Bertie Superintendent Says Funding Is Inadequate

by Cal Bryant - June 16th, 2006 - Ronaoke-Chowan News-Herald

WINDSOR - “Woefully inadequate.”

That summed up the feelings Dr. Nettie Collins-Hart has for the proposal offered by Bertie County Manager Zee Lamb in regards to current expense funds for the county school system in the 2006-07 budget.

Addressing the Bertie Board of Education here Friday during a special called meeting, Dr. Collins-Hart, the school system’s superintendent, said the proposed county budget fell far short of the system’s $1.77 million request for additional funds over the current year.

This was predictable. "Woefully inadequate." That is the response of the Superintendent to the 49% increase in county funding that has been proposed for this coming years budget. In my recent article on the proposed budget I stated "Based on recent experience though, you can look for the Board of Education and the Superintendent to complain it is not enough." I was right. Though most other departments got 6% increase and the schools are getting 49%, that is as usual considered not enough by this department that has recently endured fraud, waste, and has still not proven they can ever focus on education of our children.

Our school officials only want to focus on building new schools. Our student population is declining. They are at the bottom in education attainment in North Carolina. School officials never consider the county payoff of bonds a cost of schools even when the bonds are to pay for schools . . . and by ignoring this cost it allows them to claim that building new schools is cheaper than maintaining old schools. If you ignore paying off the bonds, that is an arugable claim. However it is a lie. In all of the slides and numbers presented during the presentation on Friday the Superintendent ignored the fact that Bertie County Citizens will be paying $805 thousand FOR SCHOOL BONDS. However though they asked for the schools and the improvments for which the $805 thousand must be paid, they DO NOT COUNT THE COST AS A PART OF EDUCATION COSTS. The huge increase in bond expense is simply ignored.

Dr. Collins-Hart focuses only on the "current expense" number and complains that the increase in that one line item amount is not enough. Bertie County Public Schools spends significantly more than most counties in North Carolina, and many of them are in the top of educational attainment while we are at the bottom. However rather than figure out how those other counties succeed with less while we fail with more, we are told that the greater amount we already spend is "Woefully inadequate."