Press Releases and Newsletters
Note To Council: Republicans In Charge (Rhino Times)
The Greensboro City Council held a special called meeting Monday afternoon, Feb. 21 at 4 p.m., to discuss the legislative agenda – the bills that Greensboro asks the North Carolina state legislature to pass.
Only four members of the council showed up for the meeting – Mayor Bill Knight, and Councilmembers Zack Matheny, Robbie Perkins and Nancy Vaughan.
Perkins pointed out that there wasn’t much they could do since they didn’t have a quorum and asked why the mayor had called a special meeting.
The council has already passed its legislative agenda and a group from the City Council has already gone down to Raleigh to meet with the Guilford delegation.
Knight said that he and several other councilmembers were going to Raleigh on Wednesday to meet with Senators Phil Berger and Don Vaughan. Berger, a Republican from Eden, is the president pro tem of the state Senate, which is more or less equivalent to the speaker of the House. So Berger has a lot of clout in the Senate. Vaughan is a Democrat, so he has not so much.
Assistant City Manager Denise Turner said that Vaughan had said he would sponsor any of the bills that don’t already have someone to sponsor them.
The purpose of the meeting seemed to be to hear from George House, an attorney with Brooks, Pierce, McLendon, who specializes in environmental issues. House was the lead attorney representing the city in the lawsuit over the T.Z. Osborne Wastewater Treatment Plant expansion, where the city was awarded over $16 million last summer.
House was at this special meeting to give his opinion on how to proceed with the city’s opposition to the Jordan Lake Rules, which, if they are enforced, will cost the city about $70 million in the next couple of years, and, down the road when storm water has to be handled, will cost an amount estimated by the state at $200 million, and estimated by the building industry in the billions. It would require retrofitting neighborhoods with storm water detention ponds.
House told the council that everyone agreed the science on which the Jordan Lake Rules were based is weak. He said the data is faulty, but for the city to come up with really good data would take two years and cost $250,000. House said he thought the city would have a much better chance of lobbying for a delay in implementation to get good data than in attempting to have the rules thrown out.
Perkins said the city would face strong opposition from state Rep. Pricey Harrison. “Pricey is going to go nuts,” he said. “I would have the total and full endorsement of the metro mayors before going forward. I would have the full endorsement of the League of Municipalities.”
What nobody said but someone should have pointed out to Perkins, and everyone else in the room, is that this is not the legislature that approved the Jordan Lake Rules. Since they were approved the Democrats have been run out of Raleigh and the Republicans have taken over. Harrison’s opinion of the bill should have the same weight that Rep. John Blust’s opinion had in the last legislature, which is not much. Blust through the years has introduced numerous well thought out, much needed bills, and most have ended up in the trashcan of some committee meeting room, not because they weren’t good bills but because Blust is a Republican.
Harrison is a Democrat. If the Republicans are going to follow the lead of Harrison, they might as well step aside and let the Democrats run the show. The League of Municipalities is a decidedly left-wing organization. It has historically supported more and more government spending and is currently in a big fight with the Republican majority in the legislature over a moratorium on forced annexation.
This is not your father’s or your grandfather’s state legislature. It is a whole new ballgame.
Later in the meeting it was noted that state Rep. Alma Adams didn’t like the idea of having the Greensboro city attorney work directly for the City Council. In every city and town in North Carolina, with the exception of High Point, the city attorney works for the elected body, not the manager.
Perkins said Adams had the NC Legislative Black Caucus behind her and could block the bill. Once again the City Council needs to wake up and realize that the Democrats don’t run the legislature. The Legislative Black Caucus is a powerful force in the Democratic Party because often if it pulls its support of a bill it will fail. The Republicans control the legislature. The black caucus is just another organization in the minority party. If the Republicans in control of the legislature are smart, and there is no indication so far that they are, they will not allow the black caucus or any other Democratic association to control their agenda.
The voters of the state by an overwhelming margin elected Republicans to run the state government. They didn’t elect the Democrats, as they had for 112 years. If the Republicans don’t make drastic changes they will be gone in two years and the state had better brace itself for another 112 years of Democratic rule. You would think that the Greensboro City Council, with six Republicans, one Independent and only two Democrats, would realize that just as the Greensboro City Council has changed, so has the legislature.
The next discussion held at the special meeting once again demonstrated the difference between government and business. The city has over $2 million in outstanding parking tickets. The only way the city staff can think of to collect this $2 million is to get a bill passed by the state legislature to prevent people with outstanding parking tickets from re-registering their cars. So you would not be able to get the license plate on a car renewed if there were outstanding parking tickets on that license plate.
This no doubt would result in far more people paying their parking tickets, but it is also a lot of work for the state, and Turner suggested that the city offer the state 15 percent of what was collected. Knight suggested that 25 percent would not be bad.
Whether it is 15 or 25 percent the whole process will add to the bureaucracy of state government – more employees, more forms to fill out and no doubt more cost because the state is not the most efficient organization in the world and is not set up to make a profit.
City Manager Rashad Young explained that the city didn’t have any way to compel people to pay their tickets. He said the city would have to take people to court if they refused to pay.
It is incredible that any company stays in business because private businesses don’t have the power of the city to cut off people’s water or put a lien on their property. How in the world do private businesses people their invoices paid?
Here is one thing that would help enormously. The city could try to collect the money itself. Business owners, or anyone who has ever owed money, know this but the city does not – people pay more after they are asked to pay. This is done by sending letters and making telephone calls. You might call them reminders.
If the reminders don’t work then companies start taking people to court. (In the case of the city it might be best not to start with a lawyer who can go to court for free.) The city should take a bunch of people to small claims court and let the news media know about it. If the city is lucky, somebody will write a story about the city taking 100 parking scofflaws to court and jamming up the entire small claims court process. If not, the word will still get around. People will pay because they know if they don’t they will be taken to court. Right now people who get a lot of parking tickets know that if they don’t pay them nothing happens.
The city has the authority to put wheel locks (boots) on cars or have cars towed that have more than three outstanding overdue parking tickets, but Young said it was not cost effective to have police actually boot or tow cars.
There is a much simpler solution. If the city is willing to pay the state 15 percent to 25 percent to collect the money, why not hire a collection agency?
Young said the city may try to get a collection agency to collect some of the money.
There is yet another solution – make all the parking downtown free during the day, like it is at night, and then the city doesn’t have the expense of meters, parking enforcement officers or the attempt to collect the fines.
The city could even try free parking for a week or a month and see if it worked.
by John Hammer
Editor
February 24, 2011
Jordan Lake Cleanup (THE NEWS & RECORD)
Greensboro Mayor Bill Knight has asked state officials to give cities four more years to clean up streams feeding Jordan Lake, the Triangle’s primary water supply. “Since the rules were put in place, a lot has happened in our economy,” Knight told members of Guilford County’s delegation to the General Assembly on Wednesday. He said the city needs more time to plan for expenses involved in complying with the rules. In general, the rules approved in 2009 require cities and counties upstream of Jordan Lake to take steps to clean up the water flowing out of their territory.
Earlier this month, Knight and other Greensboro officials asked that the rules be repealed entirely. That met with a withering reception from lawmakers, who said complete repeal was unlikely. Now, Knight and other city officials want to delay requirements involving cleanup of water discharged from sewage treatment plants. Under Knight’s proposals, cities in areas with streams that feed Jordan Lake would get a four-year reprieve to 2020 before they would have to meet new discharge standards. That would save the city $70 million, officials said.
Sen. Don Vaughan said the delegation might take up the rule change if Knight gets a groundswell of support. Sen. Stan Bingham, a Denton Republican who sits on the board that drafted the original rules, said he was “reluctant” to tinker with the guidelines. “It derails the whole legislative process,” Bingham said.(Mark Binker, THE NEWS & RECORD, 2/24/11).
Garden Parkway( THE CHARLOTTE OBSERVER)
A delegation of Gaston and Mecklenburg residents fighting the proposed Garden Parkway toll road traveled to Raleigh on Wednesday to tell state lawmakers the $1 billion project is a waste. Most legislators listened with genuine interest, but group members said Rep. William Current Sr., R-Gaston, was apparently upset with the lobbying. “He was belligerent, insulting and hateful,” said Warren Ellington, 55, of Belmont. A contract to build the controversial Garden Parkway would be awarded later this year. The N.C. Turnpike Authority is waiting on final approval from the Federal Highway Administration before construction begins. Meanwhile, opponents are focusing on stopping state money and redirecting the dollars already set aside for the road.
On Wednesday, opponents met with Rep. John Torbett and Sen. Kathy Harrington, both Gaston County Republicans. Harrington was elected to the District 43 seat once held by Democrat David Hoyle, a parkway champion who also owns property along the proposed route. Hoyle has said his holdings had nothing to do with his support of the road. A long-time opponent of the parkway, Harrington said the meeting with the citizens group went well and “I appreciate them sharing their views.” Along with James Forrester, R-Gaston, Harrington co-chairs the Senate appropriations subcommittee for transportation. “We’re looking at ways to make ends meet,” she said. “Nothing is targeted, nothing is excepted. Everything is on the table.”(Joe DePriest, THE CHARLOTTE OBSERVER, 2/24/11).
State budget questions likely to dominate agenda at 2-day summit of North Carolina mayors (WTKR)
GREENSBORO, N.C. (AP) — The state budget picture and its local implications will be tops on the discussion list for the leaders of North Carolina’s biggest cities.
The Metro Mayors Coalition is scheduled to begin two days of meetings in Greensboro on Thursday. The group includes the leaders of 26 cities from across North Carolina.
Tops on the agenda is the state budget. Gov. Beverly Perdue is scheduled to address the meeting Thursday.
Perdue has proposed a $19.9 billion spending plan for the upcoming fiscal year with hopes of closing a $2.4 billion budget gap. A proposal from Republican lawmakers falls more than $1 million below what Perdue proposes in six key categories.
Local leaders have criticized Perdue’s plan, saying it reduces education funding by $350 million, putting a greater burden on local government.
By Associated Press
4:02 a.m. EST, February 24, 2011
Hagan on a possible government shutdown (Greensboro News and Record)
U.S. Senator Kay Hagan was in Greensboro Thursday to meet with the North Carolina Metropolitan Mayors Coalition.
While chatting up the crowd, Mayor Bill Bell of Durham asked what was going on with the possible government shutdown if federal legislators cannot reach an agreement to fund government operations.
Hagan said she has heard people who say, “Bring it on.” She disagrees.
“That is not what we need to happen,” she said.
Hagan noted that she recently found out that if the federal government shuts down, Congress will still get paid. She co-sponsored a bill to nix that perk.
Perdue, mayors talk budgets, jobs (Greensboro News and Record)
GREENSBORO — They all want to add jobs.
But first, city and state leaders will have to survive another difficult budget year.
“We are picking up the pieces now in North Carolina,” Gov. Bev Perdue told mayors and city managers Thursday at the winter meeting of the N.C. Metropolitan Mayors Coalition at the Proximity Hotel.
Perdue briefed representatives from about 20 cities on state budget negotiations. She asked them to join her to fight for school funding and money for economic incentives.
Mayors said they were grateful the governor’s proposed budget has little impact on cities, although it may be too early in the budget adoption process to celebrate.
Representatives from most of the cities said they plan to cut city jobs and have held off on major investments to balance budgets. Greensboro Mayor Bill Knight, who is on the board of the Metro Mayors Coalition, said he heard some encouraging words about North Carolina in the discussion at Thursday’s meeting.
“We need to really build our business efforts, our economic development efforts,” he said. “That is going to take care of our jobs.”
Perdue told the city leaders she’d like to bolster businesses by reducing the corporate tax rate. She asked city leaders to stand with her to fight for economic incentive money to lure businesses to North Carolina. She vetoed a bill this week that would have taken $8.2 million in incentive money from her office.
“The top priority all of you talk to me about is jobs. And I need your help on this,” Perdue said.
She got support from Wilmington Mayor Bill Saffo, who said it was time the government did something to bring jobs back to North Carolina.
“We have done so much nationally to take jobs out of the country,” Saffo said.
The audience applauded when Perdue said she wouldn’t accept cuts to teachers.
“We’re with you,” High Point Mayor Becky Smothers said on the school funding issue. “Let us know when you need to raise cane, and we will.”
Burlington Mayor Ronnie Wall questioned Perdue about the legislature’s proposed one-year moratorium on annexations.
“We in cities have invested a lot. We don’t want it to go away,” Wall said.
Perdue said she hopes there is no punitive result for cities. She said annexation is part of what makes North Carolina cities strong. Later, Perdue said the moratorium would give time for all sides to be heard.
Friday, February 25, 2011
(Updated 2:48 pm)
By Amanda Lehmert
Staff Writer
N.C. Mayors, city managers share ideas with Gov. Perdue (News 14 Carolina)
GREENSBORO — The state’s economy and budget took center stage on day one of the North Carolina Metropolitan Mayor’s Coalition meeting.
There was considerable praise for the proposed budget of featured speaker Gov. Bev Perdue, which would balance the state’s books without seriously impacting the revenues of municipalities.
Perdue, mayors and city managers from the state’s 27 largest cities and towns weighed in on several hot button issues, but top on their minds was North Carolina’s budget for 2011-2012. They applauded Perdue and her spending plan for leaving municipalities largely unscathed.
“We certainly appreciate the fact that she understands that we have done a good job of balancing our budgets and keeping the state from taking some of our revenues to make it more difficult for us,” said Mayor Allen Joines, of Winston-Salem.
Chapel Hill Mayor Mark Kleinschmidt said Perdue’s approach marked a departure from the strategies of previous administrations, which had looked at cities as cash cows and their sales tax revenues as means to balance the state budgets.
“That money was generated by economic activity in our communities,” said Kleinschmidt. “Currently Governor Perdue is allowing us to have confidence that that money’s going to stay in our communities.”
The mayor of Salisbury said her city was still feeling the sting from the budget state lawmakers passed in 2001.
“It meant a $2 million loss to us,” said Susan Kluttz. “We still actually haven’t recovered in many ways like roads, things that we had to postpone.”
Perdue said it was unclear how the cities would fare in a final budget from the Republican-controlled General Assembly.
“I don’t know,” she said. “This is the third week that I’ve worked directly with the General Assembly on the budget and I am just unable to tell you where they’re going to come down.”
Joines hoped mayors would leave the two-day conference with a strong message to lawmakers.
“That we in local government, cities particularly, have addressed our budget problems, so, don’t balance the state budget on our backs,” he said.
Red-Light Cameras (THE NEWS & OBSERVER)
The state would start using cameras to nab speeders around schools and road construction sites under new legislation filed by Rep. Rick Glazier. Glazier, D-Cumberland, wants a pilot program to authorize speed cameras in up to 15 school zones and 15 highway work zones at a time. It would continue for 15 years, with the potential to generate millions of dollars from speeding tickets worth $125 to $250 apiece. The measure is aimed at repaying a big state debt to North Carolina schools. A 2008 ruling by the N.C. Court of Appeals found that $748 million in various civil penalties collected across the state over nine years should have been paid to local schools — but weren’t — under language in the state Constitution. So far, the legislature has paid down $18 million of that debt. Under Glazier’s proposal, 25 percent of the speed camera ticket proceeds would go straight to an existing schools fund, to use for driver education. The other 75 percent would be paid to local schools to “satisfy the judgment” against the state in the 2008 ruling.
“We believe this is a great way to do it,” said Leanne Winner, spokeswoman for the N.C. School Boards Association, the plaintiff in that court case. She said her group helped Glazier draft the bill. Mikael Gross, a legislative staff attorney who helped draft Glazier’s bill, said it would be up to DOT to decide where and how to use the cameras. Glazier would have the state Department of Transportation pay for the cameras, estimated at $11 million a year, from its Highway Fund. DOT would recoup the cost by reducing money it now transfers to schools for driver education, about $31 million a year, Gross said.(Bruce Siceloff, THE NEWS & OBSERVER, 2/21/11).
Perdue’s Budget (THE ASSOCIATED PRESS)
Gov. Beverly Perdue rolled out a budget plan Thursday that seeks to close a $2.4 billion budget gap by cutting 10,000 employee positions, consolidating agencies and programs and extending a temporary sales tax. Perdue said her $19.9 billion spending plan would make North Carolina more efficient while protecting the jobs of all teachers and teacher assistants currently funded by the state. Other public employees, however, wouldn’t be as protected. As many as 3,000 of the positions designated for elimination are currently filled, Perdue’s budget office said. There are currently about 266,000 state-funded positions. The proposal for the year starting July 1 tracks a previously announced plan to narrow 14 agencies and departments into eight, while cutting or eliminating 139 additional programs. “I don’t sleep well at night, worried about (workers), but at the end of the day, I do know, quite frankly as the governor, that this is the right decision as we move forward with a leaner state government,” Perdue said at a news conference.
GOP legislative leaders — newly in charge of the General Assembly and forming their own spending plan – acknowledged that there were positive steps in the Democrat’s proposal, which which spends less than the current budget year when $1.6 in federal stimulus funds are added. However, they said it doesn’t cut far enough and breaks a promise by keeping intact through mid-2013 three-quarters of a penny of the one-cent sales tax set to expire June 30. While the measure would lower the base tax most consumers currently pay from 7.75 percent to 7.5 percent, and still generate $827 million next year, the change is still a tax increase, said Senate leader Phil Berger, R-Rockingham, who had pledged with other Republicans to let the one-cent sales tax expire. “The people of North Carolina in November sent a strong message, and that message was balance the budget and don’t raise taxes. The governor sent a message back to the people today: ‘I’m balancing the budget by raising your taxes,'” Berger said. Perdue defended the sales tax, saying it helped her avoid eliminating funds for an additional combined 12,500 teachers and teacher assistants.
The proposal didn’t contain an effort to revive the video poker industry through heavy regulation. Perdue earlier had sounded intrigued by the idea, which could have generated several hundred million dollars annually. “I didn’t want the next six months, quite frankly when so much is at stake for North Carolina … to be distracted by this philosophical and moral debate over gambling and other video poker and the lottery,” she said. The two-year budget would place cuts of 7 percent to 15 percent on most state programs compared to last year’s recurring funding levels, while the public schools and higher education would see 4 to 6 percent reductions. State employees and teachers would get no pay raises for the third year in a row and could receive up to $20,000 in early retirement bonuses. Some workers would be required to pay a monthly premium for their own health insurance for the first time. As previously announced, Perdue said she wants the Legislature to reduce the corporate income tax rate from 6.9 percent to 4.9 percent. She also wants to provide an unemployment tax credit for 135,000 small businesses, spend $75 million on improvements to university and government buildings and set aside $150 million for the state’s rainy-day reserve fund.(Gary D. Robertson, THE ASSOCIATED PRESS, 2/17/11).
Feb. 17 Daily Update
The big news of the day was the release of the Governor’s proposed budget. Everyone is still combing through it, but the big items include keeping most of a temporary sales tax in place, cutting the corporate income tax rate, eliminating 10,00 state jobs (of which 3,000 are currently filled), an early retirement buy out option for state workers, and consolidating state agencies. See the full coverage below in the news clips. At first blush there are no major changes to the NCDOT budget that would be concerning, except for a $3.8 million recurring cut to public transportation. As we review the budget further we will send more information.
Members of the Joint Transportation Appropriations Committee heard a presentation today by the DMV.
The DCHC MPO has sent this letter to their delegation in support of the NCDOT’s urban loop prioritization process. There has been discussion at the General Assembly about the order of the loops. Be sure to be communicating with your delegation on this issue.
We are hearing that there may be bills introduced this session to transfer state roads to local government (referred to before as the 5,000 mile transfer). We have seen these bills before and were successful in stopping the idea by sending resolutions from cities to members of the General Assembly making our position clear. You can find our updated roads resolution here and strongly suggest your city council and MPO pass the resolution and send copies to all members of your delegation. (If you need a Word version of the resolution just email me at JWhite@nclm.org.)
The House announced their Redistricting Committee this week and said they intend to deliver the new maps to the U.S. Justice Department by May 15th.
The Governor indicated today that she has not made up her mind yet on a possible veto of SB 13 Balanced Budget Act of 2011.
S 9 Make Synthetic Cannabinoids Illegal will be heard in House Health and Human Services at 10 AM on Tuesday.
Last but certainly not least, we are very excited to have confirmed Speaker of the House Tillis as our dinner speaker next week in Greensboro at our Winter Meeting. We will also hear from Governor Perdue, U.S. Senator Hagan, President Pro Temp Berger and our three 2010 Legislative Award Winners. It is sure to be an exciting and informative meeting.
As always, call me with any questions at all.
Julie White
