Wake County school officials announced today that the school system’s official enrollment grew by 1,893 students from last year’s total.

School officials say the enrollment on the 20th-day of classes was 139,599 students, compared to 137,706 students at that same time last year. School districts use the 20th-day figures to report an official enrollment to the state for funding purposes.

The school district based the budget on having 140,012 students. Whether county commissioners ask for money back from the school system for those 413 students is debatable.

Unlike Wake, it looks like Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools are shrinking in size this year.

According to today's Charlotte Observer, CMS reported having 133,664 students in K-12, down almost 400 from last year. The figure is based on enrollment for Tuesday, which was the 20th day of classes for Charlotte, Wake and most school districts in the state.

School districts use 20th-day totals to determine the official enrollment for the school year.

No word yet on when Wake will announce a Day 20 number. But based on Day 10, Wake is still growing as it then had 139,362 students, a gain of 1,656 from last year.

Wake had 139,362 students as of the 10th day of classes for traditional-calendar schools on Tuesday.

Over the next couple of days, school officials will use the enrollment figures to determine how many teachers will be moved to different schools to help reduce class sizes. Schools get funding for teachers based on the number of students they have enrolled.

School officials say they’ve been fairly close to their enrollment projections. Schools officials had projected in February that enrollment would reach 140,012 students by the 20th day of classes. That estimate was lowered to 139,726 students last month.

Wake is continuing to lower its projected enrollment for the upcoming school year.

Wake's latest projection for the 2009-10 school year calls for 139,726 students, an increase of 2,020 kids from this past school year. This compares to a June projection of 139,951 students and 140,012 students in February.

While the recession bears part of the blame for Wake' relatively small growth rate this year, school officials have said the major reason is the new state law requiring kids to turn 5 by Aug. 31 to enter kindergarten. Growth is projected to go to above 4,000 students in 2010-11.

The school district's market share dipped to 83.3 percent of the school age children in the county.

New state figures released today show that there were 3,771 home schools registered in Wake this past school year with an estimated enrollment of 7,571 students. In 2007-08, there were 3,548 registered home schools in Wake with an estimated enrollment of 7,059 students.

The new home-school data makes it possible to calculate Wake's new market share.

The Carrboro mayor’s race has its first challenger.

Political newcomer Amanda Ashley is a 53-year-old pet shop employee who wants to keep Carrboro a small community.

“Willy-nilly growth is not the answer,” she said.

Ashley talks of limiting the population at 25,000 people. As of July 2007, the town population was 19,178, said Randy Dodd, of the Planning Department. Ashley says Carrboro can be a “western wall” against development in Chapel Hill and Durham. She also wants to keep southern Orange County “rural and green.”

Mayor Mark Chilton has been a good caretaker, she said. “I’m not running against him,” she said, but added that she sees the need to present ideas that may not be looked at. She wants more public transportation and said the town should impose a fee on vehicles “simply moving through Carrboro.”

She is concerned about Carolina North adding to the traffic moving through the town. Ashley says she walks everywhere in downtown Carrboro, and that the 25 mph speed limits are ignored. “I’m against more cars,” she said. She believes town taxes are high enough and should not rise over the next couple of years.

She also wants to look at possibilites for supporting arts, music and film.

Ashley has lived in the Carrboro town limits since 2000 and in Orange County since 1984. She works at Phydeaux pet store and earned an undergraduate degree in political science from Guilford College. She is openly transgender and has two children from a past marriage to a woman. She says she hopes that will not detract from the issues.

Madeline Jefferson sat through this past week's growth task force meeting in a wheelchair. I didn't know until she called Friday that she was also sitting in pain.

Jefferson was thrown from her Jeep May 24 when her car hydroplaned in a storm and rolled over several times. She suffered a collapsed lung and lay in intensive care in Columbia for three days before she was moved to UNC.

None of that was what she called about. Instead she wanted to express her regret at not pushing harder to keep the Sustainable Community Visioning Task Force on schedule. Jefferson has served on numerous community groups. The task force has a big job to do to deliver its recommendations to the Town Council this fall. Diversity is important, she said, but there are ways to achieve it without putting the task force on hold six weeks. (The group voted 11-5 Wednesday night to suspend its work until late August.)

Wednesday's meeting was important enough to Jefferson that she sat in that wheelchair for two hours. That's about all she can tolerate a day before having to return to her bed. "I was in pain as I at there," she said. But the delay only frustrates. "Nothing has been done," she said of the task force's work. "While I understand this is important, I feel like this whole committee is hung up on this one issue. The council is in a dilemma, and [Mayor Foy] wanted this committee to start immediately. He really wanted things done over the summer."

The task force was appointed in May, Jefferson said, which means nearly four months will have gone by with no work, not even hearing staff presentations that transportation planner Dave Bonk and others never got to present Wednesday night. "We're four months behind getting down to a single issue," Jefferson said.

Ironically, the delay could make it harder for people to serve because the group will now have to meet more often when it resumes. That will be hard for parents and others who already have commitments, like Jefferson, who has a weekly meeting of the Chapel Hill Optimists Club, a group that fights childhood cancer. Since Wednesday's meeting, she says she has "just blessed myself out for not making a motion to move forward," she said. "Once we get started, we could be meeting every week."

Read more about Wednesday's meeting in today's Chapel Hill News. (in print today, online tomorrow)       

MJ sang "don't stop 'til you get enough." Chapel Hill's growth task force's new motto may be "don't start 'til you get enough."

Enough diversity, that is.

The town's Sustainable Community Visioning Task Force put itself on hiatus Wednesday night until it gets more racial and/or ethnic minorities. The 18-member, all-white committee, decided it wasn't ready to start advising the town on how to grow until its membership looked more like the town.

The vote was 11-5. The Town Council wants an interim report by November, chairman George Cianciolo reminded the group. But not everyone wanted to wait to begin discussing where growth should occur and what it should look like.

"There are a lot of other ways we can get diversity in," member Madeline Jefferson said, attending the meeting in a wheelchair after a bad accident. For example, the committee can invite people in include their points of view, she said.

Members pointed out that the committee has been widely publicized. We reported weeks ago that no members of any minority groups even applied. 

"It's an ongoing problem," said Glen Greenstreet. "It's a real problem. If we're an imperfect group doing an imperfect job, I think that's still better than stopping the process."

But a majority decided to spend the next few weeks making one last push to add diversity to the group. Read more about the meeting and what else the group said in Sunday's Chapel Hill News. 

Staff is recommending keeping the enrollment caps at Cedar Fork and Forest Pines elementary schools for the upcoming school year.

Asst. Supt. Chuck Dulaney told the school board this week that the growth in the base at both schools will be too great for the caps are lifted. Once again, this means new people who move into either school's attendance area will be sent to a more distant school that has the space.

Leaving the caps in place will have repercussions for people who opt out of year-round schools.

David King, Triangle Transit's general manager, spoke to the editorial board this week, answering questions about why there's still no transit stop planned for RDU and about how transit paths can shape growth in a good way, among other things.

Click "read more" to listen to some snippets from the interview. In the RDU soundbite, King is talking about John Brantley of RDU. Also, there's a blog post on transit written by editorial board member Allen Torrey.