UNC Board of Governors pursuing tax-free weekend in spring

The UNC-system Board of Governors is trying to persuade state legislators to create a spring tax-free weekend to help students buying textbooks for the spring semester.

But that plan could cause the state to lose as much as $20 million a year, according to a 2008-09 report from the N.C. General Assembly fiscal research division.

A weekend is already set aside at the end of each summer for students to purchase textbooks without the burden of sales tax.

Legislators might not be willing to approve the system’s request. The state’s budget is already being geared toward other areas of improvement, such as health needs, said N.C. Rep. Nelson Dollar, R-Wake, vice-chairman of the education subcommittee on universities.

It will be difficult to add additional items to the budget, he said.

The average student spends $680 on textbooks and course-related material in stores, according to the General Assembly report. With about 425,00 students in the UNC system and N.C. Community College System, that adds up.

Ginger Burks, UNC-system associate vice president for finance, said at the February meeting of the Board of Governors that they have been coming up with suggestions to keep costs of textbooks low. The request for a tax-free weekend in the spring is just one of the suggestions they will be discussing with legislators.

Dollar said the idea of having another tax-free weekend would be a good way to balance the increasing cost of tuition.

“I think that it’s a proposal that I believe a lot of legislators will be very sympathetic toward,” Dollar said.

Greg Doucette, president of the Association of Student Governments, said he would like to see this happen, but acknowledged the challenges that the state could face if it implements this policy.

“The challenge of course in eliminating the sales tax is that we’re talking about a significant amount of the state budget,” he said. “From a pragmatic standpoint, I don’t see it happening.”



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