newsobserver.com projects - McCrory: N.C. Dems on fishing expedition - Comments

Re: McCrory: N.C. Dems on fishing expedition

uncgop — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 11:34:29 -0400

The Dems need to practice what they preach or have they quickly forgotten that their figurehead (Easley) thought the laws did not apply to him and the whole Mental Health communications would not remain in the minds of the rest of us.

Re: McCrory: N.C. Dems on fishing expedition

MeckDeck — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 08:27:28 -0400

Whew, did this thread go off the rails.

First, 12 years is a purposely dense request. Any resulting info would be too large to be actionable. Two to four years back seems a reasonable core sample.

Second, Mac McCarley doth protest too much. Were he to take himself out of the loop on this request, ie do not attempt to vet every single email message for possible non-disclosure angles, the time and cost involved with producing the emails would plummet.

In fact, I'll do the search for $10K and donate $9K to charity.

The real story here is that the city of Charlotte's gold-plated IT department evidently cannot do much of anything in a timely, cost-effective manner.

JAT

Re: McCrory: N.C. Dems on fishing expedition

tangoz — Sun, 29 Jun 2008 14:32:24 -0400

I am willing to say that Easley has spent millions on trips to Europe and eastern North Carolina. he is part of the entrenched corruption in NC.

thomaspayne needs a geography lesson, Charlotte is in North Carolina.

And a lesson on North Carolina economics, BIG business is behind the democrats in this state. How do you think Goodyear, Google, and others have received hundreds of millions in our tax money.

As far as filth is concerned, Easley has placed numerous fundraisers into positions of authority in which they have no idea what to do. One example is the Department of Transportation. And not to mention the dozens of Democrats in prisons and under indictment in North Carolina.

Are you mad that you did not get your night in the Lincoln bedroom when Bill Clinton was President. Or your sweetheart loan or piece of land involving Whitewater. Maybe you could have turned $8000 into millions like Hillary did.
Since I have been around McCrory for many of his speeches I can say with confidence that you are a distorter at best and a liar at worst.

Re: McCrory: N.C. Dems on fishing expedition

ncpoli — Sat, 28 Jun 2008 23:26:30 -0400

I would hate to be the poor NCDP intern that gets to spend their entire summer sifting through that!

Re: McRory thinks he is above the law

FFC1304 — Sat, 28 Jun 2008 16:31:57 -0400

hey 'thomaspaine'...do you feel that's there's any political corruption within the democrat party of NC and their 'leaders' who've run the show for over 100+ years?

with 'Sugah Dumplin' Perdue in, its only MORE CORRUPTION WITHOUT INTERRUPTION!!!

ElectriCities of NC needs to be investigated

alman — Sat, 28 Jun 2008 13:49:38 -0400

12 Questions of Accountability
To: NC Legislators, City officials, Attorney General, State Auditor
After months of denying a rate increase, then denying the rate increase is due to anything other than fuel costs, ElectriCities of NC finally admitted a booboo. But this one is very costly to the good people of eastern NC. They finally admitted, after telling us to USE FANS to save money.
Jesse Tilton CEO “converted a portion of the debt from fixed-rate loans to variable-interest loans in 2004. The move was expected to save around $10.5 million a year in interest payments, but instead, the collapse of the subprime mortgage market caused those interest rates to climb unexpectedly. Between last December and April, the payments were nearly $4 million over budget. They have since converted that debt back to fixed rates, but the damage was done. NCEMPA's debt service payments are rising $12 million a year, or equal to a two-percent hike in the wholesale rate.”
http://www.wilsontimes.com/News/Local/Story/Electric-rates-face-August-increase--
How much has the most refinancing of the debt cost us in total?
When was it discovered to be a bad deal? Officials in Wilson told us March was when they were told but the CEO knew in October. But the people, the people who have to pay were not told until June and many city officials were not told until June.
When did the CEO inform the cities, the board? March some; June most
How long had he known when he informed them? He knew in Oct. 2007 and did not tell his board until March. He let the costs increase and did not tell.
How much did it cost during that interim?
Has the refinancing of the debt been cleaned up - i.e. has it been refinanced again?
How much did that cost?
What percentage of the rate increase is due to the poorly managed refinancing of the debt?
Why are you not informing the ratepayers of the true costs of the rate increase? They are starting to now after lying for a while to the press and the people and even some city officials.
How much have operational costs increased (%) over the past three years?
What cuts will ElectriCities make to demonstrate that they understand the burden they have placed on eastern NC?
Why is the ElectriCities Board continuing to employ a CEO who has mismanaged public money, cost the ratepayers needlessly and hidden the facts? How can you employ a half million dollar CEO who screwed up this badly along with his overpaid managers. How can you lie to the press and people time after time. And how can board members take thousands of dollars in “salary” for being on a board when they are not doing their job. WE NEED OVERSIGHT
http://www.wilsontimes.com/News/Local/Story/Electric-rates-face-August-increase--
And why did Sen Martin Nesbitt and Rep Dan Blue (A former ElectriCities lobbyist) get a bill passed for ElectriCities and then get a PAC contribution when they have no electric city in their district. And why would a bill pass letting this group enter into ANYTHING for any longer than 3 years when the ineptness is so OBVIOUS.
Enrolled and on its way to the Governor’s office for signature is a bill that allows joint municipal
assistance agencies to make and execute contracts for more than three years. HB 1679 entitled Joint Municipal Assistance Agency Contracts, introduced by Rep. Earl Jones (D-Guilford),
was given a favorable report out of the Senate Judiciary I Committee and received unanimous support on the Senate floor. Senator Nesbitt (D-Buncombe) explained the bill on the Senate floor and stated that he had no idea why anyone would put such a restriction on an organization trying to do business. The bill amends General Statute 159B-44 by removing the three-year limit. ElectriCities will be able to bind its members in contracts for a period longer than three years.The bill is effective as soon as the Governor signs it into law.

Re: McCrory: N.C. Dems on fishing expedition

tarheez3 — Sat, 28 Jun 2008 12:42:42 -0400

It is called Freedom of Information, and everyone should be allowed to access those records.If you have nothing to hide then no problem. But I am sure that the lawyers are going to look over every piece to see if there is any thing that is questionable. Believe me in saying that there probably won't be a smoking gun in these documents but North Carolina Open Records is good government policy.

I think that after the person got busted for taking trips to disneyworld that there should be a person in each big city asking for information on credit card purchases by city employees.

"huge waste of taxpayer's money"

scharrison — Sat, 28 Jun 2008 10:51:18 -0400

Maybe you folks should think about that for a minute.

If the volume of message traffic between the Mayor's office and Duke Energy and the other two is so big it will take all Summer and cost $100,000 to perform, I'm not sure Pat was doing a whole lot of "balancing" between his two jobs.

Had he remained in a position of management, his use of the Mayor's office to help him stay in touch with Duke would merely be a slightly unethical use of public resources. But because they (Duke) transferred him into a posiition that (apparently) incentivized his pay from the recruitment of new business, that changed the game quite a bit. At that point, his role as Mayor became a business tool for Duke Energy, and many potential conflicts of interest McCrory faced also represented a boost to his income. The question isn't "did it happen?", it's just how much.

The fact that this kind of thing is not rare should bother us all. As long as we pay our elected officials so little, these balancing acts will continue to go on statewide, and there will continue to be ethical missteps.

Re: I personally would very much like to know

breining24 — Sat, 28 Jun 2008 10:43:54 -0400

I'll take my chances with McCrory rather than continue down the sorry path Easley and friends have us on.

I personally would very much like to know

James_Protzman — Sat, 28 Jun 2008 10:21:36 -0400

exactly how much influence Duke Energy has had on McCrory and vice versa. Our political institutions are deeply at risk of being owned and operated by private corporations. The influence of those corporations is undue and unwelcome on more levels than you can count. From incentives for tire companies to preferential treatment for builders and Realtors, our government is on the wrong path. A McCrory governorship would send us hurtling farther down the path of creating a deep-seated corporatocracy.

The idea that McCrory can somehow separate his public positions from this income over the past two decades defies belief.

When you cant talk about the issues...dig up some dirt

breining24 — Sat, 28 Jun 2008 07:33:38 -0400

Yet another huge waste of taxpayer money by the Dems. Nothing else better to do at Perdue campaign headquarters but look around for some dirt on Pat McCrory. She certainly can't attack him on the issues thats for sure. Charlotte is rated as one of the best places to live, best places to do business, has seen its downtown transformed into a thriving business and residential center creating jobs and a bigger tax base, oh yeah and did I mention Charlotte is the #1 housing market in the nation, all on McCrory's watch. Charlotte has a progressive transit system championed by those with some vision and the guts to push for the right things even when its not popular. McCrory took a lot of heat for the light rail line in Charlotte, funny now gas is over $4 a gallon, the rail line is wildly popular and now every city in the state is wanting to copy it. Thats leadership. Bev Perdue and Mike Easley have sat around and done nothing. The last 8 years has seen wasteful spending, vast legislative corruption, a road system that builds 8 lanes on 85 in Salisbury, while us in the Triangle and those folks in Charlotte sit in traffic. Creation of a lottery that taxes the poor and does nothing for education. Low paid and underqualified teachers in our schools, out of control illegal immigration with no plan to do anything about it, massive gang violence in our cities, the list could go on and on. If you enjoy sitting in traffic, having underperforming public schools and no plan for the future, vote for Bev. Ask yourself what exactly did Mike Easley do in the last 8 years and why on earth would we want Bev Perdue to continue the same failed policies? If the entire state was run the way Charlotte has been run the last decade and a half, we would all be better off.

Steve
Raleigh

Re: McCrory: N.C. Dems on fishing expedition

Proctor — Sat, 28 Jun 2008 03:49:38 -0400

North Carolina Democratic leaders are making a fundamental error if they try to place Charlotte as a major North Carolina city in an urban and political category all by itself. People should also consider whether companies in other major North Carolina cities such as Winston-Salem, Greensboro, Durham, Raleigh, Asheville, Fayetteville and Wilmington should be expected to disclose more than a decade's duration of internal business records, not at the request of the press or of a regulatory office of federal or state government but at the instigation of a state political party organization, and with no specific incident or controversy cited but instead a blanket demand for across-the-board company communications records for the sole reason that the Republican candidate for governor and present mayor of Charlotte has worked in these positions.

This is the most surprising and bewildering marshalling of political power against a North Carolina city's business and professional community by one of the two major-party state political organizations that I have ever encountered, and again, there are no specific alleged violations being cited and none of this demand for company records is being initiated by either the press or an appropriate governmental regulatory office.

Better fishing is to be found on the coast of North Carolina, in the streams of the Blue Ridge and Smoky Mountains and in all the lakes, rivers and ponds in between. N.C. Democratic leaders might have better luck spotting a flying fish by watching the opening frames of their favorite "Andy Griffith Show" episode. Maybe a weekend on Lake Norman would bring sporting fulfillment to the movers and shakers of the Democratic Party's Raleigh office since there is a current dearth of good fishing holes along Hillsborough Street in the Capital City.

One can only surmise that the North Carolina Democratic Party must believe that both individuals and companies in Charlotte and Mecklenburg County are virtually powerless in their expectations of being accorded equal treatment under the law across the state of North Carolina to the extent that the N.C. Democratic Party has anything to say about it. The refined philosophical reasoning seems to be: down yonder in Charlotte they're just the Great State of Mecklenburg, so we can dish it out politically as much as we want and the voters are certain to give us their enthusiastic applause and complete approval.

Lacking either a legitimate sense of inquiry by investigative reporters from respected press organizations or appropriate regulatory agencies, offices and departments of federal or state government, and apparently demanding an unprecedented volume of internal business records dating back more than a decade into the mid-1990s, there is nothing being demonstrated by the state's Democratic Party organization thus far that it wants to do anything but "fish" night and day through the employment records of Charlotte's incumbent mayor, who also happens to be the Republican candidate for governor of North Carolina.

The News & Observer's political writers have made many references over the years to a seeming recurrence of political ineptitude on the part of Charlotte candidates for statewide office from both the Democratic and Republican parties. But in this case, the N.C. Democratic Party may wind up getting at least an honorable mention somewhere down the road from such a journalistic luminary as political reporter Rob Christensen for the wackiest political play of the year.

How the Democratic Party's well-qualified candidate for governor, whose current elected position gives her the privilege of presiding over the North Carolina Senate, could permit her campaign spokesman to go out and help cut bait for this fishing trip is even more surprising, given Beverly Perdue's good name recognition and standing among mayors and local elected officials in cities and towns across the Old North State.

Charlotte candidates for such statewide offices as governor and U.S. senator may have been losing out at the polls election after election since the 1970s, but this time, the State Democratic Party may have gone out there and lost the ballgame in the first inning for its own fine candidate for governor, Lt. Gov. Beverly Perdue, because fair-minded people in the business and professional communities of every city and town in North Carolina are going to have to ask themselves if they would relish being put through a strictly political inquisition by a Raleigh state political organization with not a single alleged violation of the law being cited as justification for this thunderstorm of partisan campaign activity.

Presumably, The News & Observer at some point will do some further reporting on just who in the leadership of the State Democratic Party pushed for this rod-and-reel outing into the business and professional community of Charlotte. In an earlier era, The News & Observer itself might have editorially questioned a frolicking fresh-water fishing outing such as this one because once upon a time, The N&O, while singing the praises of the Democratic Party, reminded its readers that every now and then you have to pick some other song besides "Anything Goes."

So let all the pundits and politicos see for themselves if this song and dance plays in Pasquotank.

David McKnight

Re: McCrory: N.C. Dems on fishing expedition

ethanperry — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 23:37:32 -0400

I've been a Republican since the Jimmy Carter days - last time I voted for a Democratic President. But, for a Republican candidate to say somebody is on a fishing expedition is like the kid owning the ball and bat getting mad with a better player, and taking his equipment home, ending the game.

Republicans in the past few years have mastered the art of doing what McCrory is complaining about. Digging up potential dirt and going the extra mile to get the most out of it.

Of course, neither party has bragging rights. Both have had their share of corruption and both parties follow the money, leaving their constituents every time. It becomes all about them, individually. Somehow they fool themselves into thinking they must get the party majority re-elected at all costs, because they are worthwhile. Couldn't be further from reality and the truth. It would be better to have a system where individual citizens are selected to serve by a straw vote. They go home at the end of the term and the next citizen is selected.

In this case, voting for McCrory would be the equivalent of voting for Duke Energy as Governor. But again, the same with Perdue and her cronies, on the alcohol beverage control board.

The system is broken as is!!!

McRory thinks he is above the law

ThomasPaine — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 23:26:14 -0400

McCrory has operated Charlotte working on the puppet strings of Duke Energy and Bank of America for over a decade. They own him. We've had enough Dick Cheney type sweetheart deals owned by Halliburton. If McCrory already has his cronies squealing about complying with disclosing only the basic public information- the squealing may become deafening when they start to dig into his inside corporate dealings. The Charlotte corporate hogs are attempting to annex the state of North Carolina to drain it's money to Charlotte, and that is something I will fight. The Charlotte rulling class consider the rest of North Carolina second class citizenry and that attitude exudes from McCrory every time he's asked the question. McCrory states, " I'm going to put Charlotte at the top of my agenda- we have to look after Charlotte." NO mister Mayor, we put NORTH CAROLINA first. The pitting one region of North Carolina against other regions of North Carolina is a pathway to destroying a state. Hate, divisivness, greed, owned by corporate giants..... no thanks McCrory. You would have been a great lap boy for the Bush administration. We'll let your type of filth stay in Washington DC. NOT in our state!

McCrory: N.C. Dems on fishing expedition

ryanteaguebeckwith — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 17:15:33 -0400

Pat McCrory says state Democrats are on a "fishing expedition."

The Republican gubernatorial nominee said today that the N.C. Democratic Party has filed a public records request for correspondence between the mayor, the city manager and his staff and three Charlotte businesses for the past 12 years.

In a press release sent out shortly before 5 p.m., the McCrory campaign says that City Attorney Mac McCarley estimated the request would cost "more than $100,000" and take "up to a thousand hours" of work to complete.

"I am disgusted by this fishing expedition being conducted by the North Carolina Democratic Party with the blessing of Beverly Perdue," McCrory said in a statement, calling it "dirty tricks."

Perdue spokesman David Kochman said they were aware of the records request and had no problem with it.

"One of the reasons we have campaigns is for voters to learn about candidates and the work they've done," he said. "I would hope that the mayor has nothing to hide. If that's the case, there shouldn't be any problem sharing more information about his record."

On the issue of cost, Kochman said that it's standard for a government body to charge reasonable costs to comply with a records request.

Update: McCrory spokeswoman Amy Auth said that the request was for correspondence related to two Charlotte-based companies, Bank of America and Duke Energy — where McCrory formerly worked — and U.S. Airways, which has a hub in Charlotte's airport.

She said he has nothing to hide.

"He will gladly compare his record to the rest of state leadership," she said.

Second Update: In its two requests, the Democratic Party offered to pay to defray the cost of copies up to $200, for a total of $400.

Third Update: McCarley, the city attorney, said this would be the biggest public records request in recent memory, topping a $100,000-plus request from an unsuccessful bidder on a city contract and a citizen who supported the unsuccessful effort to repeal the sales tax.

He said that the charge to the Democratic Party would probably be between $200 and $1,000 for the cost of copies, with the $100,000 figure referring to the cost of staff time, which can't be recouped. He said it will probably take "most of the summer" to comply.