Category Archives: Government

Forsyth County Property Tax Revaluation

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I read with interest the Winston-Salem Journal article about the upcoming property tax revaluations for Forsyth County homeowners.  It was interesting because it quotes Pete Rodda, the Forsyth County Tax Assessor, as saying that we should be ready to see higher valuations than we had four years ago in 2005, thus we should also expect higher tax bills.  Given what's happened this year it's easy to believe that we'd actually have lower valuations, so if what  Mr. Rodda says is true then it's good that he gets out in front of this issue before the poop hits the fan.

Mr. Rodda also said that his office is delaying the assessment until February so that they have all 2008 sales data, which he thinks is prudent given how much real estate value is declining right now.  I'd have to agree with him there.

What worries me is that the number of actual sales is also declining which means that the recent lower sales prices may not effect the average sales prices of a neighborhood because so many more sold at higher prices two, three and four years ago.  For instance if only four houses sold at $150,000 in a neighborhood in the last four months, but over 50 sold at $200,000 over the last four years then the rate is still going to skew to the higher number.  Here's the math:

50 houses sold at $200,000 = $10,000,000
4 houses sold at $150,000 = $600,000
$10,600,000 in total sales divided by 54 houses sold = $196,296 average sale price.

This ignores the fact that literally dozens of homes in the neighborhood are currently listed at $150,000 or less but can't be sold because there are no buyers.  That means that in reality the homes in the neighborhood are probably worth less than $150,000 in today's market.  Yet the average homeowner will be facing a tax bill based on a valuation closer to $200,000 than $150,000.

To see if I was totally off base I checked out the County's website to see what they say about revaluations.  Here's an excerpt from the web page:

The appraisal staff of the Tax Assessor's Office has divided the county into approximately 1,300 appraisal neighborhoods.
These neighborhoods are homogeneous in that the parcels within the neighborhoods share many common characteristics and are
affected by similar influences. In conducting a revaluation, the appraisal staff reviews all recent sales of real property
which have occurred within each neighborhood. This massive analysis of recent sales culminates in a uniform schedule of
values, standards and rules which is applied to each parcel of real property in Forsyth County. The purpose of the uniform
schedule is to insure equity in valuations.

It
would not be difficult to simply appraise a given property at its most
recent sale price. This is not practical because many sales are not
arm's-length transactions. Sales between family members, related
corporations, gifts, etc. do not usually represent market value. The
needs and compulsions of buyers and sellers also influence sale prices.
For example, a home may sell for less than its market value because a
sudden job transfer motivates the seller. Conversely, a home may sell
for a higher amount to a new resident moving in from a region where
home values are much higher. Analyzing all recent sales allows the Tax
Assessor's Office to account for unusual circumstances such as those
described above and develop a uniform schedule of values, standards and
rules. The application of the schedule may not exactly match every
recent sale price; however, the schedule insures that each parcel of
real property will be treated in a similar manner.

Forsyth
County and the municipalities within the county adopt a budget each
year. The tax rate supporting the budget is determined by the budgetary
needs of the local government. Typically each local unit of government
reviews the budget requests of their departments, determines how much
revenue is available from sources other than the property tax, and then
determines how much revenue is necessary from property taxes to balance
the budget.

That last paragraph also worries me.  In a time of shrinking budgets I doubt we'll get a sympathetic ear from the county commissioners in terms of reducing our tax burden.  When I lived in Northern Virginia and we were experiencing incredible increases in valuations during the real estate bubble the county would regularly reduce the tax percentage so that our tax hit wouldn't be too bad on any given year.  It still hurt, just not as much as it would have.  I don't think we have a snow ball's chance in hell of that happening here.

My final point is that in the article Mr. Rodda is quoted as saying that they are going to put the valuation tool up on their website so that we can all see for ourselves that our property values have indeed increased.  That's fine, but that won't tell us what other factors underly the numbers.  Is it just comparable sales prices, or are there other data points incorporated in the numbers?  If it's simply on sales then I think they will have a problem because in the real world home values aren't simply a function of comparable sales in the neighborhood.  Other factors include number of homes in the neighborhood that are in foreclosure, the number of homes that are for sale in the neighborhood (and their listing price) and the average length of time that a house takes to sell. 

Keeping Them Honest in Houston

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According to this article a woman in Houston named Marsha Farmer has spent the past seven years exposing a scam in the city's Department of Housing and Community Development.  In 2001 when her home was damaged in a flood and 17 months later she received an estimate from a contractor in the city's home repair program and realized that the numbers didn't add up.  Unfortunately for the contractor and the Department she had a background in bookkeeping and construction as well as a strong sense of right and wrong and she spent the next seven years exposing the sham.  All the while her home was never repaired until the Houston newspaper got hold of her story and starting asking questions, so now repairs are finally scheduled to be done.  The following excerpt from the article shows what a person with a little know-how, a lot of gumption and access to Google can do:

Farmer's first contact with the home repair program came in January
2001, when she applied for new windows and electrical repairs to the
Oak Forest house where she had lived since 1987. Farmer, who is
disabled, met the requirements of the program, which provided free
repairs to needy homeowners.

She was placed on a waiting list, and after her house flooded during
Tropical Storm Allison in June 2001, her case was assigned to the
Houston Area Urban League, one of four nonprofit home repair
contractors working with the city.

Four months later, Farmer received a letter from the city saying her
house had been approved for repairs. Nothing more happened until the
day in June 2002 when she saw the report that triggered her suspicions
about the program.

Over the course of the next year, Farmer complained to HUD about her
own case, obtained files on other repair jobs under open records laws
and began compiling a database.

In her examination of Urban League files covering more than two
years, Farmer found that the city paid for excessive roofing material
in at least 18 of 24 projects. She found charges for installing a
400-foot sewer line and a 300-foot water line, even though in most
places these lines are about 50 feet from the house to the main
connection.

Almost half of the files she examined showed that bids were for exactly the program limit of $20,000.

It's not clear who benefited from the overpayments. The city
essentially outsourced the program to the Urban League and other
nonprofits, which paid companies that did the repairs based on
often-erroneous quantities determined by initial inspections.

There's much more in the article, including the fact that she unsuccessfully sued as a "whistle blower" under the False Claims Act which would have entitled her to compensation, but even in losing that lawsuit her key role in exposing the fraud was acknowledged by the judge:

"Even though Ms. Farmer's legal claims failed," he wrote, "the
litigation was productive in that it led to the city's emergency home
repair program being shut down by HUD."

And we also learn that her contributions were not insignificant:

Two months after Farmer filed her lawsuit, HUD shut down Houston's
home repair program. The agency cited evidence of poor workmanship and
"huge differences between the estimates of materials needed and the
actual units of materials applied" — the same problem Farmer had
noticed in the estimate for her house.

HUD allowed the program to resume the following year, subject to the
city's agreement to reinspect and, where necessary, repair 2,214
previously repaired houses by July 31, 2010. Farmer's review of 530
reinspection reports — about one-fourth of the total to be performed —
identified $717,000 in overcharges.

What I like about this story is that it shows the importance of oversight in government affairs, the power of individual citizens to make a difference and the important role that media plays in our daily lives.  Let's be honest, if the newspaper hadn't been there to put the screws to the government Ms. Farmer might not be getting her home repaired any time soon. She's made their lives miserable so what would their motivation have been to help her?  But bad publicity tends to motivate people and as soon as the newspaper exposed the government's (in)actions to hundreds of thousands of people they suddenly had a fire lit under them.

I know that at times I've given the folks at the Winston-Salem Journal a hard time on this blog, but believe me when I say I want them to figure things out and succeed.  We need them almost as much as they need us.

Yes! Weekly’s Barber Asks ‘Who cares about homeless and hungry?’

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Yes! Weekly's Keith Barber asks if it's wise for the city of Winston-Salem and Forsyth County to spend public funds on the new baseball stadium considering that our social services are stretched to the max.  From his piece:

The official unveiling of the Winston- Salem minor league baseball team’s new name at the Millennium Center on Dec. 4 seemed a world away from the harsh realities facing many of Forsyth County’s residents. The general gaiety of the event enjoyed by an estimated 700 people felt like a scene out of the Roaring ’20s, like the day before the stock market crash of 1929…

At the end of October, the NC Employment Security Commission reported Forsyth’s unemployment rate at 6.3 percent. The number of unemployed individuals in Forsyth has risen 35.4 percent since the same period in 2007. Since Jan. 1, 2008, nine Forsyth employers have reported layoffs and 30 area businesses have shuttered their doors, putting more than 1,000 people out of work. And those are just the ones that have been reported.

Despite the hard times in Forsyth, the show went on at last week’s ceremony to announce the new name of the team formerly known as the Warthogs. Baseball Downtown and Mandalay Baseball, the managing entity of the minor league franchise, spared no expense at the event called “Baseball New Year.” When the team’s multi-millionaire owner, Billy Prim, and Winston-Salem Mayor Allen Joines unveiled the team’s new name — the Dash — the crowd roared its approval. All of this left me to wonder: Why would the city and the county agree to loan a multimillionaire upwards of $24 million to build a downtown ballpark when those funds could be more wisely spent on the needs of the homeless, the jobless and the hungry in Forsyth County? The Winston-Salem City Council agreed to put up $12 million toward the construction of the downtown ballpark in November 2007. In March of last year, the Forsyth County Commissioners approved a resolution allowing Prim’s company, Sports Menagerie LLC, and Brookstown Development Partners to receive economic development incentives up to $12.5 million to be paid in annual installments over a 25-year period. At that time, the economic outlook in Forsyth wasn’t as bleak as it currently is, but the picture wasn’t rosy by any stretch. In fact, Joines and the city council are four years into a 10-year plan to fight chronic homelessness. Andrea Kurtz of the United Way of Forsyth County is tasked with implementing the plan. Kurtz said the recession has pushed the resources of Forsyth’s social service agencies to their breaking point.

I've never liked the idea of public funding for ball parks that benefit private companies or individuals and my thinking on the Winston-Salem ball park has focused mainly on my disagreement with the philosophy of the use of public funds in this way.  Until now I hadn't thought of the opportunity costs associated with the city's decision to fund the stadium, but when you do think about it they are substantial.  Yes the city is due to get its money back eventually, but as Barber points out in the mean time the money could have been used to bolster social services now that it's really needed but it's tied up in the stadium project.

Since we've come this far I truly hope that the project is a success and that we see a revitalized downtown come out of this, but as a community we need to have a serious discussion about how tax dollars are used for private enterprise.  What happens the next time an entrepreneur comes calling with an idea for a new theater, entertainment complex or indoor stadium that will be used as a cornerstone for some new revitalization effort in some other part of town?  Do we whip out the checkbook or do we say "Good luck" and then provide as much help as we can to make it a reality  by expediting permits, assigning someone to help them work through the red tape, etc.?  As you might guess my vote would be for the latter.

So I Went to Church and Voted

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This is my third election since moving to North Carolina and I still find it weird that my polling place is a church, and coincidentally it's my church.  Obviously it doesn't bother me in the least; I'm quite comfortable there, but I wonder how it feels for anyone in my voting district who may be Atheist, Muslim, Buddhist, Jewish, Agnostic or some other -ish/-ist/-ic?  I'm not sure how I'd feel if the polling place was in a pagan temple, but I'm pretty sure I'd rather be in a school or library.

Anyhow, there was literally no line when Celeste and I entered the church, nor when we left.  I was the 907th voter tallied by the voting machine some time after 2:00 this afternoon.  Back in '04 I stood in line for 45 minutes to register/sign in and another 45 minutes to actually cast my vote.  You may remember that was a slightly contentious election too.  Me thinks the heavy early voting really helped keep the crowds down.  I didn't blog my '06 voting experience, but I remember it going smoothly, which is no surprise since it was one of those 'tweener elections that get about 20% turnout.

BTW, I split the ticket as always.  Some Democrats, some Republicans and one Libertarian.  It felt good to spread the wealth.

What is Government?

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Well it’s almost over.  In a couple of weeks we’ll have survived what will surely be remembered as one of the crazier election years in memory.  However the election turns out the winners will be dealing with deeper systemic problems than any incoming administration/Congress has had to deal with in at least a generation if not two.  It seems to me that they will be confronted with some hard questions that have not really been addressed in a long time.  Those include:

  • What role should government play in our country?
  • Of the myriad programs that government currently manages, which should remain and which should be jettisoned?
  • How much money should we spend on the programs we decide to keep?
  • How do we get the money to pay for those operations?

Unfortunately we’ve spent decades with people screaming at each other about the role of government, yet in reality we as a society haven’t had an honest conversation about it.  We hear talking heads spouting catch phrases like "government is the problem, free markets are the solution" but never discuss how a free market can exist without government or at least within the governed society. 

Ironically if you start to get down and dirty in a debate with folks from either side of the ideological aisle they almost immediately begin to moderate themselves.  For people who want to trim government to the bone just find the government program that they value and offer to cut it and all of the sudden they’re advocating for "smart government."  For people who want the government to provide for every need simply say that it’s no problem but they will have to use the services as the government dictates and all of the sudden they start arguing for limited government.

The reality is that we need to have a long, painful discussion about what America’s priorities are.  To have a civil society we must have government.  I’d say with the exception of our friendly neighborhood anarchists we can all agree with that.  The differences come in what we ask the government to do.  We need to remember that much of what we take for granted in terms of government hasn’t always existed.  We didn’t start paying income taxes until WWI (well we paid them during the Civil War but then stopped in 1872).  On the other hand we didn’t have Social Security until the 1930s or Medicare until the 1960s.

My point is that there is no reason for us to limit our conversation to making incremental changes to government programs.  Right now we have a unique opportunity to make radical changes because we all know that the system we have now is royally effed up although we can argue all day about the reasons why they are.  So what to do?  Personally I think we should put those four basic questions I listed above to the populace and find out what this country really wants for the future.

So what role should our government play?  My personal preference is that the government limit itself as much as possible to the role of referee.  While certain jobs should always be fulfilled directly by the government (i.e. defense), for most the government should provide a safe environment for private enterprise to fulfill those roles.  A difficult part of this discussion will be deciding which programs fit the bill for government delivery.  Energy? Transportation?  Health care?  Education?  Parks?

For arguments sake who says that public schools are the best answer?  With today’s technology isn’t it possible that distributed education regulated by government might be better and more cost effective?  Isn’t it possible that it would be more effective to take public school funding and have private enterprises compete for the dollars?  I can almost guarantee that if you had a bunch of companies competing for students in Washington, DC the kids would be getting a better product than what they’re getting now.  On the flip side look at the craziness we’ve begot with Medicare.  That’s a program paid for with government dollars and administered by private enterprise and it’s looking like an absolute boondoggle. 

Once we decide on the programs we’re going to keep under the government’s control we’ll have to decide how much to spend on them.  In other words we’ll need to decide how big the military should be, how much money should be provided to state and local law enforcement agencies, how much to spend on building and maintaining roads or if more money should be spent on mass transit, what kind of energy generation projects should we pay for (solar, nuclear, coal, etc.) and the list goes on.

For those industries we decide to regulate we’ll need to determine how far regulations should go. We’ve seen in the financial sector that too much regulation can stifle growth, but not enough regulation can lead to meltdown.  Most likely we’ll only determine the appropriate levels of regulation through trial and error, but it’s crucial that we allow private enterprise to provide as many services as possible in a competitive environment so that we keep the cost of delivery down.    

Finally we need to figure out how to fund the government.  Is an income tax really the best way to go?  Other industrial countries seem to be having success with VATs, so might it be a better way for us to go?  Also, and not insignificantly, we need to remind ourselves that as members of this society it is in our interest to pay taxes.  Those taxes pay for our security and welfare, so the issue isn’t whether or not to pay taxes but determining how much is fair to pay and what those taxes should fund.

These are huge and important issues but we have not been asked to confront them.  Our leaders pay them lip service, but in reality the vested interests debate these issues among themselves and we the people rarely get asked for our take on it.  I’m sure the powers that be think that the average citizen isn’t interested in the details and will only sit still for sound bites, but I think that if we were provided with the information in plain English and allowed to see for ourselves exactly how things have been working lo these many years, they might be fairly well surprised at the response they’d get.  Let’s put it this way: we the people seemed to have pretty good instincts when the Bush administration tried to cram that bailout package down our throats.

Hopefully whoever wins this election, Presidential and Congressional, will engage our country in this kind of fundamental conversation.  If not I truly worry about the country I’ll be living in during my old age, and I don’t even want to think about what my kids and grandkids will be facing.

Civics 101

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One of the advantages of working at home is that when I take a lunch break I can whip up a quick bite to eat in my own kitchen and then plunk myself down and read the paper or watch the news on TV.  Today I took a late lunch around 1:40 and snapped on CNBC to see what was going on in the market and with the government bailout.  What I saw was fascinating on multiple levels.

First, I saw the bailout vote appear to fail which caused the DJIA to plummet 300 points in about five minutes.  It was nuts and it was something I’ve never seen before, but I was even more interested in watching and listening to the Wall Street pundits react.

What became apparent very quickly is that as smart as these people were about markets they were equally dense in the ways of Washington.  They had no clue how Congressional votes worked.  Luckily they had a reporter that could explain what it meant to leave the vote open and how it was possible for votes to change even after they’d been cast. That news caused the Dow to recover a couple of hundred points.

Then it got really good.  They decided to listen to the House vote live and they came in just as a member of the House asked a parliamentary question and asked the Chair for guidance.  Well I think that caused the commentators’ heads to spin off because when the vote was actually closed a few moments later and the House moved on to another bill they didn’t realize it. They had to wait for an explanation from the reporter and once they got it and relayed it to the audience at large and the Dow and other equity markets took an instant plunge.

I don’t expect people who normally don’t cover government to know every intricate detail or parliamentary procedure, but if I knew I was going to be covering one of the most important stories of the day as it affects my area of expertise I’d make sure I understood at least the fundamentals of how things proceed on the Hill.   It’s pretty obvious that didn’t happen in this case.

I don’t want to be too critical of the financial pundits. Their day-to-day existence requires they be highly versed in finance, not in government.  However, I do find it interesting that they were temporarily flummoxed by things they should have learned in high school civics class. 

For what it’s worth I’ve found CNBC to be some of the best television news going these days. It’s not perfect by any stretch of the imagination, but it’s head and shoulders above the rest of the "news" channels.  Watching CNN gives me nausea, MSNBC and Fox should drop any reference to news since they’re essentially televised versions of the Daily News, and the networks are pretty much DOA.  I like public television for the overall news, but CNBC seems to be the best for business and finance. 

Battle of the Green Eyeshades

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Winston-Salem is home to one large bank, BB&T.  We used to be home to Wachovia but then they went and "merged" with First Union and moved HQ to Charlotte, so we here in Winston have just one major bank that we call our own.  Thus it was with a little bit of hometown pride that I read in today’s paper that the bank’s head honcho sent a letter to the Congress critters detailing why he thinks the bailout stinks.

For John Allison, the high-risk rollers on Wall Street are getting
too much of the ear of Congress and having too much say in resolving
the financial nightmare that they created.

That’s why Allison, the chairman and chief executive of BB&T
Corp., submitted a 14-point letter Tuesday to all 535 members of
Congress with a simple message regarding the proposed $700 billion
bailout.

"There is no panic on Main Street and in sound financial
institutions," he wrote. "The problems are in high-risk financial
institutions and on Wall Street."

He said that it is important that "Congress hear from the well-run
financial institutions, as most of the concerns have been focused on
the problem companies. It is extremely important that the bailout not
damage well-run companies." Allison’s opinion is seconded by local
community-bank officials and community-bank trade groups.

"Community bankers did not create this financial crisis, but our
banks and communities are clearly feeling the impact," the Independent
Community Bankers of America said in a statement. "As the fundamental
drivers of local economies — we could be in a strong position to help
resolve this crisis."

Go get ’em Mr. Allison.

Wolves Guarding the Hen House

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One of the axioms from business that I adhere to most fervently is that when someone tells me I need to buy NOW or face ruinous price hikes I should actually do the reverse and take a deep breath and consider very carefully the deal I’m considering.  That’s exactly what we need our Congress to do now in the face of the Bush administration’s call to push through a massive bailout package for the financial sector NOW.

Here’s why I think we need to take a deep breath and think before we act:

  • Most of the press has focused on this being Treasury Secretary Paulson’s initiative, with nary a mention of President Bush.  There’s lots of speculation that it’s because the President is a lame duck at this point, but personally I think it’s because they don’t want this thing to be associated with the Bush administration, an administration that no one trusts.  Well, Paulson is a Bush appointee and he’s most definitely a part of the administration which means that his actions must be scrutinized very carefully.  Even if his actions are well intentioned (I personally think they are), he is a crony and product of the industry he is asking us, the American taxpayers, to trust him to rescue with our future tax dollars.  I say future tax dollars because this isn’t money we currently have to spend so another part of the rescue package is that we’ll raise our debt ceiling from over $10 trillion to over $11 trillion.  If we’ve learned nothing else I hope that we’ve learned that no one in this administration can be trusted not to let privateers get wealthy in the process of governing our country.  They’ve already done it with the war in Iraq and there’s no reason to think they wouldn’t do it here.
  • A big part of the bailout proposal is that it will empower Paulson, and/or his successor, to contract with private enterprises to manage the assets that the government is going to buy.  According to this article in the New York Times some of the companies lobbying for the job are the very same companies who will be benefiting directly from the proposed buyouts.  Is anyone really surprised?
  • Although I believe that cronyism has gone on in every president’s administration, the Bush bunch has taken it to a whole new level.  While many pundits are quick to point out the Clinton administration’s contributions to this mess, the reality is that we’ve been under the Bush administration for eight years and they’ve been at the helm plenty long enough to bear the brunt of the responsibility for this mess.  Heck, Bush even had a Republican Congress and an incredibly high approval rating the first couple of years.  Unfortunately the Bushies spent the last five years doing everything they can to undermine the public trust, so now when the economic stakes are greater than they’ve been in over two generations and they need the public trust more than ever, they don’t have a chance in hell of getting it.  And rightly so.  Of course Congress hasn’t done much better, so in general I think we need to do whatever is necessary to hold all of these a-holes accountable and make sure they do the right thing.
  • What is the right thing?  I have yet to read or hear anything that clearly outlines the worst case scenario if we don’t do the bailout, versus the worst case scenario if we do pass the bailout. One number I’ve heard is that the bailout will directly cost every man, woman and child in the U.S. over $3,000.  What would the cost be of letting these companies fail?  And why not let them fail and let the competitive, free market establish a replacement?  I don’t think this is a silly question, especially given the fact that AIG’s major shareholders are now looking for a way to not take the government’s proposed $85 billion loan since it will essentially wipe out their holdings. Is it realistic to assume that some other parts of the financial services market might suddenly be motivated to get their own house in order if the alternative is losing everything when the government swoops in to take over?

    Given all these questions it’s kind of hard for us Regular Joe’s to figure out what we think our
    leaders should do, and considering that we have their jobs in our hands
    in less than two months I’d think they’d want to clearly explain to us
    why they’re doing what they’re doing.

  • Oh wait, that last point is so naive of me. They don’t want us to know because either they don’t think we’re capable of understanding, or they don’t want us to figure out how inept they’ve been, or both.

I know this stuff can be kind of boring to most of us, but it’s hard to overstate how important this particular issue is.  It’s absurd that no one is effectively framing the issue for us, the people who ultimately are going to pay the bill.  Will someone please step up and tell us what the hell is going on?

Can States Copyright Laws and Regulations?

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I came across this post today on Boing Boing about a guy who is scanning all kinds of government regulations, laws, etc. and posting the images online for all to see.  Apparently some state and local governments copyright their laws and regs and he’s hoping one of them sues so that they can hash out the issue in court. 

How the hell does a government copyright what is ostensibly public information?  Now, if you read the article that the Boing Boing post points to you can understand why a government would copyright its regs, but that doesn’t explain how it’s able to do it.  Here’s the why:

To purchase a digital copy of the California code costs $1,556, or
$2,315 for a printed version. The state generates about $880,000
annually by selling its laws, according to the California Office of
Administrative Law.

That’s just horses–t.

Digging into the Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Schools Budget

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Okay, per my post yesterday about textbooks in the Winston-Salem/Forsyth County schools I’ve contacted the school system and am waiting to hear back from them.  In the meantime I’ve decided to do some research and on the school system’s website I found the Proposed Budget for 08-09.  From their line item explanations I found this:

23. 2007-08 was the one year out of five
when state textbook funds are almost sufficient to purchase all new
textbooks needed.  Social Studies adoptions occur in 2008-09, and to
purchase new books for each student will require increases of
$1,372,337.

24. We centrally budget for curriculum and
instruction supplies, materials, small equipment, etc, for system-wide
instructional needs, including basic non-consumable supplies for new
classrooms to house the 555 projected new students, calculators
required for use with math textbooks, replenishment of larger cost
non-consumables such as maps and globes, plus a new $50,000 commitment
in 2008-09 to help bring the supplies and small equipment in
kindergarten classrooms up to the standards of newer school
classrooms.  The overall increase needed is $283,130.

Item 23 is interesting because it says that due to Social Studies adoptions in order to purchase new books for each student will require $1,372,337 in addition to whatever was appropriated before.  I need to clarify what "Social Studies adoptions" means, and are they implying that in subject areas that aren’t "adopted" they don’t need each student to have books?

I can’t find an actual budget on the website so I’ve gone to the county website to find their budget.  The main budget page is here, and here’s a link to the PDF version of the breakout for the county’s education segment of the budget.  In a nutshell here’s what I found:

  • The school system asked for just under $122 million and the county appropriated just under $111 million from the general fund.
  • Of that $111 million the school spending is broken down into these major categories:
    • Instructional Programs – just under $71 million
    • Support services – just over $31 million
    • Charter Contingency – about $6.5 million
    • Capital Program – $2.4 million
  • They also break out their personnel spending and it’s a little confusing because you go from looking at millions or thousands of dollars to non-financial numbers.  I’m assuming that the numbers represent thousands of dollars.  Whatever, here’s the change in spending on their people from 07-08 to 08-09 for all funds:
    • Administrative staff – 275.9 to 285.5 (+9.6)
    • Instructional staff – 4,267.4 to 4,047.8 (-219.6)
    • Clerical staff – 2,042.1 to 1,941.5 (-100.6)
    • Hourly staff – 766.1 to 660.0 (-106.1)

So go figure, the only increase in payroll expenditures came in administration.  Huh.

I’m still trying to find out if there’s a break out on the website of how the school system spends their dollars on such things as books, computers, etc. I can’t find it yet and I may have to get it directly from the school system, but once I do get it I’ll cover it here.