Wake superintendent wants $55.8 million more for school district. Here’s where it will go.
Wake County Superintendent Catty Moore wants a $55.8 million increase in local education funding this year to help raise salaries for the lowest paid school workers.
Moore unveiled on Tuesday a proposed budget for the 2023-24 school year that asks the Wake County Board of Commissioners to provide a 9% increase in funding.
Under the proposed $2.1 billion operating budget, Moore wants $649 million from commissioners. The additional $55.8 million would provide raises for many employees, including increasing the current $16 per hour minimum salary for school support staff to $17 per hour.
Moore told the school board that raising employee compensation is a priority during a period of high vacancy rates.
“Our proposed budget includes continued and significant investments to improve employee compensation, provide behavioral health support and ensure our school facilities offer optimal environments for teaching and learning,” Moore said.
The school board will hold a public hearing on the budget proposal on April 25 before voting on it May 2.
Wake County Manager David Ellis will recommend how much to increase school funding on May 1. Commissioners will vote on the budget in June.
The all-Democratic Board of Commissioners historically has been sympathetic to requests for more school funding. Last year, commissioners increased school funding by $50 million to help raise the minimum salaries to $16 an hour for employees such as cafeteria workers and teacher assistants.
But funding Moore’s budget this year would require a property tax increase. Ellis is only projecting a $53.5 million increase in county revenue this year at a time when he also has budget priorities
‘We must invest’
At a joint meeting of the school board and commissioners last month, Moore said $16 an hour is not a living wage in Wake County. She said school employees can often make more money working for the private sector.
Wake is still struggling with high vacancy rates, including 32.3% for bus drivers, 10.6% for cafeteria workers and 6% for instructional assistants. While the teacher vacancy rate is 2.5%, Moore said the district still has nearly 300 openings.
Moore’s budget proposal came the same day that several North Carolina business leaders released a report calling for higher salaries for the state’s teachers. The CEOs pointed to issues such as the growing teacher shortage and the rise in the number of vacancies across the state.
“As we strive toward a strong, sustainable economy that supports opportunities for all students, we must invest in things we know have long-lasting positive effects, like good teachers and NC Pre-K,” said Jim Goodnight, CEO of SAS, in a statement. “This requires making our state more competitive with others in the Southeast and continuing to expand access to our proven early learning program.”
The state House adopted a budget last week that includes a 10.2% average raise for teachers over the next two years, and a 9.5% raise for school bus drivers to help improve driver shortages across the state. The budget now goes to the Senate.
Employee raises
Increases in employee pay account for $25.8 million of the $55.8 million request.
School support staff would get a minimum $17 an hour salary, or a 4% increase, whichever is greater. Raises would be provided to other pay grades to deal with “salary compression,” in which long-time staff may make as much as new workers.
Certified staff such as teachers would get a 4.5% increase in the local salary supplement that’s provided to the base pay provided by the state. Moore said this means local salary supplements will have increased 10.5% since 2018.
Teacher assistants, also called instructional assistants, would get an increase in pay when they serve as substitute teachers.
The budget also creates a salary supplement for women’s wrestling coaches.
“Our people are our greatest strength,” Moore said.
‘Asking for livable wage’
The Wake County chapter of the N.C. Association of Educators brought several school employees to the board meeting to lobby for higher wages and better working conditions.
“We are asking for buildings and facilities that allow us to do our jobs with dignity,” said Christina Spears, president of WAKE NCAE. “We are asking for livable wages so that our folks don’t have to work multiple jobs and can serve our students with attention and care.”
Ana Stratis, the cafeteria manager at Oberlin Middle School in Raleigh, said Wake County is so expensive that every child nutrition services (CNS) employee she knows works two or more jobs to get by.
“The reality remains that CNS employees are still struggling,” Stratis said. “Here’s the truth. It is impossible to pay for all of our bills working for CNS alone.”
Several safety assistants talked about the difficulties riding with special-education students who have behavioral needs and can become violent. They said they deserve higher salaries and should not sit in their cars in extreme weather because their building is too small to house them.
“We’re asking for compassion to be given to us,” said Brigitte Bridges, a safety assistant.
Where are the increases going?
In addition to providing raises, Moore said the budget begins a two-year process of transitioning more than $32 million in one-time federal COVID aid into locally funded items.
“The federal funding has been key in our pandemic response and recovery efforts, but our students’ needs extend beyond the availability of these federal dollars,” Moore said.
Areas where the increase would go include:
▪ Shift $11.8 million off COVID aid into local dollars to continue to pay for maintenance and operations.
▪ A $5.2 million increase due to Wake matching estimated state increases in employee retirement and hospitalization costs.
▪ Transfer $3.9 million more to charter schools as part of their share of the local funding increase.
▪ Add $2 million to hire additional school counselors to help with student behavioral needs.
▪ Shift $865,000 off COVID aid into local dollars to continue paying instructional support technicians to help students use their district-provided computers.
This story was originally published April 11, 2023 at 8:04 PM.
