recession
The Chapel Hill-Carrboro Board of Education meets tonight at 5:30 (closed session at the Chapel Hill Town Hall) to discuss, among other things, areas for budget reduction.
Though I dislike making judgements on topics with which I'm not
familiar, I must admit that my first glance through the list of
reductions leaves me with mixed feelings. I believe them off-base with
certain items, such as reductions in professional development,
curriculum development stipends, and new-teacher signing bonuses.
(see PDF below-pages 5 and 8) However, I believe them on-target in other
reduction avenues, including looking at the K12 Insight online surveys
and reducing the Superintendent's meeting refreshments.
I think we are in about the 4th iteration of the Chapel Hill Public Library debate, but whatever the number, it's an important debate about an important issue. Four things stick out to me:
First, the Town Council has delayed moving forward with the addition. As much as I want to see it built, the current economic situation being what it is gave them little choice. When the situation is more favorable I'm sure that they will move forward.
This week after a lot of theatre by Democrats in Congress appearing to be tough on the big three, the automotive industry is likely to be bailed out. Congress rejected the initial proposal by the automakers and asked them to come back with a better proposal and not in Leer jets. They came back with their new proposals by car.
With macro-economic indicators getting worse by the day, scaling down to the local is looking saner and more attractive.
One example of many is local currencies. Though our local currency, the NCPlenty, is barely in existence, it may be time to re-vamp it. The global and national economic climate may provide the environment necessary for making a local currency adaptive and succesfull.
In November the nation's official unemployment reached 6.5%. This is a figure that would change to 12.5% if included were those who are too discouraged to look for work any longer or those working fewer hours than they would like.
12% may be a significant number; As pointed out in Beyond Greed and Scarcity by Bernard Lietaer: In France, years ago,..
The Obama team and Democrats are acknowledging that an economic stimulus plan equal to 4%-5% of US GDP is needed. In other words 500-700 Billion dollars are needed for investing toward infrastructure as a means of creating jobs to stimulate the economy.
If there is anything of value that we may have learned from the previous local discourse on the global economic crises I would hope that it is: it is healthy to read between the lines of the national discourse mainstream setting media (i.e. NPR, The New York Times, CNN, and all mainstream corporate media to the right of these).
Before taking another message and echoing and parroting again, lets take stock of where the financial bailout has put us.
Pages
About Us
OrangePolitics is a not-for-profit website for discussing progressive perspectives on politics, planning, and public policy in Orange County, NC. Opinions are those of their authors. Learn more.
Community Guidelines
By using this site, you agree to our community guidelines. Inappropriate or disruptive behavior will result in moderation or eviction.
Zircon - This is a contributing Drupal Theme
Design by
WeebPal.
