Clement's perspective on merging Durham city's government with county administration
During Clement's time on the Durham Board of County Commissioners, the local officials began debating whether to merge the city and county governments. In this segment, she reflects on how her experience as a commissioner changed the perspective she had held while on the Board of Education.
Citing this Excerpt
Oral History Interview with Josephine Clement, July 13 and August 3, 1989. Interview C-0074. Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007) in the Southern Oral History Program Collection, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Full Text of the Excerpt
Following up on your interest in education and talking
about the city-county school merger issue. I'm wondering if you would
talk about your position on that issue, given that you had been on the
Board of Education for ten years. And then if it's changed over time in
the last few years that have been so important for the issue.
- JOSEPHINE CLEMENT:
-
Yes, Kathy, there has been a definite change, a very gradual but almost
an inescapable change in that during my ten years on the Board of
Education I had one point of view. I was very, I guess I was almost
chauvinistic about the city system. Now as a county commissioner I have
a broader view, a different perspective. We see the two systems as being
a unit as far as funding is concerned. The county is the funding agent
for both city systems although their own elected boards are the policy
makers. From that point of view I began to see the problems of financial
support. Children are the same throughout the county. They have needs,
they must have an opportunity to develop themselves to the best of their
capabilities, so that they can take their places as responsible and
productive citizens. And so my view has broadened a bit, well, I'll say
a lot. For instance, in the matter of funding we know that the
city has a very small--the
city school district, I should say--has a very
small tax base as opposed to the county school system. Now this probably
is becoming increasingly true throughout the country, but it is
particularly true here in Durham County because of the Research Triangle
Park. Also, because we had a very severe urban renewal program which
tore down homes and businesses and what not, and hastened the flight to
the suburbs so that the shopping centers and so forth are outside the
city. By not moving the city district lines to keep up with the city
governmental lines--they are not
coterminus--we don't even get the advantage of the
shopping centers and businesses like that, that are all on the outskirts
of town. There is a vast differential, something like 149,000 yield from
one penny in the city school district up until 585,000 from one penny in
the county school district. That tells you something about the
extraordinary disparity there. Then, of course, along with this change
that we've had throughout the country in demographics, we find that our
inner cities are now filled with poor and by black people. The poorest
element in our cities are very often in the inner city and that is a
euphemism very often, whereas the more affluent people, the middle-class
people, white and black, live in the suburbs. And I say that because
there is a definite correlation between socioeconomic level and
achievement levels. Children just must have support and guidance and
direction from their parents. Parents who themselves are educated and
have sufficient funds to provide a good living can offer their children
more and do offer more, whereas the children of
poor parents are most disadvantaged in this respect. They have no books
and things like that and so it further compounds the problem.
- KATHRYN NASSTROM:
-
I'm curious too about the merger task force. And I have to say that I
haven't been able to figure out when that group began meeting. Was it in
late '87?
- JOSEPHINE CLEMENT:
-
No. Let's see. It began in '88, about May, following the budget planning
sessions of the Board of County Commissioners. Our fiscal year ends June
30th. At the beginning of the planning session, say about March or
April, when we were setting goals to decide what we wanted to do and
where we wanted to be, so as to direct us and the expenditure of funds,
it was found that education was a top priority for all the
Commissioners. We were in total agreement that we needed the best
educational system that we could provide. Then the discussion turned to
whether we were actually getting the most from our money in the present
set-up. We were interested in the delivery of educational services in
the most cost effective manner. So that of course led to the problem of
the two districts, one very large and one very small, and whether this
indeed was an effective method of delivering educational services across
the county. From that the chairman, William Bell, appointed this
committee--or we all did, but he broached the
idea--and we came up with forty-one organizations,
they applied for places on the Task Force, and we tried to get a broad
spectrum of the community, geographically and in point of view of
interests and so forth. From this the task force was set up.
Each person on the task force representing in turn hundreds
of other people from their organizations.
- KATHRYN NASSTROM:
-
Right. In your watching the task force deliberations and that sort of
thing, that your position of the issue changed, or was it actually prior
to this, say in your first couple of years on the Board.
- JOSEPHINE CLEMENT:
-
It changed gradually as I got into the funding. Of course as a school
board member you go to the Board of County Commissioners asking for
money and you begin to--you understand something
about the funding mechanism. But your point of view as a county
commissioner is totally financial and also it's looking at the county as
a whole rather than at the city school district. If you say, this is
your district, then that's what you're going to concern yourself with,
of course. As a county commissioner we are elected by the total county
population, we don't even have districts, we're at large. So you have to
broaden your horizon to look at the whole county.
- KATHRYN NASSTROM:
-
In terms of your original position in favor of keeping the schools
separate, and am I right in saying that you would have shared with many,
as I understand in the black community, including people from the Durham
Committee on the Affairs of Black People, their sense that it was
important to retain control of the schools, the community influence.
That you, let's say living in this neighborhood, would know what was
going on with the school children in your area, know those teachers,
those issues about being in contact on a regular basis?
- JOSEPHINE CLEMENT:
-
No, I didn't convey my opinion. It was a sort of an unspoken, shared
belief. You have a shared system of values in a community and that
existed. And I have not shared this with anybody else. This is really
not for the public, because I have not totally come down on either side
of the merger issue and I'm trying to keep an open mind, I'm trying to
hear both sides of it.