Board Of Education To Be Stripped of Financial Flexibility

Commissioners Would Control Budget Transfers

Our "Where There Is Smoke There is Fire Series" Will Continue Later This Week.

The Lee County Commissioners are planning to place the control of county school board expenses in the hands of the Finance Committee, headed by Commissioner Robert T. Reives. In previous years, the Board of Education has had broad freedom to shift the county portion of their receipts among accounts called line items. The federal and state funds received by the schools is very tightly limited in how it is allowed to be spent. County funds were moved between accounts to fill in the holes in the annual budget.

This year the commissioners have insisted on having the budget presented in a format that shows purpose and functions--for example instructional programs would be would be the purpose and would include functions like regular, special, alternative, and co-curriculum. Under the commissioners plans, the school board could not shift more than 10% of those funds to other purposes without commissioner approval. No shifts would be permitted above 25% of the purpose. Funds appropriated for maintenance could not be shifted to special add. As the commissioner's see it, this means that the money they appropriate would be spent for the purpose they intended in the budget. (Click here to see the different categories used in Wake County. It's Section 2 of the county's budget ordinance.)

Of course, this places the point of control in the hands of Commissioner Robert T. Reives, the ultimate power on the Board of Commissioners. Such a system requires communication and cooperation. This year, the Board of Education asked for a significant increase in funds but did so in a way that might be described as "must have" and "nice to have." On April 23, school board chair Bill Tatum asked for a meeting between the finance committees of the two boards to begin a dialog over the budget. To date, and with the adoption of the budget nearly done, Commissioner Reives has refused to have a joint meeting of the two finance committees.

Appropriating funds by purpose and function may bring more accountability to the schools, but the commissioners are going to have to be open to more cooperation than they have shown so far or such a system will hobble public education in Lee County.

Update: Chairman Reives has just scheduled another finance committee meeting in a meeting with no facilities for broadcasting and posting on the Internet. If the commissioners want to exercise greater control over the Board of Education budget, the public should demand that these meetings be as widely available to the public as possible. After all, isn't this supposed to be accountability?

Additional information became available that made some corrections in this post necessary. The corrections are in blue.