News and Record article on "10 teaching positions" this morning.
I appreciate the article related to the need for additional teaching positons. Just a few comments reflecting on the piece. I'm entitling these comments "MAGIC and Math"
POOF: (Now you see $100,o00, now you don't!) Just a week ago there were several commissioners supported the allocation of over $100,000 for a school resource coordinator and vehicle which was not approved. Now, no one can find that the same money for teachers. Linda Shaw challenged me to find the money for the positions she found to fund an SRO coordinator. YOU DO THE MATH: Well, at $50,000 a piece, we have just funded two teacher positions with the SRO monies. I'd suggest 1 other position be paid for out of the county manager's contingency fund. 2+1=3. It is true that 3 is not 10 and more work must me done. But we are now 3 for 10. In baseball, that's a career!
Public, don't be fooled. Rule #1: With Guilford County commissioners, all things are possible with 6 votes. :)
POOF: (Now you see $100,o00, now you don't!) Just a week ago there were several commissioners supported the allocation of over $100,000 for a school resource coordinator and vehicle which was not approved. Now, no one can find that the same money for teachers. Linda Shaw challenged me to find the money for the positions she found to fund an SRO coordinator. YOU DO THE MATH: Well, at $50,000 a piece, we have just funded two teacher positions with the SRO monies. I'd suggest 1 other position be paid for out of the county manager's contingency fund. 2+1=3. It is true that 3 is not 10 and more work must me done. But we are now 3 for 10. In baseball, that's a career!
Public, don't be fooled. Rule #1: With Guilford County commissioners, all things are possible with 6 votes. :)
4 Comments:
From: MWALLING@triad.rr.com [mailto:MWALLING@triad.rr.com]
Sent: Wednesday, August 11, 2004 12:18 PM
To: billyyow@bellsouth.net; Jeff Thigpen; IMLshaw@aol.com; Bob Landreth;
jamestownvet@northstate.net; Skip Alston; Carolyn Coleman; Mike Barber;
Mary Rakestraw; kidappeal@triadbiz.rr.com; Steve Arnold
Cc: gbbe1@cs.com; mendens@guilford.k12.nc.us; dygarr@aol.com;
alan.duncan@smithmoorelaw.com; sharpea@guilford.k12.nc.us;
mcsykes6@aol.com; kcooke73@triad.rr.com; hayesd@guilford.k12.nc.us;
johnnyh@aol.com; nrouth@bellsouth.net; dotkendall@aol.com;
griert@guilford.k12.nc.us
Subject: Transfer of County Funds for New Teaching Positions
I would like to commend Commissioner Thigpen for being an advocate for the children and the teachers of Guilford County in trying to find $450,000 for 10 additional teaching positions. While this is a worthy effort I do have the following questions and comments about how this can be accomplished.
First, how is it possible to reallocate $450,000 when the new Guilford County budget is not even 45 days old? It seems that any reallocation would either hinder the ability of other Guilford County agencies to complete their designated tasks for the current fiscal year, or highlight the fact that the budget was inflated in other areas to begin with, such as with possible pork barrel projects.
If neither of these statements are true than either Guilford County would need to raise an additional $450,000 after tax rates have already been established for the current fiscal year or raid some type of a reserve fund. To me if there is an excess $450,000 laying around in the coffers of Guilford County has the question been raised of do the taxpayers of Guilford County merit some type of a rebate instead?
Second, the Guilford County Board of Education has yet to announce if the Federal Grant application for the High Point Choice Plan has been approved. Until this announcement is made I believe it would not be prudent to consider the transfer any additional funds to the Guilford County School System. If the Federal Grant is not approved I believe there is a $4,000,000 hole in this year’s school budget, which would first need to be addressed. Assuming that the Federal Grant is not approved; the same $450,000 that Mr. Thigpen is talking about may be required to cover the shortfall for teachers already on the payroll within the High Point Choice Plan, not pay for 10 new teachers.
Thank you for your time and consideration.
Sincerely,
Mark Walling
High Point
REPLY:I appreciate your note. Your first question is certainly valid. I'll answer that question with another. How could our board find another SRO coordinator position at a cost of $100,000 35 days after our budget was passed? The answer is 6. If a majority of our board will support it, we can find a way. For example, if we took the $100,000 some of my fellow commissioners proposed for the SRO and applied it to teaching positions that would give us 2 teaching positions. If we took $50,000 from our manager's contingency fund that would give us 3 positions. As you know 3 is not 10. But I'm batting .300 on my first day. As a baseball player, that's a pretty good start.
On your second point, you may raise a valid point. Our next scheduled commissioner meeting is not until mid-September. I hope we will know the fate of the federal grant by that time. Wasn't the notification date 7/15?
If you don't mind, I have a web blog and I'll post your query.
By
Jeff L. Thigpen, at 3:05 PM
You are right that my metaphor for magic is truly not magic at all. That was my point. I don't think money gets "sandbagged" so to speak, but I believe priorities change and if our Board amends our budget along the way, that is fair game if a majority of the Board agrees.
On the two items you mentioned, these items have a context and actually "the way you read them" was incorrect. Let me give you the history. The International Travel services was originally taken out of our FY 05 budget entirely and it is fee driven. The Health Dept. believed these services were available in other parts of the medical community. They also realized through program evaluations that many Health Department service areas needed to be strengthened. The clinical staff working International Travel(for people who go to other countries who need shots) were thus moved to these other areas to improve our service provision to the community (without the addition of new positions). However, Dr. Krishnaraj decided, after conversations with our staff, Health Board members, members of the community, etc. that the County would greatly benefit from the reinstatement of the program. They then took it back to the Board of Health in July for their approval of program funding ($192,720-100% ALL CLIENT GENERATED fees!). There was no increase in funding and the projections were based on the prior year. (THAT IS THE REST OF THE STORY FOR THE ITEM.)
Second,in these budget times few program allocations are "annual" and the state passes its budget when it passes it. July/Sept....whenever. They are subject to cuts and its hard to budget locally in general. Just ask the School system. But the Childhood Immunization program was a different issue. State grant funding was made available to us in July (after we adopted our budget) which allowed the Health Dept to return almost $80,000 in County funds to the Commissioners for other uses. We were simply shifting funding sources for this Program.
I hope this is helpful information.
Jeff
By
Anonymous, at 3:17 PM
"your willingness to be publicly accessible here for all the county to see has won you my vote in November.".....here, here.......thanks for blogging........good leadership...........dk
By
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, at 11:50 AM
Jim, maybe I should just connect you to the finance director in the Health Department! Hahaha. I'll try to respond in time. On the other comment, I'm sure there will be issues like this in the Deeds office!
Jeff
By
Jeff L. Thigpen, at 7:35 AM
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