Cabarrus Cheap Seats

I got the opportunity to sit through the last BOC meeting. I got there a little late; but stuck around until the end. Here are just a few thoughts:

• Personnel Changes - The resignation of County Attorney Fletcher Hartsell and the election of Carruth to Chair and Joni Juba to Vice Chair. What’s interesting is that the only people who won’t be up for election next year are in leadership - which isn’t a bad thing. It wouldn’t be good to have lame ducks in leadership. These changes will make next year pretty interesting.
• The Introduction of the Mexican Exclusion Resolution - Near the beginning of the meeting, Coy Privette added to the agenda a resolution whose verbiage was taken from Bill James of Mecklenburg County.
• The anti-Jail activists - They spent about 90 minutes making comments, showing models, and proposing somewhat novel arguments. One person suggested that downtown Concord shouldn’t change at all because it would endanger it’s future in such cinematic masterpieces as “Shallow Hal” I got the opportunity to talk one of these folks while I was returning from What-A-Burger. I don’t doubt their sincerity, intelligence, or thoughtfulness. However, they failed to make the case as to how the expense and increased safety risks of a remote jail site is less than the perceived impact on the atmosphere of downtown Concord.
• The Budget Audit - OK, this may seem strange and wonkish; but it underscores a fundamental difference between how the board was run under the Freeman/Privette leadership and how it is run under the Carpenter/Carruth leadership. The County came out with a fund balance about $3 million ahead of 15% fund balance target. These monies were moved to the Capital Fund for future use per a resolution that Privette and Freeman voted against. Note: I misread the minutes for this meeting, they voted for the resolution to save the excess funds and then voted against the following resolution that would have set the tax rate to keep the County from raiding the fund balance for another year. Under the old leadership, this money would be used for the next years’ budget and when Capital projects came up they would borrow the money. Naturally, saving ahead doesn’t allow the current majority to invest in pet projects to win some quick votes; but it saves future taxpayers tremendous amounts of money. Most debt currently being carried by the County was accrued by the previous leadership with no voter input. Had this philosophy been in place under the previous leadership, we would be carrying significantly less debt.