Bertie County Patriot Archive: BOE Presents Budget In Joint Meeting <br>Focuses On Our Children

Bertie Middle School

The Bertie County Board of Education (BOE) and County Commissioners met in joint session yesterday to see the final details of the budget request for the BOE from the interim Superintendent, Dr. Michael Priddy. One aspect of this years presentation was its location. It was held on the construction site of the new Bertie Middle School which is almost completed. Though like most constuction sites it was a little untidy, it was interesting to see how close they were to being done.

Melinda Eure, Norman Cherry, Alton Parker, L.C. Hoggard - Vice Chairman County Commissioners

Dr. Michael Priddy - Interim Superintendent, Rickey Freeman - Chairman of the BOE, Rick Harrell - Chairman County Commissioners, Zee Lamb - County Manager

Mike Bracy, Wallace Perry, Gloria Lee, Charles Smith

Most of the budget presentation was conducted by the school systems Finance Officer Pearline Bunch and she did a very good job. It was encouraging to see in the details an effort to live up to Dr. Priddy's words, "This budget represents an effort to build public confidence and lend credibility to funding requests based on real needs."

Pearline Bunch

This years presentation had none of the inconsistencies and invalid numbers of the two previous presentations I saw on the school budget. I am a person with some experience reading financial statements and it was encouraging to find that the presentation actually made sense. Starting from last years numbers and moving forward with what was added, what was subtracted, what was being done with the difference between the two, the budget was possible to follow. That is not easy but this year it was done well.

It was clear that the county had gone out of its way to provide the most money possible, once again providing increases for the BOE that are much higher than other departments are being given. The BOE and Superintendent worked hard to stay within the numbers possible.

As a result, this years meeting seemed to have a totally different tone, one that was quite positive and focused on what was in the best interest of our children. Some of that tone is reflected in the article by Cal Bryant in the Roanoke-Chowan News Herald entitled 'Impressive' proposal.

Rick Harrell , Chairman of the County Commissioners certainly reflected that new tone when he asked the other Commissioners if they would consider rounding the county paid portion of the budget up to an even $2.5 million by adding an additional $11 thousand.

As it was presented the budget for Bertie County Schools will be composed of $16.24 million in North Carolina regular funding plus $3.15 million in state small schools, low wealth and DSSF funding, $2.49 million from Bertie County and $2.14 million in federal funding for a total of $27.63 million. This is down from previous years overall due to the continuing decline in student enrollments for our County resulting in significant reductions in state funding. The county portion of the money continues to climb though.

The most exciting part of the presentation was how much effort was being expended in moving money into the classroom, something that will be a lot more valuable for our children than some of the efforts that have been discussed in the past. The budget includes a new bonus program providing money to hire and retain the best teachers possible. That is the best thing I saw. I do not want the school people to feel I am not appreciative, but the money for the function is still just a start. It would be great if they could keep working to free up more money for this in the future. Good teachers are what will really make a difference in how much our children learn, and a part of the new program includes money to retain the good ones we aleady have. Even wanting to see a whole lot more done with this program in the future, I believe the Board of Education deserves high praise for what they have done.

At the conclusion of the meeting we took a tour of the new facility. That started with a presentation from the new principal, Sandra Hardy.

Sandra Hardy - Principal Bertie Middle School

Richard Andrews

The Architect, Richard Andrews (shown above), from DKWA Architects also had a few comments before he introduced Jimbo White (shown below) supervisor from the contractor building the facility.

Jimbo White

Both of these men bragged on the new facility and talked about what a great and exciting facility it is. My personal thoughts are that the best school I ever saw from the prespective of what children were taught was a dilapidated old facility. School buildings do not teach kids and fancy schools with low test scores is sometimes indicative of the failure to understand what is needed to teach our children. I hope we keep that in mind in the future. Keeping facilities maintained is necessary, but how fancy they are does not ultimately change the education.

What follows are pictures showing the new Bertie Middle School. Our group tour was conducted by Charles King, Construction Inspector from DKWA.