County commissioners, school board in Wake County, N.C., squabble over construction proposal

The Wake County (N.C.) school district would like to put a school construction bond referendum on the fall ballot, but school board members and county commissioners continue to squabble over details. The Raleigh News & Observer reports that discussion of a $939.9 million school-construction program finished 90 minutes early in an attempt to defuse the heated exchanges. The source of the tension was the state Senate’s passage of a bill that would allow the Republican-led county commissioners to wrest authority for school construction away from the Democratic-led school board. The proposed construction program calls for Wake County to build 16 new schools, renovate six existing schools and pay for other projects. The program would add 20,185 seats to accommodate the 19,898 new students expected to arrive by 2017.