First hearing on budget draws crowd
GREENSBORO — Crunching budget numbers is never easy. But as the Guilford County Board of Commissioners saw Thursday night, it's even harder to face people affected by deep budget cuts.
Nearly 200 residents attended a public hearing to ask the board to reconsider some of the $17.2 million in budget cuts proposed by County Manager Brenda Jones Fox — especially funding for libraries and health care for the poor.
"It can be hard to hear," commissioner Carolyn Coleman said of the pleadings. "It really puts a face on things, but that's important."
Lyn McCoy of Greensboro told commissioners that most of the cuts inordinately affect children, the elderly and the poor.
"All of us ask you not to balance the budget on the backs of those who have the least voice and the least power," McCoy said.
Fox's $568.9 million budget calls for the elimination of the county's $1.6 million contribution to the Guilford Adult Health program. Executives at Moses Cone and High Point Regional Health Systems, which jointly fund and operate the Guilford Adult and Guilford Child Health programs, have said they will pull out if the county does not renew its participation in both programs.
The two systems pay about $3.5 million toward both programs each year; the county spends about $3 million.
The Rev. Julie Peeples, pastor of Greensboro's Congregational United Church of Christ, said her church members would keep the commissioners in their prayers. She was one of a handful of religious leaders who asked the board to continue caring for those who need help the most.
"Every day as a pastor, I am seeing more and more families in dire need who never expected to find themselves in that situation," Peeples said. "This partnership that you see on paper is their lifeline to mental and physical care."
Chairman Melvin "Skip" Alston said children and the poor will be cared for even if contracts with the county's two largest health systems aren't renewed.
"We are not going to abandon our children in this county," Alston said. "Our health department is equipped to take all of these children if Moses Cone decides to abandon them if we won't give them another million dollars."
Dozens also turned out on behalf of the Gibsonville and Greensboro libraries.
The proposed budget would cut the Greensboro library's funding by $600,000 and could result in the city charging out-of-town users for library cards.
The county budget proposes cutting Gibsonville's allocation completely. Since the county's $55,500 share makes up more than half of the Gibsonville library's budget, town officials said the library would have to close.
Gibsonville librarian Kathy Loy described the town's library as small but vital.
"It's amazing what goes on in those four rooms," Loy said. "We do story times for public children and for home-school parents and their children."
Just as importantly, Loy said, there are teenagers who use the library computers to take online college classes.
"It's a community library," Loy said. "We love our people. They love us — we know them by name."
Howard Ray, 74, said his late wife took their grandson Tyler Hunt to the library every week when he was a boy. Now a sophomore at Eastern Guilford High School, he is on the honor roll and just finished his Eagle Scout project.
"I give a lot of the credit to that library," Ray said. "Tonight something told me I had to come down here and say this. I believe it was Grandma."
The commissioners will hold another work session on the budget May 18. Commissioner Kirk Perkins was one of several commissioners who insisted the board take another look at funding for both health care and libraries.
"This is about reading and education," Perkins said. "We're losing kids to dropouts. Those kids that got to the libraries, who have story time, they're not the ones who are dropping out. So I'll say right now, I'm not going to support any budget that guts our libraries."
Contact Joe Killian at 373-7023 or joe.killian@news-record.com
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