Comments | Eastern NC Now

It is great to have a city council that is working for the citizens and taxpayers instead of for the greedy special interest who were looting the city, and when it comes to looting the city, we need to get that money back from the former manager.

Commented: Thursday, January 1st, 2026 @ 2:05 pm By: Bubba

Fritz mentioned a couple of things that grabbed my attention:

1. Building Schools

The CITY is going to build new schools? I would think that would be a County endeavor; Are we going back to a "Washington City Schools" scenario?

People don't want another Washington Montessori or Terra Ceia Christian School; they want community charter schools, like BGCS, throughout the County so they DON'T have to come all the way to Washington.

2. Bringing in land developers

There has been a noticable population decrease since 2020. People are either dying or leaving the County due to sub-par education, insane real estate prices (controlled by the school board), lack of industry and idiotic politics. Houses aren't flying off the market...unless you're a rich Yankee moving down here to retire in what's become known as a "Death Community". I'm not understanding the "glitter appeal" of living in overpriced homes stacked on top of each other.

3. The New Mayor

TBA...

Commented: Thursday, January 1st, 2026 @ 11:44 am By: John Valley

Good to see our council hard at work. Bobby Roberson is a great choice for interim. He knows our city and its government very well. Tyre, who does not even really live in the city, is a phony and nothing but a bitter trouble maker, still butt hurt our his political machine losing control.

What about that outrageous payola to the former city manager of $140,000 of taxpayer money? That needs to be clawed back.

Commented: Thursday, January 1st, 2026 @ 10:07 am By: John Steed

Thank-you John for your concurrence.

Commented: Thursday, January 1st, 2026 @ 7:07 am By: Stan Deatherage

The GOP is eating itself alive and MAGA ain't quite got the horsepower it used to have; I hate to say it but it's an undeniable truth. People aren't as clueless as they were in 2016.

Current "MAGA" Republicans, those who hotdogged it through the "Election Integrity" farce and played along with the "BIDEN is a legitimate President" script, are in a very tight spot with the remaining voters come primary time.

The "old guard" mentality of conducting conservative political strategy has led to several disastrous high profile fumbles that ended campaigns overnight. The turd that Robinson started never stopped rolling downhill; they wanted you to forget it was there.

There has to be a "come to Jesus" but the odds of that happening look slim at the present. They would rather go down with the ship than face intelligent public questioning. I wouldn't be surprised if one of them was to get on TV and sound completely cookoo for CoCo Puffs....something that makes absolutely no sense.

Commented: Wednesday, December 31st, 2025 @ 3:45 pm By: John Valley

This makes you wonder if Buckhout's health problems were of the mental health variety. Did voices in her head tell her Trump gave her a shout out when he clearly did not?

Commented: Wednesday, December 31st, 2025 @ 8:07 am By: Bubba

Clearly, some of the party leaders do not abide by the plan of organization and operate by pushing their own personal agendas using the party as their platform. These party officers have disrespected the committee as a whole and have gone rogue - so far with no consequences. These atrocities must be addressed if the Beaufort County Republican Party is to retain any credibility. This is corrupt behavior. The violators need to answer for their crimes and receive punishment for their violations of trust.

Truely, there are major issues with abuse of power, maturity, ethics, fair play good sense, and a community mission within the confines of the party. And let's not forget outright dishonest hatefulness, oftentimes directed toward a long and growing list of native conservatives. At this time the Beaufort County Republican party is an embarrassment.

If good people on the committee do not find a way to address this monstrosity, this local institution should be shunned by honest people forever. If it comes to that, look at the harm done to the people of Beaufort County. It's bad enough now. It is imperative that confidence be restored for the good of Beaufort County. Isn't that what we all should be working for?

Obviously, some of the people involved are not in it for the right reasons. Such people must not be allowed to hold power without the rights to that power. In fact, no one has the right to usurp power.

Commented: Tuesday, December 30th, 2025 @ 4:34 pm By: Van Zant

There is some serious sleaze all over the place. Some folks have no tolerance for some of it but have a high tolerance for the other of it. As for me, sleaze is sleaze.

I'll not be sacrificing any of my local representatives for any of these high and mighty state reps.

Commented: Tuesday, December 30th, 2025 @ 9:11 am By: Van Zant

I want to commend our own State Senator Bob Brinson who represents Beaufort County as one of the only three senate Republicans who stood alongside Senator Bobby Hanig to oppose the Shrimpgate bill. No Democrats did at all. The others were staunch conservative Senator Norm Sanderson of Pamlico County and Senator Michael Lazzara of Onslow County. I thank them for their courage in standing up to the "leadership" on this awful bill.

Commented: Monday, December 29th, 2025 @ 5:33 pm By: Steven P. Rader

There is some serious sleaze among the RINOs in the General Assembly, mostly on the Senate side with Berger, but some on the House side, especially with a few committee chairmen like Dixon. Pay for Play is what led to Berger pushing Shrimpgate, which was totally corrupt and an outrage. Pay to Play is also what led Dixon to try to shut down NC's raw milk farmers. Total corruption. It is Tammany Hall on a state level. Republicans need to oust this vermin in our primaries.

These people, both the corrupt RINOs and the special interests, are smart enough to do their crooked business verbally, either face to face, or on the phone, where there will be no paper trail. FOIA does no good in tracking down verbal deals. They would probably have to plant bugs in Berger's office to get a handle on this sleaze, and that is not going to happen.

Commented: Monday, December 29th, 2025 @ 1:32 pm By: Rino Hunter

Appropriations Act provisions are frequent grist for attacks on legislators because most citizens don't know how that process works. This bill is the state budget, and you have to vote down the entire budget to take provisions out. That is why the Appropriations Committee puts in "special provisions" that they could never pass on their own merits, like that one Washingtonian referred to below.

(This is a response to Washingtonian's comment below and does not involve Shrimpgate, as the amendment to kill the shrimping industry was made to a bill that was under the normal legislative process, not part of an appropriations bill)

The Appropriation Committees in House and Senate meet in secret, and nobody outside of the top leadership knows what they are doing as they prepare the budget. Legislators with items they could never pass on their own merits try to get them added as "special provisions".

When the Appropriations bill is made public it is fast tracked to a vote. Legislative rules do not allow for amendments to it from the floor. It is an up or down vote. Occasionally, things are so egregious that enough people in either House or Senate just refuse to move the budget. That has happened this year with some of the stuff that Berger had his senate appropriations committee put in the appropriations bill in the Senate like tax increases and the House said no. The Freedom Caucus is a significant part of the House resistance this year to Berger's budget.

There are always some bad things in Appropriations bills. It is just the nature of the beast. The real question is whether they are the hill to die on, because if the appropriations bill is defeated, then all the things like pay raises for teachers and other state employees, and useful new programs go down the drain, too. Not all special provisions are bad, but because they are a way around the usual legislative process, they all too often are. The one you mention certainly is one of those bad special provisions. Every time a budget is voted on, every year, there will be bad things in it. The budget process does not allow them to be surgically removed, so to stop them, legislators have to bring down the entire budget.

Anybody familiar with the process, which most are not, know it is a really cheap shot to go after an opponent based on special provisions in the budget, because there are always bad ones. To stop these things, we would never have a budget.

The 2023 Appropriations Act also went through when a different House Speaker was in office, and he played hard ball much more than the present Speaker. To vote against the budget then, if successfully blocking it, would have likely meant all the local money for legislators who blocked it being taken out of the new budget.

Washingtonian must have had Armstrong share his opposition research. One wonders what other cheap shots might be in there.

Citizens should wish for changes in legislative rules to allow a mechanism to amend the budget on the floor, such as with a super majority vote or something to stop endless amendments, or to strictly limit special provisions in budgets. Unfortunately, legislative leaders, even the benign ones, have never been amenable to such changes and would fight tooth and nail against any proposal to do so. Again, it is just the nature of the beast.

Commented: Monday, December 29th, 2025 @ 11:17 am By: John Steed