Source:  PRESS RELEASE, 5/27/11

Governor Perdue today sent a letter to the General Assembly leadership expressing concerns over severe cuts in the Senate and House budget proposals. While the governor was visiting a school in Newport, three cabinet secretaries met with media to outline some of their more significant concerns.

Below is a copy of the letter from the governor and a list of 10 significant concerns expressed by Gov. Perdue and Secretaries Freeman (DENR), Young (Crime Control and Public Safety) and Cansler (DHHS).

10 Reasons North Carolina Will Move Backward if the Senate Budget Passes

1. Our education system will suffer devastating cuts.
a. “We cannot go backwards on education. It's part of who we are as a people in this state and it's what has differentiated us as a leader in the south. We are not a Mississippi; we are not an Alabama; we are not even a South Carolina. We are North Carolina, and we have chosen to become that because of our generational legacy of education.” ~ Governor Bev Perdue

2. The Senate budget will drop North Carolina to near last in per-pupil spending. How can we be a model for the south with numbers like that?
a. North Carolina already ranks low out of the 51 states and D.C. in per pupil spending. These drastic cuts would propel us to 49th or 50th, with Utah behind us in dead last.

3. The Senate budget cuts an estimated 20,358 public school positions.
a. 2,175 Teachers
b. 65 Principals
c. 505 Assistant Principals
d. 14,753 Teachers Assistants
e. 658 Instructional Support Personnel
f. 265 CTE Teachers
g. 208 Directors
h. 571 Clerical
i. 1,158 Custodian / Other

4. The Senate budget eliminates 14,753 classroom positions (Teacher Assistants in Grades 1-3)!!
a. In most school districts, teacher assistants also serve in other critical roles:  such as driving school busses, serving as reading coaches, monitoring lunch periods or after-school pick up, etc…Eliminating these teacher assistant positions has a significant double whammy impact on the school districts.  
b. The student to adult ratio would double in the more than 14,753 1st, 2nd and 3rd grade classrooms that are losing their teacher assistants.

5. The safety of our people will be jeopardized. There will be fewer law enforcement officers on our streets to protect us.
a. The Senate budget will mean cops get fired.

6. Our world-class Emergency Management system will be severely damaged. In a state that suffers hurricanes, tornados, flooding and landslides – in a state that has three nuclear reactors in-state and another just across the border – we cannot afford to cut the people and programs who help North Carolinians prepare and get back on our feet after a disaster.

7. $2 Billion -- $2 BILLION – will be cut from the North Carolina economy in Medicaid cuts. Provider rates will be cut and services will be lost.
a. The more than $700 million in state cut equates to $2 billion with the federal match.
b. Studies have shown in other states such cuts mean tens of thousands of jobs lost.
c. These cuts will force provider cuts and severe cuts in services.
d. People won’t be able to get eyeglasses – or even an eye exam – anymore.
e. Folks with asthma won’t get their respiratory therapy.
f. This is just the beginning.

8. Bad budgeting errors and time requirements by the Feds will result in a spiral of Medicaid financial problems.
a. The federal review process for making rate changes or service cuts take weeks or months. Each delay makes it harder to manage funds.
b. The House and Senate got some of their numbers flat out wrong. And they are expecting savings that state officials – and even federal officials – say simply can’t be achieved.

9. Clean water will be harder to come by in North Carolina.
a. The Clean Water Management Trust Fund would get an $87.5 percent cut – making it nearly impossible to assist local governments with water and sewer projects, or to reduce and clean up pollution.
b. Tourists don’t want to swim in polluted waters. Businesses can’t come to towns without water and sewer infrastructure. This cut will affect quality of life and economic development.

10. Businesses will have to go farther and wait longer to get permits for projects.
a. Core DENR staff – including those in customer service -- will be gone. Businesses will see a marked decline in the personal and local service they need to move projects through efficiently and quickly.