Click on the map below to learn more about the impact of state budget cuts in your community.
Western North Carolina region
- Current unemployment rate: 10.8% [ ii ]
- By 2013, projected job loss from budget cuts: 5,113 [ vi ]
Piedmont-Triad region
- Current unemployment rate: 10.1% [ ii ]
- By 2013, projected job loss from budget cuts: 7,318 [ vi ]
Southeast North Carolina region
- Current unemployment rate: 11.2% [ ii ]
- By 2013, projected job loss from budget cuts: 4,261 [ vi ]
Charlotte region
- Current unemployment rate: 10.3% [ ii ]
- By 2013, projected job loss from budget cuts: 7,979 [ vi ]
Eastern North Carolina region
- Current unemployment rate: 10.6% [ ii ]
- By 2013, projected job loss from budget cuts: 4,156 [ vi ]
Research Triangle region
- Current unemployment rate: 8.6% [ ii ]
- By 2013, projected job loss from budget cuts: 9,242 [ vi ]
Counties: Carteret, Craven, Duplin, Edgecombe, Greene, Jones, Lenoir, Nash, Onslow, Pamlico, Pitt, Wayne, Wilson
- As a direct result of state budget cuts, more than 144 K-12 teaching positions have been eliminated in Eastern NC, and a total of 1,736 school-related jobs have been lost. [1]
- Many of the students who will feel the impact of these budget cuts are those who can least afford a reduction in services. Pitt County’s Exceptional Children program, designed to assist students with disabilities, has been forced to eliminate 56 teacher assistant positions. [2]
- In Jones County, 15 teachers were given pink slips – 10% of the rural county’s teacher workforce. In addition to these losses, teacher assistants received a pay cut, while funds for textbooks, instructional supplies, and professional development have all been slashed. Otis Smallwood, Executive Director for Human Resources in the county, says he regrets the cuts: “Schools are going to have to do more work with less people. People are going to have to double and triple up; not only will they be teaching but they will have other responsibilities. There are not enough people to spread the load out.”[3]
- Budget-writers in Raleigh claim that this budget protects the classroom, but faced with a loss of $6.8 million in funding, Pitt County Schools Superintendent Beverly Reep disagrees: “You can’t pass almost $7 million in reductions back to us and not impact the classroom.”[4]
- In Craven County, 65 fewer at-risk children will be able to enroll in the NC Pre-Kindergarten program in 2011-2012 than the previous year as a result of budget cuts.[5] Of the 379 applications taken, there is only enough room for 179 children in the program. NC Pre-K is designed to prepare 4-year-olds to enter the school system with reading, language, and math-readiness skills; communication and listening skills; and higher order thinking and problem-solving skills. [6]
- The ripple effects of state budget cuts sometimes turn up in unexpected places. Health officials in Lenoir County are concerned that they might be contributing to a rise in teen pregnancies in the area. Melanie Palmer, Lenoir County Health Department Nursing Director, says that the loss of funds at the local level has slowed teen pregnancy prevention initiatives: “Any time the state cuts its budget, it impacts us. It impacts the amount of travel we get for education programs. It impacts the amount of outreach we can do in the community.”[7]
- Pamlico County is one of several in Eastern NC that struggled to control massive mosquito outbreaks in the aftermath of Hurricane Irene. The 2011-2012 budget eliminated the five-member state team that monitored mosquito populations, counseled state and local officials on how to control the pests, and oversaw grants to local governments for mosquito control. [8]
- Over $350 million was cut out of NC Medicaid in the current budget and the lack of funding is posing a major threat to services on which many eligible North Carolinians depend. Jimmy Gay, a resident of Jacksonville and a diabetes patient who relies on Medicaid to pay for necessary eye-exams, worries that a reduction in benefits for people with less serious conditions than his will prevent some from seeing doctors routinely and may lead to some health issues going undiagnosed. [9]
- The Eastern North Carolina School for the Deaf in Wilson is one of three special-needs schools facing closure as a result of the NC budget. Department of Public Instruction officials will be forced to decide which of the three schools will shut down by January, 2012. Gary Farmer, former dean of the ENCSD, believes the loss will deal a blow to disabled students and says it’s a mistake to place any of the schools on the chopping block: “They are getting ready to snatch the little island of hope that they’ve got left, and I don’t understand it.” [10]
- [1] Department of Public Instruction – August 31st, 2011 ↩
- [2] WNCT – August 11th, 2011 ↩
- [3] ENCToday.com – July 22nd, 2011 ↩
- [4] WNCT – June 1st, 2011 ↩
- [5] New Bern Sun Journal – September 21st, 2011 ↩
- [6] New Bern Sun Journal – August 20th, 2011 ↩
- [7] Kinston Free Press – October 2nd, 2011 ↩
- [8] News & Observer – September 23rd, 2011 ↩
- [9] Winston-Salem Journal, August 30th, 2011 ↩
- [10] NC Policy Watch – October 26th, 2011 ↩
These cuts were not inevitable but a choice. By maintaining the temporary tax package, which included the penny sales tax and a surcharge on high-income earners, or looking at reform-minded revenue, lawmakers could have avoided many of these deep and wide-ranging cuts.
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