Highlights of Easley's Budget

Public Education

* ABC teacher performance bonuses: $90 million.

* Pay for rising school bus fuel costs: $13 million.

* Reduce class-sizes in early primary grades beyond what is provided for by funding from the North Carolina Education Lottery: $11 million.

* Remove inflationary increases for instructional supplies and textbooks: -$4.7 million.

* Give subsidized More at Four slots to another 6,345 children, raising the total in the early childhood initiative to 35,000: $45 million.

* Expand Learn and Earn high school initiative to another 13 schools next year, with planning grants for 16 others: $3.2 million.

* Expand high-speed Internet and broadband services to more public schools: $6 million.

 

UNC System

* Across-the-board cuts of 0.8 percent across the UNC system with some exceptions, specific reductions determined by system and no cuts affecting negatively on classroom operations: -$18.5 million.

* Remove inflationary increases for UNC system utilities, library books, campus equipment and vehicles: -$7.6 million.

* Raise system enrollment growth over previous 2008-09 projections: $34.6 million.

* Increase regional collaborations with community college system to help areas with no UNC campuses in Hickory, Rocky Mount and Jacksonville: $1 million.

* Expand Easley's EARN Scholars Program, which helps students in low-income families graduate from UNC system schools debt-free, to provide grants to students in private and independent colleges. No additional funding needed.

* Fund priority recommendations in University of North Carolina Campus Safety Task Report: $11 million.

* Grant to build N.C. State University's Advanced Transportation Energy Center, which will research development of plug-in cars: $500,000.

 

Community Colleges

* Raise system enrollment growth for 2008-09: $23.8 million.

* Hire 55 new faculty, purchase equipment for allied health and nursing programs: $6.9 million.

* Fund 58 halftime information technology positions on campuses: $1.9 million.

 

Health and Human Services

* Remove 1,110 children from waiting list for subsidized child care: $9 million.

* Implement new foster care reimbursement program designed to more equitably reimburse families and providers of services: $8.3 million.

* Reduce Medicaid forecast due to reworking of state-federal formula and increase in drug rebate collections: -$65.5 million.

* 75 percent reduction in inflationary increases for reimbursements to medical providers for services to Medicaid patients: -$42.2 million.

* Reduce from 15 to eight the maximum number of hours a mental health patient can be served through the Community Support program: -$9.1 million.

* Cost savings from statewide chronic care management of aged, blind and disabled: -$24.7 million.

* Expand NC Health Choice program to provide subsidized health insurance to 10,683 more children in low-income families: $10.4 million.

* Hire 132 people to develop more mobile crisis units, inpatient benefits and other community services for mentally ill: $36.2 million.

* Hire 107 new psychiatrists, nurses, health care technicians and doctors at state's three psychiatric hospitals: $5.4 million.

* Develop 36-bed overflow unit at Dorothea Dix Hospital during transition to new Central Regional Hospital, fill 175 positions: $5.2 million.

* Provide mental health services to combat veterans and families: $2.2. million.

 

Justice and Public Safety

* Reduce various operational judicial branch budgets: -$4.2 million.

* Create five-person team in Department of Justice to investigate fraud among community mental health service providers: $113,000.

* Hire 37 new counselors, supervisors and cooks at nine juvenile justice detention centers: $2 million.

* Restore funding for Juvenile Crime Prevention Council reviewed by Legislature during interim period: $22.7 million.

* Eliminate inflationary increases for prisoner care in Department of Correction: -$9.7 million.

* Hire 21 chief probation-parole officers and support staff to reduce caseload and supervision levels: $42.2 million.

* Give more money to crime victims compensation services so that rape victims don't have to pay some costs associated with sexual assault forensic exam: $600,000.

 

Natural and Economic Resources

* Purchase more agricultural conservation easements on farm and forest land: $5 million.

* Hire nine positions to establish planning services to assure stable water support and prepare the state to withstand droughts: $880,000.

* Increase funding for One North Carolina Fund to provide incentives to keep state competitive with attracting companies: $10 million.

* North Carolina Green Business fund expansion: $1 million.

* Open trade office in Shanghai, China: $375,000.

* Job Development Investment Grants: $17.7 million.

 

Capital Improvements

* Supplemental funding for North Carolina chronological history exhibit at N.C. Museum of History: $2.6 million.

* Expand N.C. Museum of Art: $5.1 million.

* Lake Mattamuskeet Lodge renovations: $15 million.

* Creation of North Carolina Freedom Monument in downtown Raleigh: $1 million.

* Planning, renovations and construction at N.C. Zoo in Asheboro: $6 million.

* Issue $553 million in new debt to construct state government office buildings, prisons and University of North Carolina system buildings.

* Construct 400-site campground at N.C. State Fairgrounds: $6.3 million.

* N.C. National Guard armory improvements: $8.4 million.

* USS North Carolina Battleship Memorial renovations: $2 million

 

Other Government Agencies

* Implement recommendations by Governor's Task Force on Preventing Pesticide Exposure: $714,000.

* Reduce annual transfer from Highway Trust Fund to general operation fund: -$25 million.

 

Salaries

* Average 6.96 percent increase for public school teachers and 5.97 percent for principals; 1.5 percent raises plus $1,000 one-time bonus for other state employees, university and community college system workers: $594 million.

* 1.2 percent cost-of-living increase for state retirees. No additional funding needed.

 

Taxes

* Tax increase on beer, wine and spirituous liquor: $66 million.

* Increase tax on cigarettes from 35 cents a pack to 55 cents: $99 million.

* Sales tax holiday for energy efficient appliances: -$1.5 million.

* Extend tax credits for research and development and North Carolina Ports: -$4 million.