September 13, 2010. BLOWING ROCK -- North Carolina State Representative Cullie Tarleton, who serves in Raleigh on behalf of Watauga County and Ashe County, today gave his annual "State of the State" presentation to The Rotary Club of Blowing Rock, at Chetola Mountain Resort & Spa, Blowing Rock.

While lamenting that given the harder economic times "...we have no money," Tarleton outlined several steps the State had made cutbacks to balance the budget, as required by law.  He noted that some of these were difficult, particularly in education, which accounts for some 60% of the state's budget of more than $18 billion.  Enrollments are up across the board, he observed, in K-12, community colleges and universities, so demand for education services is up at a time when budgets are having to be cut back. "Throughout the budgeting process," he said, "we tried to keep the budget cuts out of the classroom." Of particular interest to the assembled Rotarians was the 28% annual increase in enrollment at the state's community colleges. He explained that during economic downturns many of the unemployed choose to "spruce up their resumes" with new learned skills, or to be retrained for jobs in another industry.

"Overall," concluded Tarleton, "the state is in pretty good shape considering the economic circumstances of our time and about as good as can be expected."

The next meeting of The Rotary Club of Blowing Rock is on Monday, September 20th, 11:45 am, Chetola Mountain Resort & Spa.

Comments: