The new state budget takes aim at North Carolina’s public charter schools, and John Locke Foundation Director of Education Studies Terry Stoops had a chance to discuss the issue during radio interviews this week with Bill LuMaye on WPTF and Chad Adams on WLTT. WGHP Television aired an interview with Stoops discussing the progress of Guilford County Public Schools’ Mission Possible program. WTVD Television interviewed Stoops about the Durham Public Schools’ new grading system. Stoops also shared insights for a Durham Herald-Sun story on North Carolina’s taxpayer-funded programs for early childhood education. The Heritage Foundation’s Insider Online promoted Stoops’ recent report on charter school diversity, along with an analysis of the state Senate’s budget plan from Joseph Coletti, Director of Health and Fiscal Policy Studies, and a critique of a DNA collection bill by Daren Bakst, Director of Legal and Regulatory Studies. Speaking of that DNA bill, the News & Observer and Charlotte Observer referenced Bakst in an article about Attorney General Roy Cooper’s last-minute efforts to push the bill through the General Assembly. Bakst also delivered a speech on taxpayer-financed election campaigns to a North Raleigh group tied to Triangle Conservatives Unite. Meanwhile, the Wilmington Star-News interviewed Coletti for a pair of articles discussing rising government costs. Policy Analyst Michael Lowrey‘s annual By The Numbers report generated a pair of recent media references. The News & Observer and Charlotte Observer quoted from the report in examining businesses’ decisions to “flee” Chapel Hill. The Taylorsville Times also published a story in which the Alexander County manager referenced By The Numbers data. (He cited the County’s good standing among most others in the state in relation to taxpayer burden. According to a John Locke Foundation report for fiscal year 2008, Alexander was 96th of 100 counties for Combined Property Tax Burden Per Capita (with higher numbers meaning lower burdens).)