Perdue ready to fight on schools and incentives (News and Observer)
As she prepares to deliver her State of the State Address and to release her budget, Democratic Gov. Bev Perdue appears to be girding for battle to protect education spending and public incentives for companies which bring jobs.
Speaking to the state AFL-CIO meeting at a downtown Raleigh hotel this morning, Perdue said Republican legislative efforts take funds for economic incentives was already creating concern among corporate executives looking at North Carolina.
“They want to be assured that North Carolina will honor its economic promises,” Perdue said. “This is not a good conversation…They have an ability to choose from five or six or or 20 states. This is hard to try to explain to them.”
Perdue is expected to deliver her State of the State address Monday night, and her budget proposal several days later.
Although she did not tip her hand, she said “I’m going to make tough decisions.”
She said she had been reading a lot of history lately, and thought about some of the difficult decisions made by Democratic governors such as Jim Hunt and Terry Sanford and Republican governors such as Jim Martin and Jim Holshouser.
“You don’t go backwards, when you need to go forward,” she said.
“Every decision that will take resources away from your child’s public school is a bad decision for North Carolina,” Perdue said. “Every decision that will take resources away from our ability to compete globally for jobs and industry is a bad decision.”
Among the politically difficult issues she has been considering is whether to propose the extension of the $1.3 billion temporary tax increase that is scheduled to expire June 30th and whether to have the state regulate the video gaming industry.
Submitted by robchristensen on 2011-02-08 10:17
Tags: Under the Dome | Beverly Perdue | economic incentives
