Weeks overdue, North Carolina finally has a budget. It contains tax increases. It has less money for education. It does not pull the state out of its financial crunch.
The North Carolina budget is crafted every two years. The budget year is called the long session. Alternate years, the short sessions, may tweak the budget, but they're mostly for new or leftover legislation.
Now, we have a biennial budget totaling $19 billion. It's balanced, as required by the N.C. Constitution. The state can have a surplus at the end of the two-year cycle, but it can't have a deficit.
How the Democratic legislative majority balanced the budget is cause for concern for most Republicans, some Democrats and Gov. Bev Perdue, whose signature will be affixed, but who stated she "is reluctant" to sign it.
Opponents say the budget's tax increases are unfair to taxpayers trying to cope with a poor economy. Defenders say they cut more money from the budget than the total value of the tax increases.
We're trying to understand how that is a plus. State spending was cut, so there is less to pay for. Taxes are going up because the state still needs more revenue.
Schools are getting kicked hard. Since the budget wasn't delivered on time — it was supposed to be in force by July 1 — everything education was put on hold.
Public schools, community colleges and the UNC system were left dangling, trying to calculate who and what to cut from their budgets. All scenarios were predicated on some degree of guesswork.
Catawba County's three school systems will have to trim millions of dollars from their spending plans. That means programs, curricula, staff and faculty will be reduced. Some cuts already have been made.
School starts in two weeks in Catawba County. That's a short time to make final preparations for the academic year. And we can't forget this state budget will control spending for two years unless there is a miraculous economic turnaround that infuses state coffers with revenue.
Recent industrial and business deals will make a difference, but not overnight. Recovery seems to be a long-term proposition.
We appreciate the General Assembly's predicament. Lawmakers did not want to make many of the budgetary decisions. We do not accept the delay in finalizing the budget, however. The problems should have been tackled months earlier.
We cannot escape the fact that North Carolina — especially education — must perform with less money and fewer people, and taxpayers will pay more in the process.
Note: Gov. Bev Perdue's statement on the budget is under Let's Talk Politics that is now on the Opinion drop-down menu.
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