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Parents urge equitable use of bond funds, district-wide year-round calendar; resident asks about USDA school-meal cuts
Summary
During public comment, speakers urged the board to use bond funds equitably rather than to build a selective K-8, and asked the board to consider adopting a district-wide year-round calendar to reduce inequities. Another speaker asked how recent federal cuts to food aid will affect the county27s school lunch program.
Three public speakers addressed the board during the March 24 public comment period, focusing on school calendar equity, bond spending priorities and food-aid cuts.
Casey Collins, introduced himself as the parent of a first grader at Central Elementary School and a member of that school27s PTO and Community Schools Advisory Board. Collins said his family chose Central because they valued a racially and socioeconomically diverse experience and urged the board to consider a district-wide year-round calendar. "If the year-round model is so effective and there's evidence to support this, why then could we not put the whole district on the same schedule so that everyone could benefit?" Collins asked, noting potential operational benefits such as streamlined transportation, reduced food insecurity and improved childcare alignment.
Luda Stessel (presented in the transcript as Luda Shtessel), who identified herself as a parent of two children at Central Elementary School, also urged the board to use bond funds to benefit the greatest number of students rather than to construct a new K-8 that would be admission- or lottery-based and likely continue selective enrollment. Stessel cited 2023-24 school report-card letter grades for several elementary schools, and provided district-level free- and reduced-price-lunch context: she said Central and New Hope have approximately 70% economically disadvantaged students, River Park about 35%, and Grady Brown about 60%, compared with about 18% at Hillsborough Elementary. Stessel said she considered it "irresponsible" to use bond proceeds to fund a new K-8 that would serve a selective population funded in part by taxes paid by lower-income neighborhoods.
A third speaker, Rachel Royce, read a short statement about a reported reduction in federal school food aid: she said she had seen that the U.S. Department of Agriculture had cut $1 billion in food aid and that North Carolina27s Food for Schools Cooperative Agreement grant had been cut by $19 million; she asked how that would affect the county lunch program and what the district planned to do in response.
Board procedure notes: the board's public comment rules restrict each speaker to three minutes and bar back-and-forth exchanges; the chair and clerk reminded speakers about decorum and distribution of written materials to the board clerk.
Ending: Board members thanked speakers and said staff would follow up on questions about USDA funding and further clarify calendar and bond-allocation issues in upcoming budget and bond discussions.
