By By BETTY MITCHELL GRAY
Staff Writer
Three Beaufort County leaders Tuesday had a message for the Beaufort County Board of Education — drop its petition now before the N.C. Supreme Court during the next 30 days.
If not, then risk not only losing good will with the county Board of Commissioners but more than $400,000 in funds the county has already paid to the schools as a result of the lawsuit between the two boards.
“If they don’t withdraw the petition and show some good faith and we have to go to the Supreme Court again, I will want the county’s $412,000 back,” Commissioner Hood Richardson said in an interview with the Daily News on Tuesday.
“We are still having to spend money that belongs to the people of Beaufort County for a useless end,” he said.
The petition was filed late Friday. Lawyers for the school board also filed a motion in Beaufort County Superior Court last week seeking a stay of a retrial of the original court case until the N.C. Supreme Court rules on the petition asking the court to reconsider its Aug. 28 ruling in the case.
County leaders said in interviews at the county’s Administration Building they were surprised by the scope of the petition that was filed.
The petition “is a much broader reach than what was represented to this board,” said Jay McRoy, chairman of the Board of Commissioners in an interview. “The local school board has said … this whole deal is just a clarification of the ruling, but when you read this petition, they are asking for a rehearing of the case.”
“We’re somewhat surprised at this time,” he said.
Commissioner Jerry Langley agreed.
“They need to simply say ‘Enough is enough,’” he said.
One school board member said in an interview Tuesday that he is ready to drop the petition.
School-board member Mike Isbell said he voted against the school board filing the petition asking the N.C. Supreme Court to reconsider its ruling in the funding dispute between the school board and the county, adding he would “just as soon drop it.”
In July 2006, the school board took the county to court, arguing that the school system’s funding from the county was not adequate to properly run county schools for the 2006-2007 school year. A jury subsequently awarded the school board an additional $756,783 for the year. Superior Court Judge William C. Griffin Jr. ordered the county to pay the school board $412,000 of that jury award while the case made its way through the appeals process.
In August of this year, the high court reversed a decision by the N.C. Court of Appeals regarding the lawsuit and remanded the case to Beaufort County Superior Court. The court determined that instructions to the jury were flawed in Griffin’s definition of the word “needed” as it relates to appropriations needed to operate a public school system in Beaufort County. Griffin retired earlier this year.
In a previous interview, Rod Malone, lawyer for the school board, said the petition asks for a clarification of the court’s ruling as to why Griffin’s instructions were not correct. The school board is seeking an expanded definition of the word “needed” rather than the restricted definition as defined in the court’s ruling, he said.
In its ruling, the high court said the standard of “needed” that juries should consider should be “the financial resources of the county, and the fiscal policies of the board of county commissioners” in addition to “the educational goals and policies of the state” and “the budgetary request of the local board of education.”
The petition argues that juries in school-funding cases should instead determine “the amount of local funds needed to maintain a county’s public school system during a particular fiscal year” without regard for a county’s ability to pay for it.
Richardson said a court ruling in favor of that definition could be devastating to Beaufort County’s budget.
School-board member Cindy Winstead said Tuesday that she is interested in keeping a good working relationship with the county board, but it is the responsibility of the school board to clarify the definition of “needed” for other school boards in the state.
She also said the “found it kind of hypocritical” of the county commissioners to criticize the school board for costing the taxpayers money by filing the petition when the county spent taxpayers’ money filing appeals of the original Superior Court ruling.
The N.C. Supreme Court is scheduled to decide within 30 days whether to rehear the case.
County Manager Paul Spruill said that if the county has to argue the case again before the high court, the expense to county taxpayers to respond to the petition will be considerable.
“If the Supreme Court chooses to take up this petition as filed, the Beaufort County commissioners view this as a worse-case scenario for our taxpayers,” he said.
To date, the county’s legal expenses to defend itself against the lawsuit have totaled $158,032, according to Jim Chrisman, assistant county manager and finance officer. The school board’s expenses in the lawsuit have not made available to the Daily News despite repeated requests for that information.