A commission appointed to reform the state budget will hold its first meeting next week.

Gov. Beverly Perdue plans to address the Budget Reform and Accountability Commission and charge it with finding ways to save the state money.

"She will be charging them with the task of really looking deep, of not being afraid to make tough decisions and tough recommendations," said David Kochman, a spokesman for Perdue.

Perdue promised throughout her campaign to appoint a commission to eliminate waste and duplication in state government. She appointed members in March. Commission leaders have met to set up a framework for how to proceed but did not intend to get working in time for the recently adopted state budget, Kochman said.

"There wouldn't have been time for them to dig deep on things," Kochman said.

The goal of the meetings would be to have recommendations before next year's short legislative session. 

The first meeting, which is open to the public, is scheduled for 1 p.m. Tuesday at the Administration Building, 116 W. Jones St., in Raleigh.  

Gov. Beverly Perdue named the rest of a budget-cutting panel. 

The five appointees include Dan Gerlach, a former budget adviser to former Gov. Mike Easley who now runs the Golden LEAF Foundation, and Norma Houston, a former chief of staff to Senate leader Marc Basnight, the Associated Press reports.

Other new members include former Glaxo chief executive Charlie Sanders, the first chairman of the state lottery commission; IBM executive Curtis Clark; and N.C. Central department chairman Ron Penny.

Earlier this month, Perdue named former Cabinet member Norris Tolson and Hilda Pinnix-Ragland to head the committee.

The so-called Budget Reform and Accountability Commission will propose ways to cut state spending for the legislature to accept or reject.

Gov. Beverly Perdue has named the co-chairs of her budget reform panel.

Hilda Pinnix-Ragland and Norris Tolson will lead the Budget Reform and Accountability Commission, an outside commission that will recommend ways to cut state spending. 

Perdue said she wants the commission to conduct "a detailed review" of the current state budget to look for inefficient spending and come up with suggested cuts and consolidations.

"I expect my BRAC team to root out wasteful and unnecessary spending, hold government accountable for its appropriations and help ensure taxpayers are not funding ineffective or unsuccessful programs," Perdue said in a statement.

Pinnix-Ragland is chairwoman of the State Board of Community Colleges and holds an MBA in accounting. Tolson is president and CEO of the N.C. Biotechnology Center and previously served as secretary of commerce, transportation and revenue.

Both served on Perdue's gubernatorial transition team.

Gov. Beverly Perdue's budget-cutting panel seems to be on hold.

During the fall campaign, Perdue pledged to create an independent and bipartisan panel of 15 citizens to suggest ways to trim state spending.

The proposal was modeled after the Base Realignment and Closure process which suggests military base closures subject to an up-or-down vote in Congress. The idea is to reduce the influence of backroom deals.

On her first day in office, Perdue signed an executive order creating the Budget Reform and Accountability Commission. Her Web site makes no mention of any appointments to it, however, even as Perdue is putting the finishing touches on her budget.

As noted elsewhere, she made no mention of the reform during her budget-heavy State of the State speech last night.

Senate Majority Leader Tony Rand said he doesn't think the new BRAC panel could get set up in time for this year's budget.

"That wouldn't be in place in time for what we're doing right now," he said.

Update: Spokeswoman Chrissy Pearson said that Perdue will make an announcement about the BRAC budget reform process on Friday.

Gov. Beverly Perdue promised to cut wasteful spending.

In a page on her campaign Web site, Perdue pledged to create an "independent and bipartisan body" of 15 citizens to suggest ways to cut the budget.

The proposal is modeled after the Base Realignment and Closure process for closing military bases.

"In the first year of each budget biennium, the BRAC Budget Board will present a maximum of ten separate governmental efficiency proposals," the pledge reads.

The legislature will have to vote on each proposal.

Perdue has already fulfilled part of this promise, signing an executive order today creating the board.

U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Dole has a new ad attacking her Democratic rival, Kay Hagan.

What the ad says: The ad begins with images of a small dog barking and jumping at a fence. Narrator: "They call her 'Fibber Kay Hagan.' Fib after fib, she tries to turn us against Elizabeth Dole. But we know Elizabeth has been consistently voted one of the 10 most admired women in the world. Her clout works wonders for North Carolina. So bark away Fibber Kay. That dog don't hunt." Dole: "I'm Elizabeth Dole and I approve this message." Text on the screen says Dole "saved jobs," "saved bases," "saved farmers" and "helped sheriffs."

The background: The ad does not specify who "they" are who call Hagan "Fibber Kay."

The Dole campaign said they did not come up with the nickname, but they did not know who did.

"We're not sure who coined it, but we hear people call Kay Hagan 'Fibber Kay' on the campaign trail and we hear it frequently," said spokesman Hogan Gidley.

A search of North Carolina newspapers, blogs and Web sites did not return any references to "Fibber Kay" from before the ad began airing, and nearly all written since were about the ad itself.

The ad does not name any of the supposed "fibs" that Hagan has made.

MOST ADMIRED: Every year since 1948, the Gallup organization has surveyed a random group of Americans on the men and women in the world they most admire.

As secretary of the U.S. Department of Transportation under President Reagan, Dole first made the top 10 in 1987, returning three years later as secretary of the Labor department.

Though she received votes in other years, she returned to the top 10 as the wife of presidential candidate Bob Dole and president of the American Red Cross. Between 1996 and 2003, she was ranked between third and tenth place.

She also landed in ninth place in 2005, but she has not been on the list in the last two years.

She was in the top 10 a total of 11 times — the same number as the poet Maya Angelou and news anchor Barbara Walters.

JOBS AND BASES: The U.S. Department of Defense announced a round of base closings and other changes in 2005 as part of a regular program begun at the end of the Cold War. The multi-year process is designed to be insulated from political pressure.

Some North Carolina leaders had feared the loss of thousands of jobs — something that never materialized. A number of politicians, including Dole and Democratic Lt. Gov. Beverly Perdue, have claimed credit for North Carolina's relative success, but there is no way to quantify how much each helped.

FARMERS: In 2004, Congress and President Bush approved a buyout of the Depression-era system of price supports — or quotas — for tobacco leaf. Cigarette companies financed the buyout, passing on the costs to consumers.

The buyout is designed to put $9.6 billion into the pockets of quota owners and growers over 10 years. Some farmers have used the money to reinvest in the crop, while others chose to change crops or retire.

Dole supported the buyout during her 2002 campaign and was a vocal advocate in Congress, along with other senators from tobacco-growing states.

SHERIFFS: Since 1996, the federal government has offered a test program for sheriff's deputies to investigate illegal immigration.

Though immigration enforcement is typically handled by the federal government, the goal of the 287(g) program is to start deportation proceedings on illegal immigrants who are arrested for non-immigration related crimes.

In North Carolina, a handful of sheriffs' offices, including Mecklenburg and Wake counties, have signed up for the program, which Dole has promoted.

The federal government pays for the cost of training deputies in immigration enforcement and grants sheriffs' offices access to immigration records.

Is the ad accurate? There is no way to verify the "Fibber Kay" nickname or who coined it and no evidence it has been used. Dole has been consistently ranked among the most admired women in the world. Though the ad's claims are vague, Dole did help farmers and sheriffs in Congress, but there is no way to quantify her role in saving the state's military bases.

— Ryan Teague Beckwith and David Ingram

Democratic gubernatorial candidate Beverly Perdue is airing a new ad touting her record in office.

What it says: The ad shows images of Perdue from her early life and her political career. A narrator says, "Bev Perdue. Neither of her parents finished high school, yet she became a teacher and earned a Ph.D. She's spent a lifetime fighting for the middle class — Smart Start for our kids, cutting the sales tax on food, saving our military bases from closure. In these tough times, she'll lead the way — a higher minimum wage, property tax relief for seniors, creating the jobs of the future. Bev Perdue, a governor for us."

The background: Perdue taught in public schools in Georgia and Florida from 1970 to 1974. She received a doctorate in education administration in March 1976 from the University of Florida.

Gov. Jim Hunt and the legislature created Smart Start, a statewide pre-school program, in 1993 when Perdue was in her second term in the state Senate. That year, Hunt appointed her as one of 16 initial members of a board to oversee Smart Start.

Then-Gov. Terry Sanford helped establish a statewide sales tax on food in 1961 to pay higher teacher salaries. It was supposed to be temporary, but it lasted almost four decades. Lawmakers cut it from 4 percent to 3 percent in 1996 and eliminated it two years later.

Perdue was co-chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee when lawmakers eliminated the tax. She voted in favor of doing so, but was not a champion of the cause. An unusual coalition of liberal lawmakers and anti-tax Republicans pushed for eliminating the tax, while the Senate’s leadership was less enthusiastic.

"I have long believed it is the wrong item to tax and there should be a total elimination," Perdue told The Charlotte Observer in August 1997. But, she added, "You have to look at fiscal responsibility. The priority, I believe, in addition to cutting the food tax, is to provide adequate funding for teachers and to clean up the environment."

Gov. Mike Easley appointed Perdue, as lieutenant governor, to lead the state's efforts to protect North Carolina’s military bases from closure by the U.S. Department of Defense. The multi-year process is designed to be insulated from political pressure, and it involved work from a large number of people, including the state's congressional delegation.

Perdue has called for increasing the minimum wage in North Carolina by one dollar to $8.25, from the minimum of $7.25 an hour set to take effect in July 2009.

She also says she favors expanding the state’s homestead exemption and freezing the property tax revaluations for seniors who make less than $50,000 and have lived in their homes for at least 20 years.

Is the ad accurate? Yes, though there is no way to quantify how much Perdue helped the state's military bases.

— David Ingram

U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Dole had to change planes recently.

The first version of a recent ad for the Salisbury Republican boasts of her work helping North Carolina's military bases avoid closure during the BRAC process.

But as the liberal Senate Guru blog and D.C.-based newspaper The Hill pointed out, stock footage in the ad showed a French plane — a Dassault Super Étendard (top image).

A second version of the ad substituted an all-American F-15 (bottom image).

"Basically, our media consultant used the wrong stock footage, but it was corrected," Dole spokesman Hogan Gidley told the newspaper.

The campaign of rival Democrat Kay Hagan used the flub to argue Dole was out of touch.

"I imagine she’s celebrating Bastille Day today, as well," Hagan spokeswoman Colleen Flanagan told The Hill.

Update: Dole's campaign issued a statement:

"While Kay Hagan is focused on little gotchas, slipper parties and lurking around gas stations, Senator Dole is campaigning on her long record of delivering results for North Carolina and has an actual plan to improve the economy and bring down gas prices," Gidley said in a statement.

Beverly Perdue and Elizabeth Dole are taking credit for saving the state's military bases.

During the federal Base Realignment and Closure process, the Democratic lieutenant governor and the Republican U.S. senator both worked to promote the state's bases.

But the BRAC process was established to insulate decisions about base closings from the sort of political influence that the two claim to have exercised. Experts and community leaders say North Carolina was a logical place for expansion because of its location, the strategic emphases and the availability of land.

"Elected officials are going to take credit for events such as the BRAC decision when it comes out favorable, and place the blame elsewhere when it hurts their states," said Robin Dorff, a professor of national security at the U.S. Army War College. "That's a natural part of politics." 

The issue helps both Dole and Perdue, allowing them to cast themselves as pro-military, economic boosters and effective in a traditionally male arena. And some say that it's hard to gauge what would have happened if they hadn't been around. (N&O)