As Grand Vizier Hood points out, there is no sack of magic money from Washington that is going to fix state or local budgets. Not only is there no federal money, Mecklenburg County has never depended on federal support to make the numbers work.
The overwhelming majority of revenue for the county budget comes from — wait for it — county sources, some 69 percent of all revenue — over one billion dollars this year — is local. Only 11 percent comes from the state and just 6 percent from the feds. (The balance comes from rentals, fees, sales of property, ABC stores, etc.)
The immediate reason the county is short $90m. is that sales tax revenue — along with business activity taxes like permits and fees — has fallen from the $245m. a year pace. But this happens at the exact same time the county is trying to pay down all the school construction debt is ran up in recent years. A bad combo.
