PA Municipal Budget Priorities

The Board of the People's Alliance has voted on priorities for the City and County's 2023-24 Budgets. Read the full statement on the PA Blog.

Action Steps

We need your help to make sure our elected officials support these asks:

• Sign this Petition in support of H.E.A.R.T. funding. 
• Send an email to City and County leaders in support of these asks. 
  • City Council: [email protected]
  • County Commission: [email protected]
• Make a public comment at an upcoming budget hearing. 
  • Attend the Education Action Team Meeting — March 21st, 8:00 p.m. to learn about the team's budget priorities and practice making a public comment to have your voice heard!
• Use some of our suggested talking points below!

Public Comment

March 20th, 7:00pm City Council Public Session

March 23rd, 6:30pm Board of Education Meeting

Suggested Talking Points...

Education

Provide wage increases for classified staff

• We ask that our County leaders include funding to raise the wages of classified staff
• We are facing an unprecedented cost of living crisis. 
• Our instructional assistants, bus drivers, cafeteria workers, and many more – are critical members of a schools’ education team
• They deserve to be compensated at a level that allows them to live full and happy lives here in Durham. 

Support differential pay for Exceptional Children’s Teachers

• Our EC teachers and support staff are some of our District’s hardest-working employees.
• In this time of deep staffing shortages, our EC department has been hit especially hard.
• We propose rectifying this by compensating EC staff at a competitive rate that appropriately values the additional workload and the physical and emotional demands

Community Safety-Expand the H.E.A.R.T. program

• In collaboration with organizations across Durham, we urge you to expand the H.E.A.R.T. program so that it can provide citywide, 24-hour access.
• Their initial data has shown signs of success. Since launching in June, H.E.A.R.T's four programs have responded to over 4,000 incidents.
• H.E.A.R.T responders felt safe in 99% of encounters.
• We believe that scaling H.E.A.R.T. will allow it to be more effective.
• Durham residents deserve access to our exceptional resources at the H.E.A.R.T. program without having to worry about whether they are available in their area or at that time of day.
  

Housing

Implement a Guaranteed Income Program for Low-Income Renters

• We encourage City and County leaders to use excess ARPA funding to help keep at-risk community members in their homes.
• We propose a Guaranteed Income Pilot for Low-Income Renters allowing relief to flow directly to renters whose landlords do not accept rental assistance.
• This program fits squarely within Durham’s participation in the nationwide Mayors for a Guaranteed Income and Counties for Guaranteed Income initiatives.
• As statistics from Dataworks show, nearly 2,000 Durham tenants were evicted in 2022, we believe that finding ways to keep people in their homes must be a top priority.

Transit

• We urge you to closely evaluate services outsourced to third parties.
• Paratransit provides essential service for our city’s disabled and elderly residents, but it faces staffing shortages
• We encourage our elected leaders to evaluate Paratransit Operator compensation and whether insourcing these services would be in the best interest of the community. 
• We also encourage you to continue prioritizing the safety and accessibility of bus stops.

Economic Justice

Continue funding the current guaranteed income pilot in Durham (City only)

• The preemptive policies of the state that prevent municipalities from mandating a local minimum wage, local governments in North Carolina have limited ability to directly impact the wage floor. 
• We salute Durham’s current guaranteed income pilot (Excel, managed by Step Up) as a promising strategy to assist formerly incarcerated citizens with an important source of monthly income.
• The pilot is due to end soon, but with early indicators suggesting that the pilot is going well, we urge the City Council to continue funding Excel for another year (or until the final report is available) with public or private dollars.
• The City Council can show the way forward for other municipalities, including those of differing political stripes—that our cities can be united in supporting those among us who make the lowest wages. 

Provide full support for Durham Tech budget request (County only)

• Durham Tech plays a critical role in developing Durham's workforce pipeline.
• We recommend that the Board of County Commissioners fully fund Durham Tech’s budget request for 2023-24, including student scholarships. 
• Revive efforts to pass a “healthy and sustainable communities bond” to fund equitable green infrastructure projects. (City and County)