Being on a school board is a little like being the head chef at the local Applebee鈥檚. You don鈥檛 get to choose the ingredients and it鈥檚 not your recipe, but if someone doesn鈥檛 like the Bourbon Street Steak, you鈥檙e going to hear about it.
In other words, school boards in North Carolina have relatively little power but plenty of responsibility. And it鈥檚 been that way for a long time.
鈥淥ne of the things that North Carolina did in the depression was remarkable,鈥� says Michael Crowell, a professor of public law and government at UNC-Chapel Hill. 鈥淣orth Carolina decided that the state, the Legislature, would be responsible for the operating expenses in all the school systems.鈥�
To this day, unlike in other states, school boards have no taxing authority. Their budgets are determined by the state and local county commissioners. And in the 1960s, the Legislature passed a law setting all local school boards at five members, elected at-large.
Other than that, the Legislature pretty much ignored school boards.
Until desegregation.
Starting in the 1970s and extending until the 1990s, school boards consolidated as their districts did. It was a tense and sometimes violent time. In places like Charlotte, Raleigh, Durham, Greensboro, Greenville and others, school boards grew to as many as 12 members, as city and county boards combined.
Now, fewer than half of the state鈥檚 school boards still cling to the model of five members, elected at-large. Most are bigger, and include some combination of members elected from districts or at-large.
But whatever changes have come have always been either through the courts due to the Voting Rights Act - or from the ground up, starting at the local level and eventually getting approved by the General Assembly.
Until this year.
鈥淭hese maps were drawn without any public input, against the will of the school board, and for transparently partisan reasons,鈥� said State Senator Josh Stein, a democrat from Raleigh, debating a bill on the floor of the Senate that would change how Wake County School Board members are elected. A separate bill would affect the Guilford School Board. Both would re-write district maps and change the balance of at-large and district representatives. 鈥淭his legislation is about a Republican majority in the general assembly inserting itself into local affairs in order to exact partisan payback.鈥�
That Republican majority says that鈥檚 not true. The bills鈥� sponsors say they want to increase voter turnout or ensure rural views are represented on school boards.
Whatever the motivation, this level of attention from the General Assembly is a new development. Before he joined the UNC-Chapel Hill faculty, Michael Crowell spent decades helping local school boards navigate the complexities of re-drawing districts. He says he鈥檚 never before seen Legislators get involved in re-drawing school board maps.
鈥淩epublicans who previously have not liked a method of local election and have had no way to influence how it鈥檚 done have been put in a position where, in fact, they can do something about it now,鈥� Crowell said.
The bill changing school board elections in Wake County has passed the Senate. The Guilford County bill will likely come up for a vote there soon. Both will still need to be passed by the House before they become law.*
*The original version of this story indicated that Gov. Pat McCrory would have to sign the bill before it became law. In fact, according to , Governors are specifically exempt from having veto power over bills that apply to fewer than 15 counties in the state.
