The Wake County school system stands to get less than half of the $500,000 it was supposed to receive from disgraced former House Speaker Jim Black for turning over land in Matthews to pay the fine for his state corruption conviction.

Black was allowed in 2009 to turn over 9.5 acres near Charlotte to the school system to settle half of the $1 million fine he was assessed in his state corruption case. On Tuesday, the school board will vote on selling the land to the Town of Matthews for $295,427.

If approved, the school system would get $241,127 with the State Board of Elections receiving $54,300.

UPDATE

In a comment to that post, Terry Stoops, director of education studies for the Locke Foundation, says Judge Donald Stephens owes Margiotta an apology for calling him "idiotic" for having criticized the deal in 2009.

John Hood is warning North Carolina Republicans they should learn from their mistakes in the Wake County school board elections or risk the consequences during next year's presidential fight.

In a column today in The Carolina Journal, Hood, president of the conservative John Locke Foundation, writes that "Wake County Democrats staged the shocking defeat of the one conservative, Ron Margiotta, who wasn't a newcomer to the school board." Hood criticizes how Republicans presented their message to voters.

"For the most part, their (Democratic) candidates chose clear, persuasive messages that presented themselves as reasonable-sounding alternatives to opponents they portrayed as extreme," Hood writes. "The Republican messages were muddled and unappealing."

As you can tell from the constant online references, opponents of Wake County school board candidate Susan Evans are taking every chance they can get to point to images of her with the Rev. William Barber.

The latest example comes from Joey Stansbury, the one-time campaign treasurer of Evans' opponent, school board chairman Ron Margiotta. In today's edition of The Daily Journal on Stansbury's conservative Wake Community Network site, he points to a Carolina Journal video showing Evans singing with Barber at the June 2010 school board meeting where he was arrested for refusing to give up the podium.

"The fact that there are so many videos and photos of Susan Evans on youtube and elsewhere underscores her substantial involvement and collusion with William Barber, Great Schools in Wake and others to disrupt school board meetings and create as much chaos as possible," Stansbury writes.

It picks up on the theme that Margiotta has used in his recent mailers. Wake County Democratic Party Chairman Mack Paul charges these efforts are racially motivated.

The Carolina Journal is exploring the potential link between President Barack Obama's re-election campaign and Democratic efforts to regain the majority on the Wake County school board.

Today's article in the Carolina Journal, which is published by the conservative John Locke Foundation, focuses on a June 23 meeting of the Obama For America Southern Wake Grassroots Planning Session. CJ notes how the group said one of the purposes of the meeting was to address the school board elections.

"The election, ostensibly nonpartisan, has attracted national interest. And while local Democratic officials say they have received no direct support from the Obama for America campaign, there’s little doubt that a Democratic sweep coupled with the defeat of (school board chairman Ron) Margiotta in October would ripple far beyond Wake County," according to the article.

John Hood is citing school choice as "the single-biggest result of conservative electoral gains in 2009 and 2010."

Most of the focus of Hood's column last week in the conservative Carolina Journal focuses on the lifting the state's charter school cap and allowing tax credits for special-needs kids who attend private schools.

But Hood, president of the John Locke Foundation, also cites school choice efforts in several school districts, including Wake County.

The Jim Black land deal isn't turning into a financial windfall for the Wake County school system.

As noted in an article Wednesday in the Carolina Journal, the school system still hasn't sold the two parcels in Mecklenburg County that Black turned over in July 2009 to satisfy half of the $1 million fine that the former state House speaker received as part of his corruption conviction.

The land swap generated a lot of controversy as some people, including Wake school board member Ron Margiotta, charged that Black got a sweetheart deal by not having to pay the full fine in cash or providing more valuable pieces of land to Wake.

Did the school system get suckered by imprisoned former state House Speaker Jim Black as he settled the fine in his corruption case?

That's the implication in the Carolina Journal, which is reporting that the school system agreed to take from Black two parcels of undeveloped real estate in Mecklenburg County to satisfy the remaining half of a $1 million fine. The problem, according to the Journal, is that recent property revaluations put the value of the land at $150,000.

In addition, the Journal is reporting that school board attorneys and Wake County prosecutors agreed to the deal without notifying school board members ahead of time. A few school board members were told about the deal by Supt. Del Burns weeks after it was completed.

The Carolina Journal's January issue has an article about Raleigh's updated Comprehensive Plan as well as a story about the fact that Planning Director Mitch Silver lives in a 3,565-square-foot home in North Raleigh.  Titled "Green For Thee, But Not For Me?" the latter article also notes that Silver owns a Toyota Highlander.

The city's updated Comp Plan, of which Silver is a key architect, is designed to encourage urban living and more transit options and generally move the city away from the sort of sprawling suburban development that has characterized much of Raleigh's growth over the last 30 years. In the article, Silver says he eventually plans to move to a new home in Raleigh and bought his house quickly when he was preparing to move to Raleigh from Washington D.C. in 2005.

So what to make of this? Is Silver a hypocrite for living in a large house in the Evans Mill subdivision in North Raleigh and advocating that the city try and move away from such living? Would he have more credibility if he was living above a retail store in North Hills and taking the bus to work?

It's not all that surprising to learn that Silver lives where he does. For all the ambitious goals in the updated Comp Plan, it should be noted that the city is a long, long way from transforming itself into something that resembles a transit-friendly city with lots of urban living options.

What do you think? Is it fair to criticize the housing and transit choices of Silver, City Manger Russell Allen or any of the elected members of Raleigh's City Council? 

Jon Sanders, writing in the Carolina Journal, has some choice words today for the UNC system and the very wordy commission it formed after some ugly graffitti threatening President-Elect Barack Obama appeared on the walls of N.C. State's Free Expression Tunnel.

A quick review: The UNC system has created the "UNC Study Commission to Review Student Codes of Conduct as They Relate to Hate Crimes." Just rolls off the tongue, doesn't it?

The commission is tasked with determining whether A) the state's universities should adhere to a single policy related to hate crimes and B) whether all new public university students should go through mandatory diversity training.

Earlier this week, the commission held a public forum. More on that here.

If you missed last week's article, Wake may have to raise school breakfast and lunch prices.

Food and labor costs are going up, according to Marilyn Moody, senior director for child nutrition. She said there's also been a big drop in sales of a la carte items, the things that balance the budget.

But the reason that drew the most questions at a school board committee meeting earlier this month is that more families are applying for federally subsidized lunches.