 |
|
new budget
These are difficult times to try and balance the county’s budget.
The county used $2.9 million of its savings to balance the budget last year. That’s not available now because savings are so low. There also is no contingency fund in this year’s budget, which drew an ominous warning this week from Interim County Finance Director Leo Hunt.
Commissioners cannot plan on state relief for Medicaid reimbursements by the June 30 deadline.
That means there must be either a tax increase or more cuts. One area that doesn’t need to be cut, as suggested by Commissioner Bill Memory at a meeting this week, is the education budget for Columbus County Schools, Whiteville City Schools and Southeastern Community College. Memory proposed cutting a penny of the county budget that is allocated to the schools’ budgets, or about $300,000.
The schools could stand to lose more than $4.1 million in state “low-wealth” funding if the commissioners cut education by one cent.
This is because the state enacted a penalty clause so counties wouldn’t use low-wealth funds as an excuse to cut their own funding for schools – essentially robbing Peter to pay Paul.
Even without the low-wealth component, the schools don’t need $300,000 in cuts. Their budgets didn’t increase last year, and no increase is budgeted again this year, despite many obvious needs.
Losing state low-wealth money would mean the loss of teachers’ supplements, staff, supplies – the whole gamut.
We don’t believe the commissioners would actually allow the loss of low-wealth funds, but cutting the school budget would open the door.
People can live with cutting a proposed elevator for the county administration building, but few want to see the schools’ budgets slashed.
Improving education is such a big challenge in Columbus County, it’s unthinkable that even more resources would be taken away.