Civil Rights Museum makes it into the budget
The original draft of the House budget released last night was remarkable for its lack of local projects. There was no money, leadership said, to pay for lots of small projects when there were big priorities - such as mental health and education - that needed tending and not a lot of money to go around.
But the house appropriations committee is hard at work this afternoon and a Greensboro project that was not in the original draft has made its return.
The International Civil Rights Museum would receive $245,000 from the state under an amendment put forward and won by Rep. Alma Adams, a Greensboro Democrat and one of the "big chairs" of the appropriations committee. Originally, the museum appeared nowhere in the House spending plan.
At this point in the game, the honorables can't create money with new taxes and they can't exchange money between different sections of the budget. So if there's a project one wants funded in the "General Government" section - as is the museum - one has to find money in that part of the budget. You can't, for example, take money from the natural and economic development section and shift it to education.
Adams found money used in the administration of the legislature and shifted it to the museum.
"I'm just trying to keep it alive so it will go to conference," Adams said.
The real game here for someone trying to fund a project is to make sure it is either in the governor's budget, the House budget or the Senate budget. All three, of course, would be best. But as long as it's in one, the item is alive. The civil rights museum was not in the governor's budget and the Senate has yet to take a whack at their spending plan.
Adams said she hoped the Senate would put funding into their budget. Either way, she said, the goal was to try to win as much as $1 million in state support for the museum this year.
Adams also said that Rep. Hugh Holliman - the House majority leader and someone who sits in on high-level budget discussions - had run and won an amendment that would put more money into the High Point Furniture Market. The original draft cut promotional aid to the market by 1 percent. Holliman's amendment would boost support by something close to $600,000, Adams said.
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