North Carolina Charities Appeal to State Pride to Temper Budget Cuts

A coalition of nonprofit groups in North Carolina is taking a novel approach in its effort to temper state budget cuts—appealing to state pride.

The goal: to persuade the governor and Legislature to raise taxes to help close the state’s multibillion-dollar budget deficit instead of just cutting spending.

Together NC, a group that includes more than 120 charities and professional associations, has posted a Web video that highlights the state’s “world-class university system” and the “public investments” that “make us the number-one place to locate a business.”

“We can stay on the path to prosperity with smart investments, not shortsighted cuts,” it says.

The video even takes a jab at the state’s traditional rival, South Carolina. “Of course, we could take a different path,” it says, while flashing a sign that says, “South Carolina Welcomes You.”

“But wouldn’t we rather stay in North Carolina?”

Rob Thompson, executive director of the Covenant With North Carolina’s Children, a coalition of children’s advocacy groups, and a coordinator of Together NC, explains that the group has tailored its message to research showing the best way to influence people about government spending.

“In the past, we’ve used a lot of the ‘save our services’ idea: You can’t cut services for poor people, for kids,” he says.

But he says the group learned by working with Demos, a public-policy research group in New York, that the public responds better to “aspirational” messages than to those conveying a “constant crisis mode.”

As for the dig at South Carolina, he says, among another things, that state has been slashing spending on higher education, resulting in big tuition increases.

Together NC also recently wrote a letter to Gov. Beverly Eaves Perdue, who is working on a budget for the 2012 fiscal year. It praised the state’s “high quality of life” and asked her to “take a balanced approach to our state’s fiscal crisis, which includes raising revenue.”

Watch Together NC’s video here:

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