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Wednesday: SOS?
posted at 2007-03-28 20:20 | Last modified 2007-11-14 10:38
SOS
Is it “Save our Summers,” or “Save our Students?” Depends who you ask. About 200 people turned out for a public hearing today on school start dates. On one side, the tourism industry, parents, and YMCAs and other summer camp programs argued in favor of the current law, under which most school systems can’t start their year before August 25th . On the other side, teachers, school administrators and other parents spoke in favor of H359, which would put school calendar control back into local hands.
One school administrator who spoke today boiled it down to a choice between better education or a “few extra days of family vacation.” That may be a bit harsh - or not, depending on your stance. But I can say I haven’t heard anyone argue that later start dates are better for kids’ educational progress. Better for business, certainly, and for tourism and family vacation time, but most folks who teach kids for a living think the school year should start earlier than August 25th.
The calendar bill is scheduled for a committee vote tomorrow in House Education. Both sides have been lobbying furiously. Stay tuned.
Same Day Registration
House members held a long and occasionally bizarre debate today over whether to allow early one-stop voters to register and vote on the same day. Democrats say it’s more fraud-proof than regular registration, since wannabe voters would have to appear in person to register, and then use a “retrievable” ballot in case their registration turns out to be no good.
Republicans tried twice to amend the bill to require a photo ID. Both attempts went down in flames along party lines, but not without some odd moments along the way. Sponsor Deborah Ross (D-Wake) broke into French on the House floor. Durham Dem Paul Luebke told Gaston Republican Bill Current he needs to read up on his civil rights history after Current demonstrated a failure to see the link between voting access and race. Onslow Republican Robert Grady (not Cleveland, as I said earlier - thanks, Chris Hayes!) put in a word about active-duty military who have a hard time voting. And Moore Republican Joe Boylan stood up to offer an amendment, then apparently forgot what he was talking about.
After all the shoutin', Same Day Registration passed its second reading along party lines. Thanks to an objection to third reading, the bill should get a final vote tomorrow.
Just 15 cents a day to help a child….
No, it’s not Sally Struthers – it’s school nutritionists, who came to Raleigh today to ask for state money to feed kids healthier meals.
Spokeswoman Cindy Marion says NC school lunch programs get almost nothing from the state. 52 percent of their funding comes from the feds, and 47 percent comes from “a la carte” sales, much of that from extras like ice cream and snack cakes. That works fine, as long as they’re selling what kids want to buy. But what kids want to buy isn’t what they ought to be eating.
Nutritionists say the state needs to move to healthier menus to cut down on child obesity. That means no more candy bars and ice cream – which will mean less revenue to pay for more nutritious food, which costs more to buy and make, anyway. So they’re asking the state for 15 million dollars – which they say equates to 15 cents a meal. They say that’ll let schools upgrade what they feed kids without selling junk food to cover the cost.
Rescheduled
Maj. leader Hugh Holliman pulled his beleaguered smoking ban bill off today’s calendar. It’s rescheduled for next Wed., giving Holliman and allies a week to shore up support. The House vote on the kindergarten start date bill got pushed back to Thursday, too, as did a vote on adding American Sign Language to NC’s foreign language curriculum.
And a lot of things on the Senate side were rescheduled today so members could attend services for Susan Malone, the wife of Wake Senator Vernon Malone. She passed away Saturday. My deepest sympathies, Senator.
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