Routh on sales tax referendum and classroom spending

A political forum held at Congregational Church of Christ last night was sparsely attended by both voters and candidates, and a pitch for the quarter-cent sales tax referendum on the ballot in Guilford County perhaps the most engaging subject on the program.

“In 2008, voters voted $651 million in bond issues,” supporter Bill Guill said. “That equaled six new schools, 15 schools to be renovated. That also included money for the new jail, new money for Guilford Tech as far as the improvement of its campus. In looking at the bond debt payments, that would be an increase of about 8 cents on the property tax per property owner to try to reduce the bond debt. The county commissioners put on the ballot a quarter-cent sales tax. What that would do — it would not be a tax on food, on prescription drugs or gasoline — but also it would bring in $12 million, and 40 percent of that money would come from people outside of Guilford County.”

Guill said approval of the sales tax increase would not necessarily provide adequate revenue to avoid a property tax increase, but it would at least ensure that the burden was shared. He said that a sunset provision for the proposed sales tax increase “has not been discussed at this time.”

Some conservative activists have faulted the Guilford County Commission for putting the bonds on the ballot in the first place and then for enabling a tax increase in times when they would like to see government at all levels tighten the purse strings. So what did the citizens purchase on credit for this bill that’s now coming due?

“It is true that the largest bond is for schools,” said Nancy Routh, an at-large school board member who is defending her seat against challenger Lisa Ingle Clapp. “In 2008, we approved another $457 million for school construction. We’re in the middle of that project at the present time. I mentioned the size of the county, the size of our school system, and the growth that’s there. And a lot of people do not realize how fast we are growing. I was surprised when I first looked at it: In eight years we’ve added 10,000 students.”

Clapp did not attend the candidate forum, and some voters appeared to have difficulty discerning differences in their positions. The best that Routh, who is completing her second term, could offer was this: “I do think sometimes if you have not had more experience and more involvement with schools, you tend to think it’s a one-issue thing. When you’re actually on the board, it is one of the most complex systems in terms of trying to manage the school system. I think point of view may be the biggest difference, but I don’t attempt to speak for other people who need to speak for themselves.”

Routh reserved her hardest shots for Theresa Yon, Republican candidate for NC House District 59, although she did not mention her by name. Yon has proposed a mandate that would require that a minimum of 65 cents out of every dollar allocated for education be spent in the classroom.

“A lot of things get classified as administrative, you’re talking about employees who are bus drivers, who are maintenance folks, who are custodians, who are cafeteria workers — all of those who are necessary to provide the services,” Routh said. “I heard someone talk about recently how they should manage the state allocations for K-12 allocation requiring so many cents out of the dollar to go to the classroom. And I said, ‘Well, define classroom, do you mean that you now want the teacher to have to clean the floor and fix the lunches and all of that which you have to do if you’re going to be maintaining that classroom?”