Brand new District 4 Guilford County Commissioner Mary Beth Murphy has a lot of input that she wants to give to the Guilford County Board of Commissioners, and, starting on Monday, Dec. 7, she’ll get that chance.
Murphy, a teacher in Guilford County Schools who surprised many by beating two-term incumbent Alan Branson in the District 4 county commissioners race, said that, clearly, as a teacher, she has a focus on school funding and school issues – but she added that there are a lot of other important issues she wants to tackle during her coming four-year term.
Murphy said she hopes to represent District 4 well – and, likewise, all of the people of Guilford County. She said part of the process is hearing from the constituents. Murphy learned a lot about their concerns and hopes on the campaign trail, but she pointed out that it’s hard to meet with everyone in the district. District 4, which covers much of eastern Guilford County, is known for being large and diverse.
“Geographically, it’s enormous,” she said of the district, adding that that made it difficult to meet everyone in the district.
One issue Murphy stressed during her campaign – one that’s important to District 4 – is the need to improve broad brand internet access to underserved markets in Guilford County.
She said the Board of Commissioners needs to lead the way on the effort and said that the county needs to take advantage of existing programs meant to meet that goal and the county also needs to engage in more partnerships with private companies to work toward better access.
Of course, there’s no question that a major focus of Murphy as a commissioner – as on the campaign trail – will be getting more funding for the Guilford County School system.
She said that the $300 million school bond referendum, which passed after the current Board of Commissioners put it on the November ballot, wasn’t enough.
“I expected it to be between $700 million and $900 million,” she said.
A lot of other voters did too, and that may have gotten Murphy some votes.
“Frankly, it was very disheartening,” she said of the amount. “Schools are the driving force in our economy and the money spent there is an investment in our future.”
She said that, based on the amount of the school bond that the board put on the ballot, there seems to be “a disconnect” between what the commissioners are willing to offer and what the school system needs.
Breathe of fresh air for district 4 glad Branson is gone. Ms Murphy best of luck but don’t get greedy when it comes to the schools . The school board an superintendent need to be held accountable for the excessive spending on pay and benefits for employees that have nothing to do with the day to day operations of a school. Guilford county schools are the most wasteful entity in the county. A new building doesn’t help a kids learn that is were a teacher comes in and that’s were the money should be spent
Guilford County residents better hold onto your wallets. Taxes, taxes and more taxes with the proceeds going to liberal sinkholes all over.
Just keep “virtual learning” going thru 2022. Imagine the savings.
Another do-gooder in office. I’ll bet she a joy to work with.
I have lost my faith in the American voter.
This is tyranny.
Congratulations and love your enthusiasm to support all ages. Yes, every student needs the tools to do the work and to provide that equal opportunity.
Public dollars should be capped at a certain amount per student period. The School Board should have to raise any additional funding theirselves. If High Point University can do it, they can too. Our schools are a train wreck. Top heavy administration, many underpaid, and many overpaid employees. Way too many who want to forgo teaching children the three R’s and choose to indoctrinate them into the liberal hive mind instead.
The fact that voters approved the bond for schools but didn’t realize the sales tax proposal they defeated was to fund the bond shows how inept the Commissioners and School Board are at trying to raise money for schools. This is just one reason the schools don’t deserve more money. The ballot proposal should have been one issue that asked if voters would “approve a bond of $300 million paid for by an added sales tax of ¼ cents”. That would have been a more realistic question for voters who most likely would have turned down the bond.
There shouldn’t be additional funding for schools until there’s a serious cleaning of school staffing, especially in the upper management levels. Those people should have to give some accountability for their jobs as they require teachers to do. There should be a complete inventory of school buildings, assets, holdings, and discussion of how they could best be used, repairs that need to be made, cost of repairs, and a timeline for those repairs before any new construction is allowed to be considered. All current structures should be brought up to code and existing buildings should be maintained yearly from here on out in order to keep them up to date instead of letting them rot in order to justify the need to spend money on new buildings (which seems to be the norm for GCS).
People who have observed money spent on GCS for 40 years with little positive return in terms of students better educated or teachers feeling more appreciated. They only see more administrative personnel with larger salaries and better benefits who keep asking for more money from the state and County while saying that people need to realize they need to pay higher taxes for the children. As a taxpayer, I’m not buying the whining plea for funding when I see the money being blown on useless programs, adjunct staffing, and extra-curricular activities without kids leaving school with the ability to read, do basic math, write sentences, think critically, reason, or make good decisions.
We as voters aren’t letting our kids down by turning down bonds or the funding of them, Ms. Murphy. We want better educational standards and a better school environment for teaching; a better community for our schools and to live in; a better economy for our businesses and families; a better and more sensible government that will allow our families and community to have stability and a chance at success. We want our freedoms given back.