million. That money was part of the pot (including the sales tax ‘adjustment’) that was used to make changes.

PROPERTY TAX INCREASE FAILED: Commissioner Clarke and Commissioner Dunlap voted and seconded a motion to increase property taxes by a little over 1 penny but it was denied (4 of the 6 Democrats voted against it along with all three GOP).

POLICE PROPERTY TAX INCREASE PASSED: On a party line vote, a tax increase of 2.58 cents was approved to raise the taxes on folks that live in the unincorporated area. The GOP position was to oppose this because these folks get so little service. Now they will pay more for that poor service. Basically, these folks in far suburban areas will have to pay to fund a urban police force though most will become a part of one of the Towns (which have suburban less expensive police forces).

SUMMARY:

All in all it could of been worse, however the overall losers will be (my opinion):

* CPCC (losing a lot over the previous year)
* Parks
* Libraries (increase barely covers unemployment comp costs)

I think the efforts to deny the libraries sufficient money will create a honk’n big fight as the library will be forced to rank branches and City and Town Pol’s begin to exert pressure in exchange for money.

Since the City can’t make up the difference for ALL City libraries (to keep all open) count on a bunch of them to close.

Matthews and Mint Hill will likely make deals for theirs. The going rate now is for each town to put up $250k however Huntersville and Pineville have zero incentive (they either have a regional branch that is protected or no branch at all). Davidson has no money so their branch is likely on the chopping block as they are way short of the $250k mark.

This will be an E-Ticket ride. Final budget approval is set for June 15th.

Regards,

Commissioner Bill James (R, District 6)

I still have no idea why Republican members of the Charlotte city council are monkeying with the libraries.