http://66.225.205.104/LMPERDUE.mp3
Governor Bev Perdue was in Charlotte on Thursday and talked to two different sets of people -teachers upset by layoffs and Chamber of Commerce members. She made a pitch to both groups to get behind a push to raise taxes and ease proposed cuts for North Carolina's public schools. WFAE's Lisa Miller reports. Charlotte is one of six cities Perdue is visiting to drive the point home that the state's schools would be crippled if more revenue isn't found. She began the day surrounded by about 65 teachers and parents at Elizabeth Traditional Elementary near uptown. You could say she was preaching to the choir. "So I'm here today not begging you to raise taxes. We all hate taxes," Perdue told the crowd. "I'm urging you to work with me to fix this budget hole so that the kids and future workers of this state don't pay for it. North Carolina has to have revenue, my own budget had revenue." Earlier this week, Perdue began urging state lawmakers to raise taxes beyond the $780 million proposed in the House budget. In public she's not putting a number on the tax increase. Some legislators have said she's pushing for an amount between $1 billion and $1.5 billion. For now Perdue is short on specifics. She's not saying where she wants lawmakers to raise taxes, although earlier she proposed targeting beer, wine, and tobacco products. Perdue also had other business in Charlotte Thursday, a speech to members of the Charlotte Chamber. About a hundred people gathered in an auditorium at CPCC to hear her talk. "Whether you agree with the decisions I'm making or not, I would ask for your support of education and economic development and of investment in our future," urged Perdue. "The only way we can get deeper into the 21st century successfully as a state and as a country is to continue to invest in each other and in our children who will be the workers of the 21st century." And that was about as close as Perdue came in her speech to mentioning her push to raise taxes to minimize education cuts. She did talk a lot about economic development, stimulus money, and the pains of Charlotte felt around the state. Perdue almost left the auditorium without mentioning raising taxes. Business leaders didn't address the issue, but Mecklenburg County Commission Chairman Jennifer Roberts did. Perdue answered: "I was here talking about education and I would really like to urge the Charlotte business community to help me as we look to provide revenue to keep our schools open. You all have some serious challenges here with schools and the size of schools even with the recovery money." A few heads nodded in the audience, among them some local elected officials. As for the Charlotte Chamber's support for higher taxes, that may be a tall order. Chamber President Bob Morgan sounded more neutral on the issue. "We would prefer to see them addressing spending cuts first," said Morgan. "Can you realistically balance the budget through spending cuts alone? That's a real question to be addressed. If new revenues are going to be generated, we would strongly encourage that we not look at raising the personal or corporate income tax rate." Morgan says the Chamber hasn't taken a position on sin taxes. Charlotte Mecklenburg Schools estimates it would get $20 million with the new taxes already approved by the House. But the district would still end up $13 million short in state funding from last year. Since Perdue hasn't proposed a specific plan, it's too early to say what CMS would receive if lawmakers go with her idea.