Board of Commissioners - Regular Meeting

Good evening, and welcome to the July 14, 2026 special meeting of the Gasson County Board of Commissioners. My name is Chad Brown, service chairman of the board, as well as the commissioner of the Riverbend Township. I would like to welcome our viewers and thank Spectrum Cable and AT&T for making it possible for our citizens to view tonight from a live stream audience. I would like to present your Gasson County Commissioner, beginning on my far right. Allen Fraley, charitable township.

Good evening, Scott Sheehan, Gastonia Township. Jim Bailey, South Point Township.

Kathy Cloninger, Dallas Township.

Bob Hovis, Crowder's Mountain Township. Good evening. Tom Keager.

At this time, I will please ask you to rise for the invocation given by Commissioner Hovis and the pledge of allegiance given by Commissioner Fraley.

Please bow with me.

Gracious Father, we come to you tonight to deal with a very special issue. We all care on this dais about Gaston County Schools. Our previous action for the $10 million and the $3.5 $4 million that we allocated outside of the regular budget process should explain to many people that we care, and Gaston County students and Gaston County schools means a lot to us. Our discussion tonight will be open and direct. There's no predetermined amount or motion to come before this board that's been derived by the commissioners here on this dais. The conversation is for the public and for the public to see, and we stand up in front of the public with that conversation in front of your heart as well. We ask that you grant us the strength and the wisdom to make the best decisions that we can for both the county, the school system, and most importantly, our students and our children. We ask that in Christ's name. Amen. Please join me in a pledge of congratulations to the flag of the United States of America.

and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

The first item on the agenda tonight is discussion of consideration of funding for the school, Gaston County Schools. The board has called a special meeting to discuss the funding needs of the Gaston County Schools and consider the approval of a proposed one-time appropriation of additional funds. During this discussion, we will have the manager outlay a few of the comments. So I will go to Mr. Roten first, and then we'll come back and we'll all discuss.

Absolutely thank you. I just want to make a few points about where the county is and where we are financially. Since I took over as manager in August of 2024, there were financial difficulties primarily around the slowing of sales tax as well as property tax remaining stagnant and inflationary costs as well as costs in the county continuing to rise. We have reduced over five positions in the manager's office alone. We've eliminated a whole nother department within the county. Those efforts have saved the county over 1.5 million annually. We've also implemented process improvement across our whole organization, which is returning roughly half a million dollars. Last budget, we made significant operating reductions in excess of $13 million across our county departments in order to absorb the debt service costs of the $190 million in school bonds last year, which included debt service payments increased by $17 million. The county has also absorbed rising costs of health insurance and retirement. We've raised premiums on our own employees for health costs and not added new positions, even when several departments had increased service demands. All of the increases within our budget have been mandated or directly tied to increasing costs of providing services. We have delayed or canceled our own capital plans and projects since our debt capacity has been reduced, and most of it went to school debt last year. and funds have went elsewhere. The continued use of fund balance is not sustainable, and with vulnerabilities in future years and unknowns around revenue and the revenue outlook for the county, appropriations are risky, but that does not mean they're not necessary. These are board policy decisions. I will say that I just want to be really clear that the county has done and will continue to be good stewards of taxpayer dollars. And the needs remain in our organization as well.

Thank you. I wanted to start out by saying I want to speak directly to the teachers, employees, parents, students, taxpayers of Gaston County employees as well. Everyone who cares about our future is Gaston County. This is more about people than it is a budget. It's about teachers deciding whether they can continue to build their careers here. It's about parents who want a stability for their children. It cares about the taxpayers who expect us to use their money carefully and responsibly. Every one of those concerns matter. The Gaston County Board of Commissioners and the Board of Education are partners. We are not enemies. We are not foe. We are partners. We continue to make a difference in responsibilities, but we serve the same families and the same children as the same community. Throughout the process, I have intentionally held back my personal recommendations and wanted to listen to our teachers, school employees, school board members, the school administration, taxpayers, county employees, and leadership of Gaston County itself. The commission has a responsibility to support a public education We also have the responsibility to maintain the entire county. That responsibility extends across the whole community. It continues into public health, social services, community buildings, infrastructures, parks, libraries, courts, technology, emergency and medical halls and communications, law enforcement, and county employees who make this service possible. For more than 12 years, the Gasson County Commission has delayed some of its own projects and needs, where most of our projects were unnecessarily thought. They're involved in maintaining buildings, systems, and services we already have in place. During the same time, we continue to help our partner agencies while maintaining a healthy fund balance. A healthy fund balance is not simply extra money. It helps keep the county paying its bills, responsible to emergencies, protecting its financial standing, and borrowing money at lower costs, which builds school systems and other facilities. Maintaining its balance has required discipline, but it also come at a cost. County infrastructure has aged, projects have been delayed, and recruiting and retaining county employees has become more difficult. Supporting our essential services and the needs requiring neglect each other, one another, our responsibility is to care for the entire county and the means finding balance and not choosing winners and losers. We must support our schools and protect our county and the financial future. We have been told that the superintendent of the school system can maintain its current operations under operating a flat budget and the amount already given to the county. At the same time, our teachers have clearly told us that employee supplements are important and recruiting and retaining qualified education in the educators is also needed. I believe that we should have the direct responsibility to those concerns. Therefore, tonight I'm proposing that we come out discuss how we want to put together a program of what we want to do, but this proposal isn't meant to be an additional support, but a possibility for teachers and employees to do their own thing in everyday work. However, the funding cannot be larger than the conversation. So at this time, I will open up the floor to discussion on what anybody wishes to discuss in this matter.

Mr. Bailey. The other day I put out a video on Facebook to get people's questions and comments on a lot of the things. And I got a number of interesting comments, some good, some bad, some indifferent, some just wanting information. One of the things that there was a gentleman asked, what about the North Carolina lottery? Where does that money go? And I was kind of shocked to see it, where it went. Because in 2005, when it was passed, 35% by law was mandated to go to school construction, non-instructional support, pre-K scholarships, and school transportation. This year, it's been cut more than half. This year, it's planning to be 16.4%. So I'm not pointing fingers at the state, but I'm just saying, if a lottery was put in place to help fund the schools, why is it being reduced every year? I mean, 16.4% of a program that's supposed to solely go to schools That's a problem in the state. Addressing what we got here, there was a few people, there was one lady, and she was very specific. She says, we need to identify what our needs for the children are. My idea are teachers. We're losing teachers. If the teacher's supplements are not increased substantially, and Mr. Houchard, or Dr. Houchard, if he I can't support anything that's not substantially raising the supplements for teachers. Can't do it, sorry. We've had others that talk about wanting complete transparency. They said it's not our job to oversee the Board of Education, or the school board. I agree with that. But if you remember last year, with really no doing with this board, Mr. Hussard come up and said, we're $15 million in debt. We need $15 million right now or we're going to have to lay off teachers before the end of the year. Okay. How are we supposed to take that? Is that mismanagement, misappropriation? There were some issues, I understand, and it was some of the COVID money. It was a number of issues. It wasn't everybody's problem. It was everybody's problem. It just wasn't one person's problem. So we approved that money so the classrooms could stay open. And now there's kind of unevenness on both parts on where we're supposed to go from here. We have in front of us today a large amount of, it's a wish list pretty much from what I'm looking at. I've talked briefly with some of the people on this board. Some people want to fund certain things and just give the money to the school board and the school superintendent to spend as they will. I don't have a problem with that. As long as they're gonna sit here and tell me that, at least $2 million is going to school supplements for teachers. And that's all I have to say.

Thanks.

Mr. Hovis.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I had the opportunity, along with Commissioner Sheehan, to follow up on a motion that was made in the chair's absence. And we adopted the budget for us to have a group of county staff, school staff, and two electives from each body to sit down and create this wish list that Commissioner Bailey was speaking in reference to. And the purpose of that was in order for this board to understand what we're funding, we needed to be kind of line item specific. People on this board wanted to know where the dollars are going. I don't think that's asking too much to explain to our voters of why we've added additional cost to the county to fund what needs, especially in light of the shortfall that was unexpected and unintended and didn't happen intentionally that we dealt with earlier in the year. With that being said, this wish list or this list of true needs is in two different categories, mandated and non-discretional increases. and non-mandated or discretional increases. In other words, there are things that are outside our statutory requirements to fund. And with that being said, that's what we have before us tonight that this board is going to discuss and come up with some level of recommendation for additional funding. I don't think there's a person on this dais that doesn't agree that additional county monies need to go to Gaston County Schools to meet real needs. I don't think there's anybody up here that doesn't believe that. The question is how far we want to go in our savings account to manage the county properly so that we don't find ourselves in a situation, unintended as it was, that the school system found themselves. That wasn't intended. It's one of those gotcha moments that happened. And we can debate how or whatever, but at the end of the day, that's where we are. And that's why this board acted quickly without any reservation or hesitancy to fund and complete the past school year without any question. And if anybody would like to say that we didn't do that, you're welcome to talk to me. My phone number is listed on the county website. I will talk to you at length about any one of those items at any day. But with that being said, we have to make the decision of how deep we're going to go into our savings account to fund this list of over $11.3 million. And that's what we have to do. And we have to be responsible to the public. This isn't about the political aspects. This is explaining how we've managed. Because when I first came on this board, had we completed the Belmont Middle School under the bond issue that was about to expire, had we built that school, in three years, the county would have technically been in arrears because all of our debt service was crescendoing at a time when we would have not had adequate revenues to continue to operate the county. We had less than a million dollars of unassigned fund balance nine years ago at that time. And with that being said, sitting on this board, we have exercised a whole different methodology of spending as The chairman explained, he explained it very, very well in terms of what actions this board has taken over the last five or six years specifically. But with that being done, we were able to build our fund balance back to where we were actually one of 11 counties in the state that has a AAA bond rating. Now you say, oh, that's just great. We can go around and say we've got a AAA bond rating. Well, it's more than that. It's how much of your public tax dollars we pay in interest on any debt that we incur. So the less interest we pay, the more bang we get for your tax dollars in building new projects and other capital needs. So that's why it's important, and that's why it's left up to us seven individuals to make that decision as given to us through the state general statutes. And we have the responsibility of following that, and everyone up here takes that very seriously. And I just wanted to give you that caveat in terms of what we're looking at and what we're going to be doing. Thank you.

Mr. Cloninger.

I support, given the school's additional funding, and my breakdown includes funds to the certified employee supplement adjustment for teacher supplements and not for administrative staff, the $3.6 million. I also support the $1,042,000 for state increase for employee compensation, the $1,570,000 for state increase employee pay benefits. And this is based on my itemized request or the wish list which we received. It's my desire that asking to follow this request as funded for the teachers and other school personnel. Thank you.

Mr. Sheehan.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. As Commissioner Hovis had stated, he and I have been immensely involved in this process from start to finish. And there's been a lot of conversations, not just in person, but on the phone. Chairman Crisp, I think we have probably spoken more than either of us care to. uh but i will say that we're still on speaking terms at least as of today so i appreciate you and all your time and your insight getting through this process i do want to address a comment that i've heard multiple times from people regarding our fund balance and i need to get mr manager here can you kind of explain to everybody listening and present about our fund balance where it is where it's gone how much we've pulled as of recently for multiple different reasons and what an additional appropriation tonight is going to do to that and the long-term negative effects of that.

Absolutely. So as Commissioner Hovis mentioned, around nine years ago, we were at an all-time low in fund balance. So we really look at it as unassigned, which means free and clear money, money that you can take out for really any purpose. There's other fund balances that are much more difficult to access because they might be restricted for social services or a certain function. But unassigned fund balance was at like $1 million or less than 2% of our revenues, which is not sustainable. It's not even a one-month cash flow and really potentially could get you on a warning list with the state. So we're very prudent, this board was very prudent in increasing that fund balance until last year the fund balance went up to 23%. So that was our high. Our policy that we've adopted policies on fund balance is to keep between 15 and 20%. Once it goes over 20%, that then goes to capital to fund capital projects. Well, last year, it went to 23%, but there were several appropriations during the year. So the $10 million for schools, we also had issues on our side in terms of self-insurance costs just going through the roof that we had no control over. and then whatever action could be taken tonight. So where we were at 2% and it gradually kept up to 23%, an action tonight could bring that fund balance, depending on what this board chooses to do, could bring that fund balance anywhere between like 13% and 16%, which could fall below our policy, could stay within it depending on what the amount is. The ramifications of that are we have that policy, that policy is adopted, and so therefore that's actually a stricter thing. When you adopt a policy from a financial perspective, the rating agencies really lean into that because they're like, you imposed that upon yourself, you chose to do that, why are you deviating from that policy? And so we would have a three-year window to get back into compliance. The risk of that is that within those three years that our bond rating becomes reduced because they see a continued decline after a continued sustained increase. And they'll say, well, something's going on here. Maybe they would ask us for justification and reasonings and we could have explain it. But my fear would be that you would get a bond rating decrease, which could then ultimately decrease your buying power, decrease your ability to access the capital markets, and then obviously cost taxpayers more dollars when you do issue debt. And that's just something that I think we need to be aware of. Fund balance is a one-time source of revenue. It should be used for one-time things. Not that you can't ever make an exception and use it for an ongoing expense. but typically it's used for one-term expenditures, capitals, emergencies, or economic opportunities, which is why it's critical and why it's there. It's why it was very critical that we had that last year when an emergency came up, that we had those funds and we were able to use those. this situation could be seen the same way, though obviously next year, you know, there will be the expectation that that continues. And so if that's the expectation, the question is, is where are the additional revenues gonna come from next year? And so what's the sustainability of that, especially when we know there's some potential for a ballot measure to cap property tax limits and in November. And so what does that look like on us? I don't know. I mean, I can't answer that question. But that could limit your ability to increase revenues or generate revenues. And sales tax has plateaued and pretty much stayed stagnant, especially since the municipalities have left their rates higher, counties reduced their rates. So we've actually gotten significant reduction in our own sales tax based on how that's levied out based on ad valorem. So those are just a few things to keep in mind and happy to answer any other questions.

Thank you, Mr. Manager. Thank you, Mr. Chair. That's all we've got at this time.

Mr. Kueger.

Yeah, just you touched on the debt indebtedness. What is the total bond debt? Everything, not just schools. What's our ballpark? I don't need an exact number.

So the payments are roughly $42 million annually. The actual amount of debt is probably in excess of $300 million.

What is the school bond debt right now? What are we paying a year for that?

What are we paying? Well, over $30 million.

And the last of the bond money, it's gone now?

It is. There's no more authorization, so any additional bonds for schools would have to go to a voter referendum, or you could potentially do limited obligation bonds.

And with the addition of more funds to the schools, if that were to happen tonight or somewhere immediately down the road. What would that do as far as allowing the county voters to vote on another bond referendum for the schools? Would that put it back?

I would think it would delay it, yes. I would think it would delay a bond referendum for capital.

I'm good. Mr. Fraley. Just a few brief remarks here. A lot of stuff's already been said. But first, I'd like to thank Vice Chair Hovis and Sheehan for serving on this. I know they put a lot of time and effort into other board members from Board of Education and anyone else that was involved with that. But I would say, you know, after In the past several months, we've given $17 million out of the county fund balance. We've talked about that some tonight, just to cover payroll and expenses that we weren't expecting to happen. But this problem needed to be addressed very quickly, very fast. And we did that. We answered the call. We did what we needed to do. And I think handled that situation. Now, with the fund balance where it is, with things that the manager was just talking about, I think that whatever decision we make here tonight, it has to be something sustainable. Because if this same thing, the same call comes this year with three months to go, we're not going to be able to answer the bill. We won't be in a position to do it. So we need to make sure we don't get in this situation again. I do think much of this falls back to COVID. Things were really crazy different. All the money that came out, I think, on the Board of Education standpoint, that money, the ongoing expenses, the spending kept going after the money stopped. Probably was put in some places it shouldn't have been. On our end, we didn't take into consideration a lot of the inflationary problems that came along with that also. And we didn't keep the funding up on our side. So that's why we're here tonight to try to fix that. And we certainly can find reason to point fingers at each other back and forth who's to blame. Is that going to fix anything? No, it's not going to. That's why we're here. Hopefully what I think we can do is just to find a way to fix it the best we can tonight, rectify the problem, move forward. That's it, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you. That's everyone who spoke. I want to be succinct and say we still need clear answers going forward about how the funding and current financial problems what's taking place and how we can correct them rather than try to figure out what was happening. We gotta correct them. We gotta be able to have a stable plan for our future. Tonight, I wanna recommend something. I want to see where we stand because this should be able to support the teachers, should be able to support our taxpayer, should be able to support the county's financial stability. So I will start with, I like to move to appropriate $5 million $3 million of that going to supplements straight to teachers. The other $2 million to satisfy what can be done through the state increases employer paid, the benefits, and to the employer's compensation. This is not a blank check, but it's also not an end to the discussion and conversation. I wanted to throw that out there to make sure that the teachers understand that we hear you. It's not that we haven't heard you. We also have a responsibility to make sure we take care of our fiduciary responsibility we have. And I want to thank you guys for always being present and doing the things you have. We continue to partner with our school system. For those reasons, I would ask the fellow commissioners to support that. But I will open the floor for any amendments. I will make that in the form of a motion to appropriate $5 million. $3 million of that go into teacher supplements. And the other $2 million going to the benefits of paid employees, everything given going to employee compensation on the things that we would have to take care of from our side. Mr. Bailey? I second. Mr. Bailey seconds. Any discussion? Mr. Fraley?

I could support that, but I would want to add the $275,000 in to take care of the beam funding for one year.

I think that was taken care of last night. I think they voted to- Has that already been done?

Well, I mean, it's on this list. That's the reason I'm bringing it up.

I think last night they decided to keep that in place for a year. So that basically is an outside piece for that.

Well, I know. But if we're actually saying how we want them to spend the additional monies, I want to make sure that that doesn't get brought on the table at their next meeting and gets taken away somehow.

So that's an amendment to the-

Sorry. Are you wanting to make an amendment for that? If I need to. If I don't need to. I want to get this straight.

So that would be 5.275, correct? Yep. Is that correct in your math over there? All right. So the amendment, do I have a second to that amendment? A second. Seconded by Commissioner Cloninger. Any discussion on the amendment? We'll vote on that first, correct?

And then you'll vote on the amendment.

All right, we'll vote on the amendment at this time, which is to have to appropriate $5.275 million, with those funds going to $3 million for teacher supplements, The other 2 million going to the ongoing benefits and employee compensation, those two items, and I guess the second and third one down to that. And then the last one being the 275,000 for the beam elementary to be appropriated. Is that correct? You have that as a, so motion was made by Commissioner Fraley, seconded by Commissioner Cloninger.

On the amendment.

On the amendment. Any discussion?

Can I ask one other thing? I'm sorry. Mr. Cloninger. So you said that, how much money is going to the employee compensation?

$2 million for those two items that you have there in two and three.

This two and three?

Yes.

Okay. All right.

I've got a question. Mr. Keegar. You just said employee compensation. Are you saying that in general, or are you speaking specifically of the supplement?

Spelled out wise on this particular page. Let me get my glasses, sorry. State increase in employee paid benefits was the 1.570. You have that number there, Mr. Keegar? That complete, and then the rest of it going to the state employee's compensation side. up into whatever that number would be minus the 1.57 out of that 2.

I don't want to belabor this, but we heard a lot of folks that spoke on behalf of the schools on the EC programs. And I just want to throw that on the table and see if we can't throw something in that direction.

That would go for the schools to be able to do that with the budget we've already passed. But that's up to you if you want to make an amendment to add that. Just to recap why you're thinking about it, the amendment on the table, Commissioner Fraley, seconded by Commissioner Cloninger, was for $5.275 million. That was to cover the address to budget gap for WSB beam intermediate, the state increase in employee paid benefits, and the rest going to allocated to whatever employee compensation and increases was incurred because of the state giving. their teacher salary. Can you just talk about that for a second while we're talking about this? It was about the teacher salary, how that increased. By the increase of that, increased hours. Can you talk about that, please?

Yeah, happy to. So the state budget that just passed passed significant increases for teachers across the state. We do have locally funded teachers, locally funded positions here. and so that is essentially an unfunded mandate that then gets passed down to the schools and this is the amount that that state budget is costing the county for teachers that are paid locally so the million forty two thousand dollars is something that i have no control over as it's related to the state budget that just passed and same thing for the state increase in employer paid benefits of 1.57

Mr. Keegar, I'm going to move on until another particular member wants to discuss something. Is that OK?

Well, I guess I wouldn't know how to suggest an amount to put in there for the program. The information we have here is an increase for teachers, training, assistance, I believe. I don't know how to break that number up where it would still help the schools. If it's not a certain amount, it wouldn't be able to do very much. And that's some information I don't know, I don't have. So I wouldn't know how to make a recommendation to put some of that funding in there. Just maybe wave your head, would anything help that program?

Let me...

OK. OK.

Hold on, please. No, you're. My fault. No, no. This is just for discussion. I'm trying to figure this out because we have to have very succinct for David to have a motion here. He's all over me. With that, the budget that's already in place, plus the additional, the amendment for right now from Commissioner Fraley, seconded by Commissioner Cloninger, is for $5.275 million. And that is for the gap funding for BEAM, the increase in employer paid benefits, and then the employer compensation, along with $3 million going to teacher supplements. If there was a number that you want to amend, then you could change any of those numbers. But like I said, I'm just trying to, I don't want to put words in your mouth. I just want to make sure David's got me putting all these pegs in these holes over here.

I agree with, excuse me, with Commissioner Teager.

Hold on one second. Sorry. Again, I don't know. I don't have that magic number. I don't know what it would do. Anything would help, they said. The schools admitted that anything would help. Could some little portion of that $5,275,000, could we just carve out? I mean, if we don't designate it for that, we don't know it'll get there.

OK, let me. I'm done. Hold on a second. Since there's amendment, we have to be very careful where we're at. I'm still in discussion, right? If you wish to change the numbers and how, whether it be you took whatever the, can you guys do the numbers on this and just give me some help? Take the 1.570 out of the 2 million. 430. That was for the state increase in employee compensation. And that's basically because of the rise in that. That could potentially come out, if you wish, to make an amendment to that to change that for that. And it could go to the EC if that's something you want to do, if you wanted to see how that worked. I'm just giving you an example so you can see how it kind of plays with that. But it's on the amendment, so I have to be very careful of what I'm inside of right now.

I understand. But still, I don't know where it could come from or what the amount would be. Let me ask you this.

I'm going to take a gander. I'm gonna amend the amendment at $5.5 million. That puts it to an even number. Do I have a second? And that second adds that from the 5.275, the rest of that to the five point, whatever that number you get to 5.5 million. What's that number? 225. Would there be a second to that amendment? I'm going to strike that amendment. I'm going to add another amendment. We'll go to $6 million. Is that what you said? Yes. $6 million. $3 million going to teacher supplements. Hold on, please. If you could just be quiet, please. $3 million to go to teacher supplements. That leaves another $3 million to put toward the increases to include the beam, the paid benefits, employee state increase, employee benefits, the employee paid benefits part. That's the 1.57. 2.75 was left over Fortnose. What was the number after that, the smaller number? $430,000? $430,000 to go. Does that cap it all? Is that right, David? And numbers, can you?

Mr. Chairman, maybe we do like a one-minute pause.

All right, we're going to take a five-minute recess. Thank you, Your Honor.

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Got an extra blow there.

As we still have discussion going now, I'm going to pull all the motions and amendments, and we'll start over. I think that's the easiest way to get to what we're trying to pull through. So do I have a motion to pull all those out? Motion made by me, second by Bailey. All in favor to pull all those, start over? All right. It's unanimous, Madam Clerk. All right. So we're back to square one. Commissioner Bailey. Yes.

I would like to recommend $8 million and $3 million to go towards supplements.

Please, please. I don't want, I'm trying.

And I'll leave that up for discussion after that.

You have to hold on one second, Commissioner Bailey. So... And the rest of those? Just the operational funding. Yes. So that's $5 million to operational funding. Is that correct, David?

That's sufficient, Mr. Chairman.

Is there a second? Seeing no second, the motion has failed. Mr. Sheehan.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would like to make a motion myself. Based off this worksheet, I would like to include item number two, item number three. I would also like to include the beam intermediate funding, and then a total give of $5 million total with the balance going to teacher supplement.

So that's $5 million, the full boat to 1.042 to go to employee compensation, the 1.570 to go in employer paid benefits, 275 to beam. Yes, sir.

and then the balance of the $5 million going to teacher supplements.

And that's $323 to teacher supplements?

No, sir. That's more than that, sir.

Can somebody give me a number, please? 2.113. $2.113 million to teacher supplements, correct? That's correct. Hold on, hold on, hold on. Just let me get this piece of paper here for David. So that's to appropriate $5 million total. The employee compensation pack, which is $1.042 million. The state employer paid benefits, $1.57 million. The beam, which is the $275,000. leaving $2.113 million to teacher supplements. Is that correct, Commissioner? Just to make sure.

That's correct, Mr. Chair.

And that is a motion. Do I have a second to the motion? Seconded by Commissioner Fraley. We are in discussion. Any discussion on this matter? Commissioner Collingwood.

Now tell me that amount, because I just can't agree to that amount for teacher supplements.

Five million total. Let me read it so David's good. Sorry. To appropriate five million in additional funding for 1.0422 employer compensation 2 point, excuse me, 1.57 million to employer paid benefits, 275,000 to the address gap funding for WB beam intermediate school, and then 2.113 million going to teacher supplements.

I just, I can't agree with that amount, I'm sorry.

We have a motion made by Commissioner Sheehan, seconded by Commissioner Fraley. Any discussion still? Seeing none, we'll call for the vote. Item is to appropriate $5 million with those funding issues with the 1.42, 2.75 going to BEAM, the 1.57 going to employer paid, and 2.113 million allocated to teacher supplements. All in favor? All opposed? It is 4-3, Madam Clerk. It passes. This concludes our meeting for tonight. Our next regular meeting is July 28th, 6 p.m. here in the Harley B. Gaston Junior Public Forum Courthouse. Thank you for watching. If you have any questions, comments, please telephone your clerk at Donna Buff at 704-866- Hold on, we're not through. If anyone has any questions or comments, please telephone your clerk Donna S. Buff at 704-866-3196. Good night.

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