The Board of Commissioners' Clown Car rolls on | Eastern North Carolina Now

    Publisher's Note: This article originally appeared in the Beaufort Observer.

    Monday (8-4-14) night's Beaufort County Board of Commissioners' meeting was a phenomenal event. We would not have believed it had we not seen it with our own eyes. You'll get to see it when the video is released, but let us jump ahead and tell you what we know is going to be hard to believe.

    First, the background, once again. There will be an election in November for three seats on the board. There will be at least two new board members elected and perhaps more. Stan Deatherage and Al Klemm will not be returning. Stan is opposed to building a new jail now. Al is for it. He has joined the three Democrats (Robert Belcher, Jerry Langley and Ed Booth) in providing the one-vote majority to make the decisions to push the jail along. We've dubbed them the Gang of Four. So what you have is a lame-duck majority that is pushing it. Two candidates running to replace Stan and Al have signed a letter saying they will vote to kill the project if elected. They are Frankie Waters and Keith Kidwell. It is generally believed the voters are opposed to building a new jail. The reasoning for that conclusion is that the proponents of building a jail refuse to allow it to be put to a vote of the people.

    They planned to get the money to finance the 20-30 million dollar project from the U. S. Department of Agriculture. USDA turned them down, because they have not gotten the people's support in a referendum. So Monday night they considered how to get alternative financing. What they heard was that they will have to get the Local Government Commission's approval for financing the project. They don't have that approval but authorized the staff to make application.

    But the problem is that if the majority flips and two members are elected who will vote to scrap the project then much of the money they are now spending will be wasted but it will save the taxpayers 20-30 million dollars.

    So the proposal put before the board, from Commissioner Hood Richardson, was that they delay spending any more money on the project until they get the financing approved. They voted 3-4 to not do that but to spend another million dollars in addition to about two million they've already committed to spend to rush the project along. They are taking that money out of fund balance (savings), hoping they can get permanent financing to replace the fund balance. But rather than stopping or slowing the spending until they know they can get the permanent financing they voted to plow ahead.

    Apparently they are thinking (we use that term loosely) that they can get the project far enough along so that the new board will have no choice but to finish it.

    But there is a kink in that thinking. State law provides that the new board does not have to appropriate the annual debt service and if they choose not to do so and that any deficiency if the creditors foreclose on the collateral that is put up to back the loan then the county is not libel for the deficiency. The creditors are stuck if they can't sell the property for enough to cover the debt. That's a risky proposition with the election pending and a probable flip flop in the majority.

    So, you might wonder: Why don't they just wait until the new board is elected and let them decide? Or, at least stop/slow the spending until they know they can get permanent financing? Indeed, it makes no sense to us.

    But that's not all of the nonsense.

    Hood Richardson made a motion that they commission an audit to find out where the $70,000 a year they have been appropriating to the Sheriff's Department to "buy drugs" in undercover operations has actually been going, what kind of convictions they've gotten, how much of the money has been recovered and where the money that was not recovered has gone. The board voted 3-4 against doing the audit. When you watch the video you will see that there was no sensible reason not to find out where the money has gone.

    After the meeting commissioner candidate Keith Kidwell remarked to us: "Wow is all I can say. Tonight the four commissioners that always seem to be on the wrong side of logic have again set me wondering. There was a motion made to do a forensic audit of the sheriff's department spending of $70,000.00 per year to make drug buys. There has been no accounting of this money and there still will not, because they have decided it would be better to audit the sheriff's office after the new sheriff is elected. What good will that do? There will be no one there to answer any questions. From a business, financial and logical prospective that makes no sense at all. The people of Beaufort County deserve to know how their money is spent. This $70,000.00 has had no accounting whatsoever, as elected officials how could you not ask for an accounting of taxpayers' money? I guess common sense is just not as common as you think it should be."

    Then, to add insult to injury they voted 3-4 not to have the current Sheriff do an equipment inventory before he leaves office. Yep, you read that correctly. They appropriate hundreds of thousands of dollars to the Sheriff every year to buy equipment. But they don't know what he bought, and what is still on hand and what is unaccounted for. There will be a new Sheriff taking office in December and they will not know what equipment was turned over from the outgoing Sheriff to the new Sheriff.

    Now one observer remarked after the meeting: "This is crazy. They are deliberately making bad decisions simply to spite Hood Richardson." Now, surely that's not true, you reckon? That would not make sense, now would it.

    Well...

    Commentary

    We are fully aware of the disrespect we are showing toward the Gang of Four (Belcher, Klemm, Langley and Booth). We regret having to do so, but we think it is entirely appropriate. These four men are exhibiting supreme arrogance and stubbornness at the expense of the hard pressed taxpayers of Beaufort County.

    It matters not whether you think we need to build a new jail or where it should or should not be built. What matters is that it is absolute foolishness to rush ahead before the election that may, and we think likely will, turn the project into a waste dump.

    We think the board should have had an impartial study done to determine if a new jail is needed now and if so what the options are for meeting those needs. The plan should have then been sold to the people who should have been allowed to vote whether to borrow this much money.

    But even if they were not going to let the people vote on the issue the Gang of Four certainly should recognize the reality that the election may change the majority on the board. It is the epitome of arrogance to rush ahead spending $11,000 a day planning a project that may likely not ever happen.

    We have no respect for any politician who puts his wishes above the will of the people. There is no excuse for that. But that is what we've got in Beaufort County.

    The disrespect we regret, and our apologies are to clowns, not these four men.

    It seems to us that the members of the Gang of Four simply do not understand reality. The reality in Beaufort County now is that many people and small businesses are hurting. Property owners have been hit with significant tax increases in recent years, along with increased insurance costs. People who rent or lease property are having to bear the load as the expense is shifted to them, many of whom are low and fixed income people. The loss of manufacturing jobs has hit Beaufort County harder than most places.

    The issue then is not whether the county needs a new jail/public safety center. That's not the point. The issue is the people simply cannot afford the increased taxes that this project will dump on them. Clearly, for four men to sit there and vote to waste a million dollars simply by not delaying the process for a few weeks shows that they don't understand reality in this county.

    Again we say, the issue is not whether a new public safety center is needed or a good idea. The issue is: The people simply cannot afford it at this time. Many people simply cannot stand another tax increase until the economy rebounds.

    As soon as the video is released we'll post it so you can watch all this for yourself. It's quite a show.

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