Coach gets ready for "blind date"

This week Charlotte-Mecklenburg school board member Joe White will be sworn in as president of the N.C. School Boards Association, representing 115 local boards.

It will be an interesting role for the retired coach, known for his die-hard Democratic politics and his tendency to speak bluntly. He'll be getting to know the first Republican-dominated state legislature in more than a century, fighting for school spending at a time when revenue is deflating like a punctured beach ball.

House and Senate Republicans will caucus this week to pick new leaders. The Public School Forum of North Carolina, a nonprofit advocacy and research group, recently described the prospect of getting to know new powerbrokers with a penchant for budget-cutting as "the worst blind date of their lives" for people who depend on state money.