Anchor Tim Boyum
Gov. Pat McCrory will release his budget proposal at 10:30 a.m. Wednesday at the Capitol. As you might imagine, there’s a great deal of speculation about what is and what is not in the budget. Perhaps the bigger question will be how much the legislature pays attention to his requests, but that’s for another day.
We can speculate all day, but let’s take a look at what we know he has said.
Here’s a link to his “budget teaser” that the Governor’s Office released on YouTube today. To be honest, it’s not really a teaser but more of a repeat of his prior themes. He wants to fix the economy, transform education, grow jobs, and work on efficiency all while creating a culture of customer service. He wants to do that in three areas that include the economy, education, and efficiency of services.
We do have some clues of what we can expect by looking back at his State of the State address he gave in February:
On the overall outlook
We learned revenues are 5.5 percent ahead of expectations compared to last year but that will likely have little impact or change this statement.
“Right now it looks like next year’s budget provides no new money or new revenue. So like families across North Carolina, we must live within our budget. We must refocus our priorities and become more efficient in how we spend our limited dollars”
IT and repairing buildings
McCrory has focused heavily on these issues:
“My budget will provide substantial funding to fix and repair state properties and our broken IT systems in North Carolina government.”
Education
How far will funding go toward vouchers or similar programs: “That’s why my administration is seeking to expand strategic partnerships between the education community and the business community. My budget will promote this philosophy in pre-K, K-12, community colleges and our university system.”
The governor has been focused on digital learning already and we will probably find more in the budget.
“Education is no longer about spending money on bricks and mortar. The power to improve education and deliver real results is at our fingertips. Right now, you watch any four-year-old child learning, they’re learning on technology, and they’re learning quicker than any of us in this room ever learned.”
Jobs/economy
The governor has talked about tax reform however most proposals are revenue neutral which means we likely won’t get any news on that front in his budget. However, he did talk about investing in study infrastructure needs and investing in that so will we see anything related to that based on his State of the State address?
“We need to present to the people of North Carolina, and the people who want to invest in North Carolina, our vision for the transportation plans, our water plans, the energy plans and communication plans.”
Democrats hammered Gov. McCrory and Republicans for the MetLife deal because of nearly $100 million in incentives. The governor and his new commerce secretary have both talked about reform in that area.
“We are going to be recalibrating our incentive program. This will ensure that we are using our resources based upon measurable results, to attract, expand and retain jobs in North Carolina. We will be undergoing a total review of our Commerce Department, to ensure that we are flexible and we are adapting to our ever-changing competition and economic conditions.”
Will we see this in the budget?
There was also this little nugget attached to the end of the “transcript” from his address.
“*(Omitted: We will also support legislation to bring a new DNA lab to the west, because people are waiting for too long for requests to be processed.)”
The governor also mentioned an effort to fund drug treatment courts better which his fellow republicans cut in the last budget.
So, we do have an idea of the theme and some details of what the governor would like in a budget. But, there are also a series of very important questions that we won’t know the answers to until tomorrow morning.
Just a few:
- Will state employees and teachers get pay raises?
- Money for education vouchers?
- How will he fund education? He has said he supports pre-K but the legislature cut its funding last year and his DHHS secretary initially hired someone who at least appeared to question the impact. What about the UNC system?
- How much IT and building repair funding will he include?
- How much will this new Center for Safe Schools cost that he announced today?
- To pay for these initiatives does that mean deep cuts elsewhere?
- Do we see a difference in the way transportation is funded and how?
