Cabarrus Cheap Seats

On his site recently, Harold makes the following claim about the FY2007 budget:

Have you ever wondered how John Day can manage to find extra money to finance a “pet” project. He has special places in the budget where he hides money for those special occasions. The “Capital Reserve Account” is one of those places. He has more, But we have exposed the “Capital Reserve Account”. The FY 2007 Budget adds $millions and $millions to this “Slush Fund”. 

We will watch this account like a hawk and report when and how much they spend from this account. Will they reduce debt or build a new school? Or, will they wastefully spend this surplus?

Just to review. Last week, I told y’all how you’d have to ignore about 10 facts to believe that a “slush fund” exists. Here’s the summary:

OK, now that we’ve set aside the fact that John Day did NOT give his department heads everything they asked for, we’ve ignored the prevailing financial climate, abandoned the County’s credit rating, buried the unanimously agreed to 2005 Resolution, dismissed the FY2005 transfer from the fund balance (the fourth one in a row by then), disregarded the $110 Million in new debt by Commissioner fiat, ignored the $20 Million in operational deficits from the three years preceding FY2005, and forgotten that the FY2007 Budget has $40 Million more in total debt and an increase in Debt Service of $3.7 Million than Harold’s FY2005 model, we can start believing the the Capital Account is a “Slush Fund”. 

[CLICK HERE TO READ THE REST OF THAT ARTICLE]

Then, I find out that the part of the budget that Coy and Company tried to cut was actually funding health care and housing for low-income senior citizens. Here’s the main part of that lil’ gem:

Let’s be really clear here. The line-item Commissioner Privette identified right after he made the motion for the $0.53 tax cut would have come from this part of the budget which includes The Cabarrus Health Alliance, Community Development Block Grants, New Schools, and other items. 

[CLICK HERE TO READ THE REST OF THAT ARTICLE]

We might be all caught up, but that’s not it.

RTFO - “Read The Friendly Ordinance”

If Harold would have looked at last year’s budget ordinance he would have read the following language:

B. The County Manager is hereby authorized to transfer appropriations within a fund as contained herein under the following conditions:

1. He may transfer amounts between objects of expenditures and revenues within a function without limitation. 

2. He may transfer amounts up to $100,000 between functions of the same fund.

3. He may not transfer any amounts between funds nor from any contingency appropriation within any fund without action of the Board of Commissioners.

4. Additional authority is granted to the manager to transfer amounts within and between funds for the sole purpose of funding salary and benefits adjustments consistent with the Cabarrus County Personnel Management Policy and the Cabarrus County Personnel Ordinance.

5. He may enter into and execute change orders or amendments to construction contracts in amounts up to $25,000 when the appropriate annual budget or capital project ordinance contains sufficient appropriated but unencumbered funds.

6. He may award and execute contracts which are not required to be bid or which G.S. 143-131 allows to be let on informal bids so long as the annual budget or appropriate capital project ordinance contains sufficient appropriated but unencumbered funds for such purposes.

7. He may execute contracts with outside agencies to properly document budgeted appropriations to such agencies where G.S. 15 A-248(b), 259, 449 and any similar statutes require such contracts. 8. He may reject formal bids when deemed appropriate and in the best interest of Cabarrus County pursuant to G.S. 143-129(a).

Kinda hard for the County Manager to move “$millions and $millions” for “pet projects” around with all of those rules. Also, do you notice how not one “pet project” is even named in pages and pages of mindless drivel at www.goharoldsmith.com?

Regardless of the facts, at Monday Night’s meeting Coy Privette’s allies Carl Hill and Darrell Bost spoke about the mythical “slush fund”. No doubt, they got some coaching from Harold or someone else. Also, Coy Privette made a motion that was seconded by Robert Freeman (and that they voted on) that would have eliminated funding for the Cabarrus Health Alliance and Community Development Block Grants which are important to a number of low-income senior citizens - of course they wanted people to believe that this was just some open-ended slush fund until Chairman Carruth and Commissioner Carpenter pointed out the facts.

So, this is my simple, little message to Commissioners Privette and Freeman, Darrell Bost, Carl Hill, and Harold Smith: Gentlemen, please - RTFO.