The Guilford County Board of Commissioners has just instructed the Guilford County Board of Elections to put a quarter of a cent sales tax hike on the ballot for the seventh time in the last decade and a half.
While the measure has always been voted down previously in Guilford County, one thing commissioners and school officials and school advocates are going to emphasize in the coming PR campaign is that the proceeds of the new tax – estimated to be about $25 million a year – will be used to increase teacher pay and the pay of “classified” school system employees such as bus drivers, cafeteria workers and janitors.
Chairman of the Board of Commissioners Skip Alston said he believes that, in the past, the sales tax option has failed in part because the money would be going to pay off school bond debt. He and many others believe the referendum has a much better chance of passing this year if citizens know that the money will be going to help increase salaries in the school system.
Alston said earlier this year that people talk all the time about what a wonderful job teachers are doing and how dedicated they are – despite not being paid enough. Well, Alston said, this will be a chance to let them put their votes where their mouths are.
That’s the message proponents are going to be shouting loudly until all the votes are cast in November. But there’s a problem: This board, the one that’s running the county in 2024, can promise how that money is used – however, there’s a well-known legal dictum that is the huge fly in the ointment.
“Current Boards of Commissioners cannot commit future boards.”
The current group of seven Democrats and two Republican commissioners can adopt 1,000 resolutions and make loud promises until they’re blue in the face regarding their intent or their wishes as to where the $25 million (and likely more in future years) goes. However, while that revenue stream will continue to come in year after year, Boards of Commissioners change and different boards often have drastically different priorities from past boards.
In a recent work session, the Board of Commissioners was discussing the wording of a resolution regarding the intent of the use of the added sales tax revenue should the measure pass.
“We’ve got an estimated $25 million,” Alston said. “Do we need to say anything [in the resolution] about the growth of it? Whatever it is, we want it going to the school system. I don’t want to cap it at $25 million.”
Commissioner Pat Tillman, who used to serve on the Board of Education, said that, since the money would be coming in “in perpetuity,” he wanted to know if the language in the resolution would be binding in future years.
“Legally, by the language, if they want this for hereafter, that’s great and I don’t think anyone would argue about that,” Tillman said, “but in 10 years, say that we really need it for donations or construction…”
“I mean, this is legal language that is going to be permanent?” he added.
In the work session, Alston responded, “I don’t think it’s legal language because we can’t bind other boards in the future. Madam Attorney, do you want to speak to that?”
“That’s right Mr. Chairman and commissioner,” County Attorney Andrea Leslie-Fite said. “It states an intent of this body and it creates a legislative history for future boards to see what this board was thinking at the time, but it is not binding on future boards. Specifically, it just gives guidance on what this board was thinking when it was adopted.”
Commissioner Kay Cashion said at the work session, “That is the point that I was going to make, that this is not a long-term guarantee of designating the funds. It will be contingent on future boards.”
Boards change, emergencies happen; future boards often look completely different than past ones.
While it’s fair to say that there would be some pressure on future boards in the near future to use the money for teacher pay, boards in five or six years might think that the school salaries are finally high enough.
There are other problems as well. Critics of the NC Education Lottery Fund argue that what really happened is that the money just supplanted other money rather than truly added significant amounts to the school systems across the state.
Money is fungible.
Around the turn of the century, a conservative Guilford County Board of Commissioners set up a Construction Fund – with the idea that the fund would be increased each year and then the county could have that money, along with the interest from the fund, to be used to go toward a “pay as you go” plan for large construction projects rather than borrowing money all the time. However, years later, a liberal board took over and said: “Hey look at this big pile of money we have just sitting here. We can spend it on this and this and this and this…”
Soon that Construction Fund was virtually empty.
So, just like the best-laid plans of mice and men, the best-made plans of Boards of Commissioners often go awry.
Show me the improvement and then ask for money.
Who told Alston “that people talk all the time about what a wonderful job teachers are doing and how dedicated they are – despite not being paid enough” ?
The fact is some teachers are great and some are not. The other facts are they are ten month employees, have every weekend , night, holiday, and summer off. They have chosen the profession of teaching knowing in advance (the pay schedule is public easily accessed information) how much they would be making.
If they cannot budget their own lives properly why would a tiny pay increase make any difference? Maybe instead of giving raises maybe have some financial counseling and budgeting help for school employees that are struggling…or they could work somewhere else.
This is how it works. They tell people it will go to school and when people agree to it they change the plans. Now, taxpayers are in for higher taxes. Can’t they see that people are over taxed as it is? Give the people a break. Stop taxing us to death for your pet projects.
I believe that most citizens know these promises being made are bald face lies. Just vote no and save yourself some money. The schools need to learn how to budget and eliminate waste, just like tax payers have to do. Schools need to teach, not throw tax dollars at problems. Once year end grades improve, if they do, then maybe you can consider asking for more money.
This is also true of federal taxes. The government is not commonly obliged to spend them in any particular way, and even if they are (such as FICA taxes to fund social security) they often find a way to spend them for some other purpose (like by borrowing from the trust fund to spend on other programs). Since elected officials know that voters do not want tax increases (at least on themselves) they support taxes on anyone else (like billionaires or successful large corporations) or borrowing rather than general tax increases on everyone. The long-term result is self-evident. The national debt has now grown to equal GDP and will soon exceed it. The federal government does not need to consent of taxpayers to enact taxes. The County Commissioners do. Unless we want the finances of our county to resemble the finances of the US, we should reject the tax increase.
The additional tax, if passed by voters, will be spent on bond debt repayment. Do not be fooled by what Skip Alston says. He NEEDS the tax to pay off the bond (borrowed) money. He is in the position of a consumer who finances the cost of a new vehicle and then finds he cannot repay the loan. The difference is that the new car buyer is SOL. Alston expects the voters of Guilford County to bail him out by agreeing to more taxes. Vote NO for Alston’s new (and permanent) tax increase in November. All GCC are losers.
Well, duh.
(Sound of applause)
You pretty well nailed it JV and Maurice