This month my colleagues and I sent legislation to Governor Cooper requiring the $58 million fund he negotiated with energy companies building the Atlantic Coast Pipeline – announced the same day his Department of Environmental Quality approved a key permit for its operations – be distributed to school systems in eastern North Carolina along the path of the project.
The legislation distributes the controversial $58 million fund to local school systems with a two-step calculation that considers the average daily membership of each school system and the pipeline mileage impacting its district.
According to a summary by the state’s Legislative Analysis Division, the allocation of the $58 million fund to public school systems will include $15,115,607 to Cumberland County