Assuming a new city council reaches an agreement on what to do about solid waste early in the next term, the budget is likely to be the major challenge in the next two years. Revenues are likely to be lower than hoped for because of the depressed housing market, while services and infrastructure remain in demand. Mayoral challenger Robbie Perkins would like to move forward with the Downtown Greenway. At-large challenger Wayne Abraham wants to repair city roads. District 3 challenger Jay Ovittore wants to hire additional police officers.
No surprise that the four conservative incumbents on council, including Mayor Bill Knight, have pledged to not raise taxes or water rates, as documented in a video clip produced by Conservatives for Guilford County. At-large incumbent Danny Thompson and at-large challenger Chris Lawyer also took the pledge. Mayoral challenger Robbie Perkins has left his options open when asked the question.
“It’s a qualified maybe answer,” said Perkins when asked during a candidate forum hosted by the Greater Greensboro Republican Women’s Club on Oct. 25 if he would vote to raise taxes. Asked if he would raise water rates and if he would cut spending, he responded, “It depends.”
Abraham may be the only challenger that has campaigned against cutting taxes, calling the council vote in 2010 to cut property taxes by a quarter of cent, “a jobs-killing tax cut.” He argues that the reduction had an insignificant impact on taxpayers, but stripped the city budget with the result that council cut funding to the Greensboro Partnership, which works to recruit new businesses to the city.
Only one candidate has expressed active interest in raising taxes.
“I don’t believe we can move Greensboro forward if we keep our taxes the way they are,” District 2 challenger C. Bradley Hunt II told an audience at the downtown public library for a forum hosted by the Greensboro Neighborhood Congress on Oct. 24. “I am a citizen and I believe that everyone wants to keep taxes low. It makes us all comfortable. But in order for us to spur economic development, in order for us to improve our infrastructure and to improve our services we must look for new ways to generate income for the city. So I believe we have to look at new ways that we may increase our tax rate so we can provide services for our citizens. So I think that in order to improve our services and infrastructure, in order to increase our police department, fire services, and also to give small business owners and minority business owners a chance to compete, we must look at ways to raise taxes.”
Incumbent Jim Kee was happy to take the opposing side on the issue.
“Certainly I would not advocate raising taxes,” he said. “Matter of fact, I voted to lower taxes. In this type of economy, citizens could not afford any increase in taxes. The way we can expand the revenue in Greensboro is to bring more businesses, to create more small businesses right here in our city. And that’s exactly what I have been doing.”
Kee, a developer, said he worked with Kotis Properties to open the H&F cafeteria at the corner of Church Street and Pisgah Church Road, creating 60 jobs. He said he has also worked with Kotis Properties to open Pace Medical at the intersection of East Cone Boulevard and Summit Avenue, which employs 30 people.
“That’s the way we keep taxes low and keep services great in Greensboro,” Kee said.
Zack Matheny, a registered Republican seeking reelection to the District 3 seat, told the audience at the Greater Greensboro Republican Women’s Club Forum that he would not vote to raise taxes. One day earlier he gave a somewhat more qualified answer to the Greensboro Neighborhood Congress.
“I don’t know, quite honestly, what’s going to happen with taxes,” he said. “My goal would be to not increase taxes. I’ve said that and we’ve been able to accomplish that by not increasing and actually have a very small, slight decrease for the city. One of our major issues is going to be real estate valuations in the next couple years.”
Historically, home values have appreciated over all, with the result that local governments can cut the tax rate and maintain neutral revenue. Real estate is revalued every eight years, and Guilford County is due for a revaluation next year. If, as expected, property values have depreciated overall because of the foreclosure and housing crisis, then local governments will have to choose between increasing the rate to maintain neutral revenue or cutting spending to compensate for reduced revenue at the current rate.
After the candidate forum Matheny said in an interview that his ultimate objective is to keep the tax bill flat, whatever that requires.
Jay Ovittore, who is challenging Matheny for the District 3 seat, stressed spending needs.
“I don’t want to make promises that I can’t keep, so I don’t want to say that I’m not going to vote to raise taxes, if necessary,” he said. “We need 200 more police officers on our police force. We need more fire people. We need our roads taken care of. We need to upgrade the Osborne water treatment plan so we can handle a capacity that’s almost near full at this point and continue to bring clean water to our communities. So that money’s going to come from somewhere. We can either get creative and do something about the landfill: Keep it closed, make it a regional solution, maybe own a regional solution, maybe cut off some of that as a portfolio, do some waste to energy. And if we spend the money on waste to energy now, that waste to energy is going to make us back millions more. And if I can keep your tax rate flat, I’ll do that. But I simply don’t know until I have the numbers in front of me.”
Mary Rakestraw, the conservative District 4 incumbent, has consistently pledged that she will not vote to raise taxes.
“With the present economy that we have we’ve got to be good stewards of your money and my money,” she said. “And I pay taxes, too. And this is a situation, y’all, that we cannot go the well but so many times. You have a budget in your own home. And you have to look at how you spend your money. And when you don’t have enough money, what do you do?... And, you know, I bet you even if you go home this coming week and you say, ‘What could I cut out that would not hurt my lifestyle, what would it be?’ Surely there is something. And we’re going to have to look at that as we go into the next two years. We have to be smart. We have to be prudent. And again, y’all, I cannot say this enough: We cannot tax ourselves out of this situation that we’re in at the present.”
Like Ovittore, District 4 challenger Nancy Hoffmann emphasized spending needs, prefacing her remarks by saying she is “committed to sound financial stewardship.”
“No one can predict the future,” she said. “So we really have to see what the situation is next year or the following year, but we know that we have possibly deferred some very important maintenance in this city. Those things catch up with you sometime down the road, and when they do the cost may be greater. We bear the cost of training the police staff and the fire staff in this city. And if we lose them a year or two years after we train them, then we have lost the cost of that investment in those people, and they’ve gone to High Point, or to Burlington, or Reidsville for another thousand dollars a year.”
Hoffmann said that a city, like any business, must “drill down” to see what spending items are “not absolutely essential” during difficult economic times, and have an honest conversation with citizens about what services they want to maintain, what they’re willing to give up, and what they’re willing to pay for.
Trudy Wade, the conservative incumbent in District 5, said she would not raise taxes.
“There’s two ways not to raise taxes,” she said. “And no, I wouldn’t raise taxes. Two ways to do that. Either you’re going to have to cut things or you’re going to have to bring in more jobs, more people, and increase your base of people paying in. There’s only two ways to do it. I think we’ve tried as a council to bring more jobs here. And I think we’ve done a pretty good job of that. For 12 of 16 years the unemployment rate’s been going up. This last year it’s started to go down again.”
In fact, data for the Greensboro-High Point metropolitan statistical area posted by the NC Employment Security Commission indicates that the unemployment rate increased in eight of the past 16 years. The rate has been declining over all over the past two years, but has remained at above 10 percent since 2009 after bouncing between 3 percent and 7 percent during the period from 1996 to 2008.
Wade credited the city council’s efforts to keep property taxes and water rates low with what progress has been seen in reducing the unemployment rate. During her remarks the councilwoman linked the tax rate to efforts to reopen the White Street Landfill, which she favors.
“If we were using our own landfill, we could save $8 million a year,” she said. “We won’t talk about the $30- or $40 million we’ve lost over the past four or five years.”
The $8 million figure tossed around by Wade, Thompson and The Rhinoceros Times is at odds with the $3.1 million per year in annual cost savings estimated by the city’s solid waste consultant for the plan to reopen the landfill that was adopted by the conservative faction. The difference can be chalked up to closure costs once the currently permitted portions of the landfill are depleted. Those who cite the $8 million figure argue that closure costs should not be included because the landfill would eventually have to be closed anyway. But under the current arrangement, the permitted portion of the landfill accepts a miniscule amount of screening, allowing it to remain open indefinitely.
Wade blamed a group of citizens who filed suit against the city to prevent the landfill from reopening with scuttling the city’s ability to pursue a regional approach, recycling, waste-to-energy technology, investments in infrastructure and cost savings.
“And we tried to take a regional approach,” she said. “And we tried to take the companies on the cutting edge of waste management and bring them into an RFP, and say, ‘What can you do for this community with technology, with recycling, and do a long-range plan for us.’ This is the first council that really stood back and said, ‘Let’s take a look at that.’ What can we do to cut this $8 million-a-year cost? And, of course, we ended up in a lawsuit, so all that technology, infrastructure, all that additional money we were going to have for the city, of course that won’t be the case now.”
Showing posts with label Wayne Abraham. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Wayne Abraham. Show all posts
Danny Thompson's specious landfill numbers
The question of what to do with Greensboro’s solid waste has receded somewhat as a campaign issue since Gate City Waste Services withdrew its proposal to operate the White Street Landfill in September. Yet the issue is far from settled: The city holds a contract with Republic Services to handle the city’s solid waste through the end of the year. And the six candidates vying for the three at-large seats on council hold different positions on the issue.During a forum hosted by the Greensboro Neighborhood Congress at the downtown library last night, moderator Marsh Prause asked some of the candidates to address a perception that Gate City Waste Services was preordained as the selected vendor to operate the landfill long before the vote was taken.
“The third proposal, the RFP that we went through based on five different companies — there was a myriad of five different rates that they proposed based on the quantity of trash that would go into the landfill,” said incumbent Danny Thompson, who was one of four sitting council members that attempted to reopen the landfill. “When the consultant got up and did his PowerPoint presentation he picked two out of those five to say, ‘Well, here’s some of the lower rates.’ As you probably may have read in the News & Record op-ed piece, what I have always stated is that we should take our own green garbage cans — household residential trash — put it in Phase III of the landfill. That would take up capacity [for] 15 years. And there would be only one fourth of the trucks that are going through neighborhoods. And at that rate, at that volume, DH Griffin was the lowest-cost provider. And you also have a flat rate where it’s not escalating with a percentage of rate increase over time. And so that’s the reason I then and continue to say that that was the best deal for Greensboro.”
Thompson’s statement that DH Griffin — a local demolition company whose executives are majority partners in Gate City Waste Services, a solid waste vendor pre-selected by city council to operate the White Street Landfill — was the lowest cost bidder is at odds with the views of the city’s solid waste consultant and staff, and at odds with the councilman’s own statement from the dais (background) before voting to initiate contract negotiations with the company.
After Councilwoman Trudy Wade made the motion, Thompson clarified, “The company that she mentioned, Gate City Waste Services, down at the bottom — their rank is second.”
Under the scenario referenced in Wade’s motion, as outlined by consultant Joe Readling, the city would accept 140,000 tons per year extending the life of the landfill to seven and a half years. That would equate to 11,167 tons per month. Considering that Gate City Waste Services offered the city fixed rate per ton, it could provide the lowest cost arrangement — but only if the landfill accepted less than 10,000 tons per month; other companies proposed to discount the rate as the volume increased. In other words, the model adopted by council in the motion contemplated a waste volume in excess of the tonnage at which Gate City Waste Services could provide the lowest cost.
While Thompson states that he favors the landfill accepting only household waste, he voted for a model that also includes city-collected commercial waste — totaling 140,000 tons per year. During a break at the forum, Thompson explained that the city could have negotiated with the Gate City to impose a transfer fee for every ton of commercial waste, which then could have been rebated to the city. That in itself would not have necessarily reduced the monthly tonnage of solid waste to make Gate City the most competitive bidder, but it’s conceivable that some commercial customers might have balked at the transfer fee and gone with a private service instead. In any case, Thompson’s assertion that Gate City was the lowest cost bidder is based on conjecture considering that the company withdrew its proposal before council had an opportunity to vote on a final contract.
Nancy Vaughan, who has served as mayor pro tem over the past two years, is effectively running against fellow incumbent Thompson on the issue.
“I think the reason why there is that perception out there is because whenever there was an opportunity to look at something else, such as talking to Republic Services, who, at that point said they could save us $3.5 million as opposed to $3.1 [million] without opening the landfill, it was voted down on a 4-3 vote,” she said. “And something like that is a little hard to defend. If there’s a possibility that you’re going to save more money and not open the landfill, why not have that discussion? I think it was things like that that contributed to the perception that this train was going to DH Griffin whether or not they liked it. I have to say that I think council contributed to that by not listening to staff and not taking their advice and doing things that they suggested that might have put us in another direction.”
Marikay Abuzuaiter, a challenger who has been active in efforts to keep the landfill closed, also criticized the process to select a vendor.
“We know that it’s taken staff time and energy,” she said. “We know that it has brought the community together, but the council didn’t listen. When you have three RFPs going out there, you have all of staff’s time, all of this energy, and our council did not even listen to the recommendations from city manager. So those things adding up, the perception is out there that the RFP was a done deal, but what wasn’t planned on was that several organizations in Greensboro, including the League of Women Voters of the Piedmont Triad, of which I’m a part, looked and this and said, ‘This is wrong.’ So many organizations in Greensboro pulled together and said, ‘This is wrong. This entire process is flawed.’”
The three other candidates outlined their thoughts about forging a solution to the city’s solid waste challenge going forward.
“The key to this is going to be good communication amongst all the members of the council and then communication with the citizens,” challenger Chris Lawyer said. “So in order to find the best solution we’re going to have to have good communication. I think we’re going to have to look at what’s going to be best for Greensboro…. Recycling has got to be one of our priorities to make our footprint less. If we’re not going to reduce our footprint then our waste problem is not getting better; it’s getting worse. So I think a top-flight recycling program, educating people on composting. I think that would be good. That would help reduce waste in our city. And then I think you have got to look at your plan. What is your short-term plan and your long-term plan? And look at each one of them and look at the cost associated. I think regional solutions are probably our best option. And then we’ve got to look at waste-to-energy plans that are maybe not right now, but they are going to be in the future — they are going to be beneficial for our city. Because those actually reduce your waste even further and it reduces your footprint even further.”
What Lawyer left unsaid is that he is on record in support of reopening the landfill.
Challengers Wayne Abraham and Yvonne Johnson put forward similar proposals for handling the city’s solid waste that emphatically reject reopening the landfill.
“Certainly I don’t think we need to reopen the White Street Landfill,” Abraham said. “I think we should take Republic Waste up on its offer. They offered us a deal where we could save three and a half million and not have to reopen the landfill. I think that’s certainly something we need to do. We could also, by implementing the Sustainability Action Plan, increase our recycling, reduce our own waste, reduce our costs and actually increase some of the income the city receives. And we would look for a regional solution. Randolph County is one possible option with a longer-term solution being possibly technology/waste to energy. But all of this would be done in cooperation with the citizens of Greensboro and listening to the citizens of Greensboro and coming up with a solution that suits all of us. Because there are solutions that do reduce our costs without having to make our neighbors live in trash. Because I personally do not want to force my neighbors to live in trash and have trucks going down the road and rodents running around and the horrible smell that they would have had to endure.”
Johnson said, “I think that we need a regional solution in the short term. I don’t think that the landfill should be reopened for some of the reasons I stated before — economic development. And no major city in North Carolina, no major city has a landfill in their city limits a few miles from your downtown. And so I think waste to energy is something I have proposed for a very long time. And I think it’s very possible to do it at our transfer station when the technology is ready or when we get a “godfather” deal where we don’t have to plunk down anything. But to have a regional plan in the short term is the best plan because even if the landfill’s open you only have about four years. Then where’s our trash going? What do we do? We’ll be in a pickle again.”
Candidates took different positions on the Sustainability Action Plan. The current council voted unanimously to accept rather than adopt the plan in January, and then promptly shelved it. Prause asked if candidates would implement the plan.
Vaughan said the reason council accepted rather than adopted the plan is because in the past the council had voted to implement neighborhood plans, and residents actually tried to hold the city to them when rezoning decisions came up.
“So we’ve stopped adopting and we’ve started accepting things,” Vaughan said. “But accepting things I think you can take the best parts out of it. I think it does demand that we have a further study of it, that as a council we need to sit down and review it, which we haven’t done. It doesn’t have to require a lot of money. My daughter’s school has won the ‘Green Cup Challenge’ two years in a row. They cut their utility bills by 30 percent, just by doing some basic steps. I think if we could educate our staff on certain sustainability things that they can do every day that we could take strides for it. So I do think it’s a plan that we have to look at and that we have to take it in small bites. I wouldn’t be willing to do the whole plan at this point. I think we need to look at it and prioritize it.”
Lawyer echoed Vaughan’s stance.
“I think we have to break down that plan and see what we can make work in that plan and what may not truly work in the long term,” he said. “I think that plan has some good components. But it’s also got some plans that may not [work] for long-term sustainability. I think that’s where we’ve got to look at this and make sure we’re looking at the pieces of this that are long term for us, not short-term gains. We need to look at long-term gains that we can potentially maximize in this. And that will hopefully save money in the long term for us.”
As mayor, Johnson established the Greensboro Sustainability Council, which drew up the plan.
“I’ve read this plan,” she said. “It is an excellent plan. I spoke in favor of this plan. And I would hope this council would take it and really study it. And we would talk about it. And if we want to begin at a certain point, fine. But if something’s going to save our city $20 million and it’s not going to cost us anywhere near that, it’s something I think we ought to pay attention to. And as much as I want green jobs to be a part of Greensboro’s culture, I think this is definitely a reason that I would definitely promote it.”
Since the campaign has gotten underway the emergency of Occupy Greensboro has highlighted mounting frustration with the failure of government to effectively address economic insecurity. And national media coverage this week singled out Greensboro as emblematic of a national trend of surging poverty in the suburbs.
Abuzuaiter and Abraham fielded a question about how they would address a crisis of “high unemployment, rising poverty and a feeling of despair among many of our citizens.”
“We need to listen to our community,” Abuzuaiter said. “There are brilliant minds in our community. We need to bring everyone to the table. We need to come together to try to solve these issues. We have 20 percent poverty rate in Guilford County. Another item is that 35 percent of the students in our schools are living in poverty. We really need to address these conditions that our people are going through. I would certainly propose and hope that we bring our minds together and come to some solutions in order to create the jobs that will eventually solve all this. Do we need to be promoting our sustainable community? Of course. Do we need to be trying to help our local community? Of course. There are several initiatives going on there. The Greensboro Currency Project. There are so many things that can help sustainability. But we’ve got to address the immediate needs at hand. We have people who are starving. If you haven’t noticed lately, there is an increase in the homeless population. Our homeless shelters do not have beds for women. They are taken up every night. We have nothing there for women to go to, to spend the night in a safe and warm environment. All of these things need to be addressed. Can we solve it with one council? Of course not. But I certainly hope that we can bring our community together, have everyone bring their ideas and suggestions, work with our nonprofits and churches. When we all come to the table there are brilliant things that can happen. And I do believe we are going to need to involve the community to make that happen.”
Abraham said, “I do agree that we’re in a crisis situation when we have rising unemployment and rising poverty, we see median incomes declining in our own area, when an article in The New York Times says, I think it’s an 83 percent increase in what is referred to as ‘suburban poverty.’ And we know that where we live is suffering economically. We have to do something about it. That is why I am focusing my platform on economic development. Because, in my opinion, we have to take whatever resources city government has available to it, and move them into restoring our own economic growth. And that’s why I’ve proposed the buy-local campaign and even redirecting some of the city’s spending. And looking at how we can pull together public and private capital. And looking at how we can restore funding or even increase funding for the economic development partnership. And restoring our infrastructure spending. If we are able to have savings from deals that we make for reducing our waste costs, those savings need to be redirected towards maintaining our roads. That will create jobs. People will get jobs working on our roads. So there are all kinds of things we can begin to do, and we need to do, because we’re in a situation that can’t wait.”
Abraham will stay in race, hopes to win with Abuzuaiter and Johnson
At-large candidate Wayne Abraham narrowly made it through the primary election, placing sixth, but he plans to hang on. Abraham and Marikay Abuzuaiter appeal to an overlapping constituency as progressive newcomers who have served on the human relations commission and have taken similar stances on a number of issues, but it appears they are competing for the third place seat in the general election.
Former mayor Yvonne Johnson and mayor pro tem Nancy Vaughan showed most strongly in the primary placing first and second, and many expect them to stay in those positions in the general election, leaving only one seat open. With many points of similarity between Abraham and Abuzuaiter, it is possible they will split votes, allowing Lawyer or Thompson to come in third. Abuzuaiter came in third in the primary.
Abraham doesn't see it that way, saying that people are unpredictable and that he doesn't think all of his supporters would vote for Abuzuaiter if he withdrew, and vice versa.
"I think efforts are underway to see if it can't be Yvonne, Marikay and myself [on council]," Abraham said. "That's what we're shooting for. I think this election cycle is different."
In the past, Abraham said, being an incumbent was more solid ground to stand on, but this time around, he thinks both Vaughan and Thompson's seats are vulnerable.
Many factors will contribute to turnout changes in the general election, including the fact that three districts didn't have a primary, a new order of names on the ballot, a narrowed field and countless other variables.
At large races are particularly difficult to predict as well, because voters can choose one, two or three candidates as opposed to the district and mayoral races where each voter has one vote. Given all that is at play, Abraham isn't ready to throw in the towel.
"I think the best thing to do is for me and Marikay to run as hard as we can," he said, and that hopefully they could both win.
Gut punches at the Greensboro Partnership
Mayoral candidates Robbie Perkins and Bill Knight got rough with each other at an otherwise genteel candidate forum hosted by the Greensboro Partnership and SynerG.
“In terms of why I feel like I’m a better candidate for mayor, I have 16 years of experience in working under other mayors to know how to lead this city,” said Perkins, the challenger. “I think it’s been a problem the last couple of years that the mayor’s office has not had a lot of experience. For example, I never would have said that losing 1,600 jobs at American Express was a ‘blip’ on the radar screen.”
He ended his remarks abruptly to let the impact sink in.
For his part, Knight recycled attack lines from the Monday night mayoral debate at Guilford College.
“There are nine people on the council and they’ve got to work together all the time,” he said. “That means working together, paying attention; not sending out texts, not talking, not exhorting members of the audience to show disrespect. When we go on a retreat, it’s not a matter of getting in the mayor’s face and threatening an override if you don’t get your favorite commission appointment.”
Perhaps the question of most interest to the hosts was how the candidates proposed to support or work with the Greensboro Partnership, the city’s top economic and community development organization. The city council voted in June to cut $14,000 in funding to the partnership, along with other nonprofits. A last-minute effort to restore the funding failed, with council members Perkins and Nancy Vaughan on the losing end. Knight and Councilman Danny Thompson voted to maintain the funding cut.
“I think you’ve got to support the Greensboro Partnership,” Perkins said. “And I don’t think you can have a briefing session and have a 5-4 vote against retaining the full support of the partnership because you’re cutting advertising funding for the program…. So number one, you’ve got to support the partnership. Number two, you’ve got to support an environment in our city that small business thinks is stable, that we are going to support them, we’re going to be there for them. We’re going to give them the confidence to invest both money and time to make their businesses grow in our city.”
Vaughan said, “I currently serve on the board of the Greensboro Economic Development Alliance, so I’m very aware of what’s going on in the partnership and the chamber, and I support them 100 percent. This year, our funding was cut by 10 percent during our budget process. I advocated very strongly to restore that 10 percent. Unfortunately, I was not successful. In the city of Greensboro we do not have a large business office where we can be proactive; we’re reactive. We need people who are out there pounding the pavement and helping us find large employers. That’s something the chamber does.”
Knight said the council would continue to work with the partnership, and named a number of initiatives the city was pursuing to help small businesses. He added, “Our responsibility is municipal responsibility. Municipal government: providing for the healthy and safety and infrastructure and the other services that go with it.”
Thompson said he supported the partnership in two undertakings: An allocation of federal funding to create a small business revolving loan fund that will be administered by the Greensboro Chamber of Commerce, and an initiative to join the partnership in funding a national public relations campaign to attract attention to Greensboro.
Remarks from other at-large candidates:
Wayne Abraham: “As a candidate, I have already reached out to the partnership, and so obviously as a city council member I would do the same. I sat down with them to discuss what we can do to provide economic development in Greensboro, and their response to me was, in large part, what I proposed in my platform for economic development in Greensboro. And one of the items I proposed was restoring funding, perhaps even increasing funding for the partnership on specific projects so that we could promote our city and promote our own economic development in this area and in our city: Buy local, implementing our Sustainability Action Plan, restoring funding to our infrastructure, and increasing our funding to the economic development partnership.”
Marikay Abuzuaiter: “We must have those who are able to go out and seek economic development for Greensboro. The city council does not create jobs. It is up to us working with the partnership to make sure that they have the tools available where they can go out and seek these economic development opportunities for us. Now, we need to make sure we have in certain instances the infrastructure, the viability for our city. We need to make sure that we are creating that positive image that will help them help sell Greensboro and in turn bring jobs to Greensboro.”
Yvonne Johnson: “I really think it’s our duty as an elected official to partner and do all we can with the partnership, with the chamber, with all of the groups that are working for economic development. For goodness sake, every candidate at every forum said one of the most pressing needs in Greensboro is jobs, so how can you not do that? And it would also give you an advantage when you are talking to the citizens about what is going on in Greensboro in terms of the effort to recruit jobs so that they become shareholders in that information and proud of what the partnership and the council and all the entities are doing.”
Chris Lawyer: “I think when you have an economic development group you have to bring that group together in order to have sustainable economic development. And as an elected official you certainly are obligated to be part of that discussion because your constituents have brought you to the forefront to be a voice for them in economic development, so we have to work closely together as a city, and as a group with the Greensboro Partnership to find the best solutions. That means bringing businesses to the table, large and small, along with the economic development arms and also the city council and mayor and get the discussion going and talk about real solutions. It’s got to be a very dynamic and very fluid situation in order for this to be a successful process. And if we’re not going to do this, then I don’t think we’re giving our citizens the full economic impact we possibly could.”
An allegation has been circulating in conservative circles that the Greensboro Partnership submitted a question to the Triad Real Estate and Building Industries Coalition, or TREBIC, for a questionnaire on whether candidates would support a prepared food tax. Answers from the questionnaire have been used by an anonymous group claiming to represent the restaurant industry to characterize candidates positions. (See previous posts: 1 and 2.)
Jason Cannon, vice president of government affairs, flatly denied the allegation.
"That is not true," he said. "We did not submit any question to TREBIC about the restaurant tax."
Cannon added that he coordinated with TREBIC on the questionnaire, and he was the only representative of the partnership that did so. He said he saw a copy of the questionnaire just before it was finalized and did not ask to insert any questions.
"There was no formal discussion and no formal activity with us looking at a prepared food tax," he said, adding that he heard some idle talk about it and researched the law to satisfy his own curiosity. Cannon is registered as a lobbyist with the state of North Carolina representing the Greensboro Partnership.
Vaughan said Assistant City Manager Denise Turner Roth told council on Tuesday that a local prepared food tax would require the NC General Assembly to pass enabling legislation. The legislature's Republican leadership has taken a dim view of tax increases and has worked closely with the conservative members of Greensboro City Council on other issues. Mayoral candidate Perkins has called the matter "a made-up issue."
“In terms of why I feel like I’m a better candidate for mayor, I have 16 years of experience in working under other mayors to know how to lead this city,” said Perkins, the challenger. “I think it’s been a problem the last couple of years that the mayor’s office has not had a lot of experience. For example, I never would have said that losing 1,600 jobs at American Express was a ‘blip’ on the radar screen.”
He ended his remarks abruptly to let the impact sink in.
For his part, Knight recycled attack lines from the Monday night mayoral debate at Guilford College.
“There are nine people on the council and they’ve got to work together all the time,” he said. “That means working together, paying attention; not sending out texts, not talking, not exhorting members of the audience to show disrespect. When we go on a retreat, it’s not a matter of getting in the mayor’s face and threatening an override if you don’t get your favorite commission appointment.”
Perhaps the question of most interest to the hosts was how the candidates proposed to support or work with the Greensboro Partnership, the city’s top economic and community development organization. The city council voted in June to cut $14,000 in funding to the partnership, along with other nonprofits. A last-minute effort to restore the funding failed, with council members Perkins and Nancy Vaughan on the losing end. Knight and Councilman Danny Thompson voted to maintain the funding cut.
“I think you’ve got to support the Greensboro Partnership,” Perkins said. “And I don’t think you can have a briefing session and have a 5-4 vote against retaining the full support of the partnership because you’re cutting advertising funding for the program…. So number one, you’ve got to support the partnership. Number two, you’ve got to support an environment in our city that small business thinks is stable, that we are going to support them, we’re going to be there for them. We’re going to give them the confidence to invest both money and time to make their businesses grow in our city.”
Vaughan said, “I currently serve on the board of the Greensboro Economic Development Alliance, so I’m very aware of what’s going on in the partnership and the chamber, and I support them 100 percent. This year, our funding was cut by 10 percent during our budget process. I advocated very strongly to restore that 10 percent. Unfortunately, I was not successful. In the city of Greensboro we do not have a large business office where we can be proactive; we’re reactive. We need people who are out there pounding the pavement and helping us find large employers. That’s something the chamber does.”
Knight said the council would continue to work with the partnership, and named a number of initiatives the city was pursuing to help small businesses. He added, “Our responsibility is municipal responsibility. Municipal government: providing for the healthy and safety and infrastructure and the other services that go with it.”
Thompson said he supported the partnership in two undertakings: An allocation of federal funding to create a small business revolving loan fund that will be administered by the Greensboro Chamber of Commerce, and an initiative to join the partnership in funding a national public relations campaign to attract attention to Greensboro.
Remarks from other at-large candidates:
Wayne Abraham: “As a candidate, I have already reached out to the partnership, and so obviously as a city council member I would do the same. I sat down with them to discuss what we can do to provide economic development in Greensboro, and their response to me was, in large part, what I proposed in my platform for economic development in Greensboro. And one of the items I proposed was restoring funding, perhaps even increasing funding for the partnership on specific projects so that we could promote our city and promote our own economic development in this area and in our city: Buy local, implementing our Sustainability Action Plan, restoring funding to our infrastructure, and increasing our funding to the economic development partnership.”
Marikay Abuzuaiter: “We must have those who are able to go out and seek economic development for Greensboro. The city council does not create jobs. It is up to us working with the partnership to make sure that they have the tools available where they can go out and seek these economic development opportunities for us. Now, we need to make sure we have in certain instances the infrastructure, the viability for our city. We need to make sure that we are creating that positive image that will help them help sell Greensboro and in turn bring jobs to Greensboro.”
Yvonne Johnson: “I really think it’s our duty as an elected official to partner and do all we can with the partnership, with the chamber, with all of the groups that are working for economic development. For goodness sake, every candidate at every forum said one of the most pressing needs in Greensboro is jobs, so how can you not do that? And it would also give you an advantage when you are talking to the citizens about what is going on in Greensboro in terms of the effort to recruit jobs so that they become shareholders in that information and proud of what the partnership and the council and all the entities are doing.”
Chris Lawyer: “I think when you have an economic development group you have to bring that group together in order to have sustainable economic development. And as an elected official you certainly are obligated to be part of that discussion because your constituents have brought you to the forefront to be a voice for them in economic development, so we have to work closely together as a city, and as a group with the Greensboro Partnership to find the best solutions. That means bringing businesses to the table, large and small, along with the economic development arms and also the city council and mayor and get the discussion going and talk about real solutions. It’s got to be a very dynamic and very fluid situation in order for this to be a successful process. And if we’re not going to do this, then I don’t think we’re giving our citizens the full economic impact we possibly could.”
An allegation has been circulating in conservative circles that the Greensboro Partnership submitted a question to the Triad Real Estate and Building Industries Coalition, or TREBIC, for a questionnaire on whether candidates would support a prepared food tax. Answers from the questionnaire have been used by an anonymous group claiming to represent the restaurant industry to characterize candidates positions. (See previous posts: 1 and 2.)
Jason Cannon, vice president of government affairs, flatly denied the allegation.
"That is not true," he said. "We did not submit any question to TREBIC about the restaurant tax."
Cannon added that he coordinated with TREBIC on the questionnaire, and he was the only representative of the partnership that did so. He said he saw a copy of the questionnaire just before it was finalized and did not ask to insert any questions.
"There was no formal discussion and no formal activity with us looking at a prepared food tax," he said, adding that he heard some idle talk about it and researched the law to satisfy his own curiosity. Cannon is registered as a lobbyist with the state of North Carolina representing the Greensboro Partnership.
Vaughan said Assistant City Manager Denise Turner Roth told council on Tuesday that a local prepared food tax would require the NC General Assembly to pass enabling legislation. The legislature's Republican leadership has taken a dim view of tax increases and has worked closely with the conservative members of Greensboro City Council on other issues. Mayoral candidate Perkins has called the matter "a made-up issue."
Parsing differences between city council candidates, at large and district
A candidate forum last night at Congregational United Church of Christ drew aspiring public servants seeking to fill the three at-large seats, along with all five districts. In the at-large segment, discussion about sustainability and ties between council members and developers brought out the most interesting responses. The candidates’ answers shed some light on their level of familiarity with the issues and sense of priority about them — or lack of each, as the case may be.
George Hartzman, an unsuccessful candidate for the District 3 seat two years ago asked the candidates to address the possibility that a company called Land Port Investments LLC owned by local developer Roy Carroll might come before the council in the future with a request for incentives, and that Carroll has made substantial contributions to some candidates’ campaigns. Before the request was withdrawn, the city had considered granting $4 million to Carroll’s company.
Candidate Yvonne Johnson, who is among those whose campaigns have benefited from Carroll’s largesse, seemed to fumble in her response.
“When I talk about site-ready, I’m certainly not talking about any particular person’s business, except the city and the economic development council and the partnership needs to do that independently so that when people are interested in coming to Greensboro to build… that we have site-ready land,” she said, “not to benefit any particular person.”
Danny Thompson, who owns a personal care company said, “I’ve never received a dime from Roy Carroll, although I’d like to. I care for his mom.
Thompson told the audience: “The economic development bond project was a project that was brought before council just in the last several months by Andy Scott, our assistant city manager of economic development. It’s not a gift. What it is — it’s that economic bond money, and it will front the money to go ahead and put in the infrastructure – curb and gutter, and water and sewer. And then you, the taxpayers — correct me if I’m wrong — get the money back once a developer comes and buys — or they actually develop the project.”
In fact, Scott said that to date all projects approved by council have involved direct grants to developers for the purpose of improving infrastructure. With the Land Port Investments LLC proposal, which has been withdrawn indefinitely from council’s agenda, Scott said staff had envisioned that the city would make a direct grant to cover the cost of water, sewer and storm sewer, but loan money to the applicant for grading. The loan would be repaid upon sale of the property.
“I would say that the evaluation of whether to approve a project is, is it going to benefit the citizens of Greensboro as a whole,” candidate Wayne Abraham said. “And so that will be how I will make the decision. If it’s going to benefit Greensboro as a whole, and we’re going to come out ahead by putting some money into a project, then yes, it makes sense to do it. If it’s not, then it doesn’t make sense. Mr. Carroll has never donated a dime to me either, so I won’t have any conflict of interest in reviewing his proposals to us.”
One audience member was concerned about a proposal by city staff to dismantle the Greensboro Sustainability Council, which was established by Yvonne Johnson at the time she served as mayor. The current council voted to accept a Sustainability Action Plan earlier this year instead of adopting it. With the exception of Mayor Pro Tem Nancy Vaughan, who applauded recycling efforts at her daughter’s private school, no council members asked any questions or made any remarks about the plan.
Vaughan said last night that she would be surprised if the Greensboro Sustainability Council was dismantled, as proposed by staff.
“I hope it doesn’t get demolished,” Johnson said. “I think it’s a very important entity that we have here in Greensboro. I think it could be a catalyst for bringing green jobs and green-job training. I know when I was mayor we got $5 million from the federal government to do retrofitting and weatherization. One of the reasons is because we had a sustainability commission. I would definitely want it to remain. I think it has some great recommendations for Greensboro’s future.”
Marikay Abuzuaiter, an at-large candidate who is politically and personally aligned with Johnson said, “The sustainability action council was set up, and Mr. Joel Landau and Bob Powell are co-chairs of that. They worked very, very hard with the council to bring forward a plan to our city council.” She added that the four candidates who eagerly raised their hands to answer the questions — herself, Johnson, Abraham and Vaughan — would likely vote to bring the plan back and adopt it.
“I have not only been interested in keeping the sustainability committee alive; I’ve advocated from the very beginning that we have to implement the plan, look at all of its aspects and figure out how we can immediately start using some of the benefits that it provided for our city so that even the city government itself has means that it can use to save energy and reinvest our own money in ourselves,” Abraham said. “The plan itself says that if we could spend $9.3 million of our own dollars and then save $29 million of our own dollars. So to me, it makes perfect sense to use this revolving account that it talks about in order to do that because, in my opinion, we’re reinvesting our own money in ourselves.”
Thompson noted that he was among the council members who voted to accept the plan.
“The one little problem we had is we didn’t have $9.3 million to spend this past year,” he said. “That’s why the majority of council accepted it, gave it back to staff to break it down piecemeal to see what we can afford each and every year.”
Abraham challenged Thompson's statement today in a Facebook post: "If he had bothered to actually read the plan he would know that it does not call for an immediate expenditure of that amount. The city would start by refitting some buildings, bank the saved energy dollars, and then use those savings to do the next project, and then bank those savings and do the next project. The point was to create a fund that would cover these costs and in the end save us $29 million tax dollars."
One woman asked candidates what council could do to incentivize business investment in core areas of the city that suffer from high vacancy rates. The question seemed to be lost on many of the candidates, who instead discussed wage requirements in the city’s incentives policy. An exception was Johnson, who noted that many of the companies that bring large numbers of jobs to Greensboro prefer to invest in outlying areas.
“Part of implementing the Sustainability Action Plan will be to do exactly what you called for — looking at our land development ordinances, figure out ways to incentivize businesses to come and infill areas that we already have so that we’re not constantly expanding and then trying to send water and sewer yet further and incorporate more land,” Abraham said. “So obviously I would be in favor of that and I think it would be a wise investment of our own capital and our own resources.”
Thompson added, “When you’re referring to trying to incentivize a business to locate in a geographic area, typically that’s like an enterprise zone. In fact, last night, I was happy we unanimously voted for a small business loan for a specific area for businesses that are only in a blighted area where we need economic development, we need businesses to grow — along High Point Road, in the southeast Greensboro corridor area…. It is important because it’s less drain and drag on our services — police, fire et cetera when we have infill in a dense area.”
The $80,000 approved by council on Tuesday to help establish a small business loan pool will be drawn from federal Community Development Block Grant funds.
I'll have coverage of candidate statements in the district 1, 3 and 4 races in this space when time allows.
George Hartzman, an unsuccessful candidate for the District 3 seat two years ago asked the candidates to address the possibility that a company called Land Port Investments LLC owned by local developer Roy Carroll might come before the council in the future with a request for incentives, and that Carroll has made substantial contributions to some candidates’ campaigns. Before the request was withdrawn, the city had considered granting $4 million to Carroll’s company.
Candidate Yvonne Johnson, who is among those whose campaigns have benefited from Carroll’s largesse, seemed to fumble in her response.
“When I talk about site-ready, I’m certainly not talking about any particular person’s business, except the city and the economic development council and the partnership needs to do that independently so that when people are interested in coming to Greensboro to build… that we have site-ready land,” she said, “not to benefit any particular person.”
Danny Thompson, who owns a personal care company said, “I’ve never received a dime from Roy Carroll, although I’d like to. I care for his mom.
Thompson told the audience: “The economic development bond project was a project that was brought before council just in the last several months by Andy Scott, our assistant city manager of economic development. It’s not a gift. What it is — it’s that economic bond money, and it will front the money to go ahead and put in the infrastructure – curb and gutter, and water and sewer. And then you, the taxpayers — correct me if I’m wrong — get the money back once a developer comes and buys — or they actually develop the project.”
In fact, Scott said that to date all projects approved by council have involved direct grants to developers for the purpose of improving infrastructure. With the Land Port Investments LLC proposal, which has been withdrawn indefinitely from council’s agenda, Scott said staff had envisioned that the city would make a direct grant to cover the cost of water, sewer and storm sewer, but loan money to the applicant for grading. The loan would be repaid upon sale of the property.
“I would say that the evaluation of whether to approve a project is, is it going to benefit the citizens of Greensboro as a whole,” candidate Wayne Abraham said. “And so that will be how I will make the decision. If it’s going to benefit Greensboro as a whole, and we’re going to come out ahead by putting some money into a project, then yes, it makes sense to do it. If it’s not, then it doesn’t make sense. Mr. Carroll has never donated a dime to me either, so I won’t have any conflict of interest in reviewing his proposals to us.”
One audience member was concerned about a proposal by city staff to dismantle the Greensboro Sustainability Council, which was established by Yvonne Johnson at the time she served as mayor. The current council voted to accept a Sustainability Action Plan earlier this year instead of adopting it. With the exception of Mayor Pro Tem Nancy Vaughan, who applauded recycling efforts at her daughter’s private school, no council members asked any questions or made any remarks about the plan.
Vaughan said last night that she would be surprised if the Greensboro Sustainability Council was dismantled, as proposed by staff.
“I hope it doesn’t get demolished,” Johnson said. “I think it’s a very important entity that we have here in Greensboro. I think it could be a catalyst for bringing green jobs and green-job training. I know when I was mayor we got $5 million from the federal government to do retrofitting and weatherization. One of the reasons is because we had a sustainability commission. I would definitely want it to remain. I think it has some great recommendations for Greensboro’s future.”
Marikay Abuzuaiter, an at-large candidate who is politically and personally aligned with Johnson said, “The sustainability action council was set up, and Mr. Joel Landau and Bob Powell are co-chairs of that. They worked very, very hard with the council to bring forward a plan to our city council.” She added that the four candidates who eagerly raised their hands to answer the questions — herself, Johnson, Abraham and Vaughan — would likely vote to bring the plan back and adopt it.
“I have not only been interested in keeping the sustainability committee alive; I’ve advocated from the very beginning that we have to implement the plan, look at all of its aspects and figure out how we can immediately start using some of the benefits that it provided for our city so that even the city government itself has means that it can use to save energy and reinvest our own money in ourselves,” Abraham said. “The plan itself says that if we could spend $9.3 million of our own dollars and then save $29 million of our own dollars. So to me, it makes perfect sense to use this revolving account that it talks about in order to do that because, in my opinion, we’re reinvesting our own money in ourselves.”
Thompson noted that he was among the council members who voted to accept the plan.
“The one little problem we had is we didn’t have $9.3 million to spend this past year,” he said. “That’s why the majority of council accepted it, gave it back to staff to break it down piecemeal to see what we can afford each and every year.”
Abraham challenged Thompson's statement today in a Facebook post: "If he had bothered to actually read the plan he would know that it does not call for an immediate expenditure of that amount. The city would start by refitting some buildings, bank the saved energy dollars, and then use those savings to do the next project, and then bank those savings and do the next project. The point was to create a fund that would cover these costs and in the end save us $29 million tax dollars."
One woman asked candidates what council could do to incentivize business investment in core areas of the city that suffer from high vacancy rates. The question seemed to be lost on many of the candidates, who instead discussed wage requirements in the city’s incentives policy. An exception was Johnson, who noted that many of the companies that bring large numbers of jobs to Greensboro prefer to invest in outlying areas.
“Part of implementing the Sustainability Action Plan will be to do exactly what you called for — looking at our land development ordinances, figure out ways to incentivize businesses to come and infill areas that we already have so that we’re not constantly expanding and then trying to send water and sewer yet further and incorporate more land,” Abraham said. “So obviously I would be in favor of that and I think it would be a wise investment of our own capital and our own resources.”
Thompson added, “When you’re referring to trying to incentivize a business to locate in a geographic area, typically that’s like an enterprise zone. In fact, last night, I was happy we unanimously voted for a small business loan for a specific area for businesses that are only in a blighted area where we need economic development, we need businesses to grow — along High Point Road, in the southeast Greensboro corridor area…. It is important because it’s less drain and drag on our services — police, fire et cetera when we have infill in a dense area.”
The $80,000 approved by council on Tuesday to help establish a small business loan pool will be drawn from federal Community Development Block Grant funds.
I'll have coverage of candidate statements in the district 1, 3 and 4 races in this space when time allows.
Greensboro primary: at-large analysis
Color code:Yvonne Johnson — blue
Nancy Vaughan — purple
Chris Lawyer — orange
Danny Thompson — red
Wayne Abraham — aqua
Jean Brown — yellow
Tie — gray
Former mayor Yvonne Johnson dominated the electoral landscape in the at-large race in Greensboro's primary election on Oct. 11, carrying all precincts in east and south Greensboro except for two, along with the downtown area.
Nancy Vaughan, who currently serves as mayor pro tem carried a block of established neighborhoods stretching from Irving Park to Starmount.
Challenger Chris Lawyer and incumbent Danny Thompson, both conservatives, carved up the Cardinal, and Thompson carried the Grandover.
Marikay Abuzuaiter, who placed third overall in the primary, evidently rode Johnson's coattails, pulling most of her votes out of precincts carried by the former mayor.
Wayne Abraham carried one precinct by virtue of earning eight votes in G45, which covers UNCG.
GOP volunteer reportedly threatened near polling place
A Republican Party volunteer who was setting out campaign signs was threatened on the eve of today’s primary election outside of a northeast Greensboro polling place, a party official says.
Ryan Wilson was making the rounds with a bundle of signs last night at about 9:40 p.m. when he was approached by a black man on a bicycle at Peeler Recreation Center, the polling place for Precinct G05, Guilford County Republican Party Chairman Al Bouldin said. Wilson was holding a sign advertising Bill Knight, the conservative mayoral incumbent. Bouldin said the lighting was poor, so Wilson had difficulty making out distinguishing features about the man.
“He said — I’m paraphrasing here — he said, ‘You’re not going to put those signs out there; if you think you are, I’m going to pull a gun on you,” Bouldin said. The man also reportedly said, “I’m patrolling this area to make sure” nobody puts out Republican signs.
Bouldin said Wilson, who is the Republican precinct chair for Precinct Mon1, placed the signs back in his car and left the area.
Susan Danielsen, public information officer for the Greensboro Police Department, said the emergency communication center received a call from Wilson at 9:51 p.m. reporting the threat. The department dispatched patrols to look to see if they could locate any suspicious subjects until 10:28 p.m., but not make contact with anyone.
“The description was very vague,” Danielsen said.
G05 is one of the most heavily populated precincts near the White Street Landfill.
“This smacks of the fact that things got so heated over the landfill,” Bouldin said. “That’s probably what generated this angry man to do such a thing.”
Knight and other conservative Republican council members, including Danny Thompson, Mary Rakestraw and Trudy Wade, have attempted to reopen the landfill. This morning a sign for Knight and one for Wayne Abraham, an at-large candidate who opposes reopening the landfill, had been knocked down outside the Peeler Recreation Center polling place.
The county Republican Party headquarters has been vandalized at least twice in the run-up to the election with graffiti inscribing “KKK” and other similar phrases.
Ryan Wilson was making the rounds with a bundle of signs last night at about 9:40 p.m. when he was approached by a black man on a bicycle at Peeler Recreation Center, the polling place for Precinct G05, Guilford County Republican Party Chairman Al Bouldin said. Wilson was holding a sign advertising Bill Knight, the conservative mayoral incumbent. Bouldin said the lighting was poor, so Wilson had difficulty making out distinguishing features about the man.
“He said — I’m paraphrasing here — he said, ‘You’re not going to put those signs out there; if you think you are, I’m going to pull a gun on you,” Bouldin said. The man also reportedly said, “I’m patrolling this area to make sure” nobody puts out Republican signs.
Bouldin said Wilson, who is the Republican precinct chair for Precinct Mon1, placed the signs back in his car and left the area.
Susan Danielsen, public information officer for the Greensboro Police Department, said the emergency communication center received a call from Wilson at 9:51 p.m. reporting the threat. The department dispatched patrols to look to see if they could locate any suspicious subjects until 10:28 p.m., but not make contact with anyone.
“The description was very vague,” Danielsen said.
G05 is one of the most heavily populated precincts near the White Street Landfill.
“This smacks of the fact that things got so heated over the landfill,” Bouldin said. “That’s probably what generated this angry man to do such a thing.”
Knight and other conservative Republican council members, including Danny Thompson, Mary Rakestraw and Trudy Wade, have attempted to reopen the landfill. This morning a sign for Knight and one for Wayne Abraham, an at-large candidate who opposes reopening the landfill, had been knocked down outside the Peeler Recreation Center polling place.
The county Republican Party headquarters has been vandalized at least twice in the run-up to the election with graffiti inscribing “KKK” and other similar phrases.
Campaign season underway in Greensboro municipal elections
Interactive Resource Center candidate forum, a set on Flickr.
Candidates for Greensboro City Council have been making the rounds to meet groups that make endorsements and lining up financial backing.
Now, the campaign is in full swing. District 4 candidate Nancy Hoffmann met voters at M'Coul's pub tonight. Candidates courting the east Greensboro vote such as mayoral hopeful Robbie Perkins are expected to appear at Presbyterian Church of the Cross on Phillips Avenue on Friday evening. On the same night, at-large candidate Wayne Abraham will be holding a fundraiser at Mack and Mack on South Elm Street, while fellow at-large candidate Yvonne Johnson will be holding a reception at House of Jazz on North Edgeworth Street.
District 2 candidate Jim Kee holds his campaign kickoff at the Nussbaum Center for Entrepreneurship on Saturday, while other candidates will be showing up at neighborhood festivals.
In one of the first public campaign events, the Interactive Resource Center held a lunchtime candidate forum on Tuesday. Candidates or their representatives sat at designated tables and shared lunch with homeless clients at the homeless day center. Afterwards, they stood up and make brief statements, and then answered questions.
The only incumbent who showed up was Mayor Pro Tem Nancy Vaughan, but she left without making remarks after she learned she was being served a lawsuit by a company that has been preselected to operate the White Street Landfill to try to prevent her from voting on the matter.
Candidates that participated in the candidate forum included at-large contenders Yvonne Johnson, Marikay Abuzuaiter, Cyndy Hayworth, Wayne Abraham and Jean Brown; District 4 candidate Nancy Hoffmann; and District 5 candidate Jorge Cornell.
Cornell embraced Abraham as candidates and clients were lining up to be served a meal.
"We need you," Cornell told Abraham, who served on the complaint review committee of the Greensboro Human Relations Commission when Cornell and other members of the Latin Kings filed complaints against the Greensboro Police Department.
Marikay Abuzuaiter: "You do not need to own a home for me to listen to you. If you are at the homeless shelter, I will listen to you. Yes, we need more homeless shelters. We need more jobs."
Wayne Abraham: "We need to create a buy-local campaign. We need to adopt a sustainability plan and restore funding for critical infrastructure."
Yvonne Johnson: "If you think the biggest need in the city of Greensboro is jobs, then I am your candidate."
Jean Brown: "I want to balance the budget. I want to stop excessive spending. Some of the laws are not necessary. I want to change some of these laws that are taking away our rights, like saying you can't park in your front yard. I've got a paved driveway, but not everybody is so fortunate."
Cyndy Hayworth said she has no hidden agendas; reported that she has recently been elected chair of the zoning commission and much of council's business involves land-use decisions; expressed the view that the city should be run like a business; and concluded, "at the end of the day, it's about you."
Nancy Hoffmann: “I’m running because I love the city. I’ve lived here by choice for 14 years. I want it to continue to be a very good city with a good quality of life for all of our citizens, and I feel that I have some background and experience that I could bring that could be helpful to create a new city council that could work together effectively.”
Jorge Cornell: "It's important that we take the money from these nice neighborhoods, nice districts, and take it back for the neighborhoods that need it....
"They call me the quote-unquote gang leader. I'm not a gang leader. I'm just a brother that's striving to improve my community."
Cornell told the audience that he is setting up a temporary labor agency, Community United Staffing, to put ex-felons to work. One client challenged him on whether the agency will be able to provide sustained employment.
"There's no guarantees," Cornell responded.
Candidates learned that Greensboro does not have an adequate number of beds to accommodate all the people who are homeless on any given night.
"My concern is the lack of beds for both men and women in Greensboro, but especially for women at different shelters," said James Reaves, a volunteer. "Every day, we send people from Greensboro to High Point, to Winston, as far away as Charlotte because we can't find a place for them. We are often asked, 'Why are you sending homeless to us? Why aren't you taking care of them yourself?"
A number of candidates responded.
"I did not know the discrepancy was so great in beds," Johnson said. "We have a lot of abandoned houses.... And if we were to give a tax break to those who own the houses, maybe we can use those for emergency shelter. I don't have all the answers. But I'm willing to sit down and try to find a solution."
Abraham concurred: "I agree we are going to have to work with the nonprofits in this city and pull them together.... I will certainly be willing to work on that kind of issue with you."
Hoffmann said, "It's not like we can do anything tomorrow, but you're looking at the candidate you can vote for in October and November that came to listen to you."
Candidate profile: Wayne Abraham
When Wayne Abraham decided to run for city council, he always knew it would be at large. After six and a half years serving on the human relations commission, including two as chair, Abraham has come in contact with issues that are city wide in nature.
Abraham has been involved in a number of community-oriented projects since moving to Greensboro in 1977, including the Triad Health Project. A graduate of UNCG, he is currently the majority owner and executive director of Personal Care Inc., a home health care company that serves residents throughout the Triad.
To Abraham, running for city council seemed like a natural next step.
“I’ve been committed, since the mid 80s, to making Greensboro a better place,” he said at the outset of our conversation at the Green Bean. “For me this was one more way I could serve our community and make it better.”
Particularly after his tenure on the human relations commission, which works closely with council but is often tasked with following the council’s directives, Abraham decided he could have more impact as one of the policy makers rather than just working on implementation.
Like most challengers this election cycle, Abraham often found himself differing with the council about how to move forward. As a commissioner he was able to find ways to work through this, but feels it’s time to make more significant changes.
“I disagreed with their vision of what Greensboro should be like,” he said. “I don’t think they’re looking long term. They created the controversy we’re living with.”
In particular, Abraham takes issue with the council pushing issues like the landfill that citizens aren’t clamoring for action on. He also expressed concern that talented and capable city staff have resigned, saying some were leaving because they couldn’t handle the current council.
As a candidate, Abraham’s primary objective is economic development, and he’s not short on ideas for how to create it. Two key approaches that he said would be relatively simple would entail enacting the city’s sustainability plan, which he said has not been implemented, and initiating a buy local campaign. The sustainability plan offers a variety of proposals that could increase investment, including incentivizing green building techniques.
During the current council’s tenure, Abraham said funding to the Greensboro Partnership was cut by 10 percent, a move he sees as detrimental to attracting businesses.
When asked how he would balance increased funding for certain projects with the city’s budget, Abraham said, “I would have to hear what the city manager has to say about areas where we could save.”
Consulting the experts was a recurring theme in his explanation for how he would approach being a councilmember, whether it be listening to planners about the proposed increase in bus fares or consulting the human relations commission.
Many residents have publicly expressed that they will only vote for candidates who oppose reopening Phase III of the White Street Landfill, and Abraham spoke at length about his opposition to the proposal as well as the way the process has been carried out.
“I don’t understand why they’ve done anything they’ve done,” he said in response to a question about why he thought Gate City Waste Services was preliminarily selected over other companies bidding to run the landfill.
In general, city council members have showed a lack of respect for residents who have raised concerns with them, particularly about the landfill but around other issues too. Abraham said it takes courage to speak at a council meeting, and that not only should those residents’ input be respected, but also valued. To that end, he supports moving the speakers from the floor portion of the regular meetings back to the beginning in correspondence with what it appears most residents want.
Many residents have stated that council members and candidates only show up in their neighborhoods during election time, and while he said he wouldn’t have time to be at everything he was invited to, Abraham said that as a council member he would do his best to be out in the neighborhoods and attending what meetings he could.
“This is a very serious responsibility and I am going to take it seriously,” he said. “I owe them that much.”
Through greater community engagement, Abraham said people would start to see it more as their government and not as someone else’s.
Our conversation focused mostly around economic development and the landfill because Abraham explained that those are the two main issues people tell him they are concerned about. After talking to more people, however, Abraham said he will outline more of his positions on different issues.
Abraham serves as the 6th congressional district chairman for the Democratic Party, giving him connections to state legislators that he said he could leverage to help advocated for Greensboro in Raleigh.
When he’s not busy with work or service, Abraham can be found throughout the city, walking in the city’s parks with his partner, working out at the Central YMCA three times a week or attending church at St. Mary’s House.
And when he’s not reading something political, Abraham enjoys reading science fiction. He can’t remember the exact name of the book he’s reading now, maybe it’s Dance with Dragons, but he knows George R. R. Martin is the author.
When asked about his favorite restaurants in town, he names a few Italian places and Phoenix Asian Cuisine, but said his real love is chocolate.
“I love going to Maxie B’s,” he said. “That’s my weakness.”
At this point the campaign’s website is up, voteabraham.com, and he has a core team of six people as well as around 15 volunteers. Voters can get a better sense of his positions as outlined on Facebook, where Abraham said he tries to write updates at least every Friday and where people can contact him with questions or comments.
Landfill fight estranges human relations commission from council
Alum Maxine Bakeman welcomed fellow commissioners, including Nancy Hoffmann, Abdel Nuriddin and Marikay Abuzuaiter, to Bennett College.
UPDATE: Assistant City Manager Denise Turner Roth said the human relations department sent out a press release in July stating that the Aug. 3 meeting would be held at city council chambers at 11:45 a.m., adding that the department did not send out a second press release noting that the meeting time and location had been changed to 5:30 p.m. at Bennett College. She said in the past the city's practice has been to have each department independently publicize its committee meetings, but going forward all department press releases will go through the city's public affairs department and be sent to its global distribution list to maintain consistency.
Roth acknowledged that the error defeated the purpose of trying to encourage public attendance at the commission meetings.
"What I am concerned about is a perception, if there is one, that there was an effort to suppress information about the meeting," she said. "That's not the case."
ORIGINAL POST: Giving his final remarks as chair, Abdel Nuriddin told fellow members of the Greensboro Human Relations Commission tonight: “This body has become a very, very dynamic instrument.”
Several members have worked anxiously behind the scenes to ensure that a resolution opposing the reopening of the White Street Landfill was read aloud before city council.
That moment came last month just before a rump majority voted to reopen a limited section of the landfill following a court ruling that the city cannot negotiate a contract for un-permitted sections of the landfill without first holding a public hearing, researching the demographics of nearby residents and considering alternatives.
The task of reading the resolution, three pages in length fell to Nuriddin, as chair.
Mayor Bill Knight told Nuriddin he had three minutes to speak. Midway through the reading of the resolution, Knight told Nuriddin his time was almost up. Human Relations Commissioner Michael Roberto stood up in the meeting and protested: “This is a human relations report.” The chair also looked upset, and the mayor indicated that he could continue.
The 15 members of the commission are appointed by members of city council. Established in 1961 in response to demands by black citizens for equal treatment, the commission’s duties are outlined in the city’s code of ordinances.
The first three duties would seem to be directly relevant to the landfill controversy: “To study and make recommendations concerning problems n any or all fields of human relationship and encourage fair treatment and mutual understanding among all racial and ethnic groups in the city… To anticipate and discover those practices and customs most likely to create animosity and unrest among racial and ethnic groups and by consultation seek a solution as these problems arise or are anticipated… To make recommendations to the city council designed to promote goodwill and harmony among racial and ethnic groups in the city.”
It was unclear at the time why the resolution had not been given its own place on the agenda. Commission members who were anxious to avoid jeopardizing the resolution declined to explain even on background why it didn’t make the agenda.
The mayor interrupted again and asked Nuriddin how much longer the resolution would take.
“The Commission on Human Relations for the city of Greensboro, based on inconclusive health information related to the White Street Landfill, and based on health concerns and fears among residents living near the landfill, and based on shared perceptions about racial injustice by residents surrounding the landfill as well as other residents throughout the city, recommends that city council not reopen the White Street Landfill until there is further study to determine conclusively the health impact on its residents,” Nuriddin told the council.
“We believe that the impact of this decision is citywide and that disregard for he health and well-being of one neighborhood or community in our city weakens our entire city body,” Nuriddin concluded. “We are only as healthy, strong and united in a common purpose to make Greensboro the best that it can be as the aggregate of our individual neighborhoods.”
The gallery rang with applause, and but reaction from the dais was muted.
Then the mayor broke the silence.
“That’s about 12 minutes, I believe,” he said.
District 2 Councilman Jim Kee commended the commission for tackling some difficult issues. He is the city council liaison to the human relations commission, and also happens to represent the district that includes the landfill.
“I asked the mayor to put you guys on the agenda,” Kee said. “The mayor refused.”
Commissioner Maxine Bakeman noted that members of council had been given copies of the resolution before it was read, reasoning that it should not have come as a surprise to the mayor.
“In no way was the commission there to disrupt that meeting,” Roberto said.
The commission is tasked by the council with addressing some of the stickiest of racial issues in a city that is notoriously divided along racial lines. Some might prefer that the commission conduct its studies and then let matters die in quiet obscurity, and the messages brought back to council by the citizen body have not always been embraced.
“This is not the first controversial issue taken up by the commission,” Human Relations Director Anthony Wade said. “Two years ago, you took up the Klan-Nazi killings. The city council signed off on a statement of regret for those killings. The following year, your complaint review committee expanded. This latest stand by this commission is part of a history.”
One hurdle in getting the resolution passed and read cropped up when Wade cautioned the commission during a meeting in May to proceed carefully because he had been handed a memo from the city attorney’s office only an hour earlier. He told the commissioners he did not have a copy of the memo with him and asked them to come by his office to review it in person because he did not feel comfortable releasing it without express permission from the city attorney.
The memo, written by Associate General Counsel Jamiah Waterman, was released within 24 hours. It said that human relations commission did not have the authority to investigate the city over its handling of the landfill, but did not address whether the commission was within its rights to make recommendations.
“That was a rather confusing statement, I believe,” Commissioner Marikay Abuzuaiter said in an interview [today]. “I brought up the fact that if there was a legal memo that would affect our running the meeting that we should have prior knowledge of it. I got the memo and read it as saying the human relations commission could not investigate or make a complaint against the city. I understand that…. There is nothing in there that says you cannot make a resolution and bring it before the council.
“It may have been sent to Dr. Wade at 4 p.m.,” she added. “I didn’t feel that we should stop the meeting because of it.”
While the tension between the council and the human relations commission is not new, the relationship appears to have become increasingly rocky over the past two years, as commissioners appointed by the previous council continued to serve and the new council charted a more conservative course.
Commissioner Marikay Abuzuaiter nearly lost her seat a year ago.
She said she received a letter from the mayor indicating she was no longer on the commission at the time. She requested a meeting with him, and she recounted that the mayor said he had been told that she had resigned. Abuzuaiter and Roberto went to council in July 2010 to lobby for her continued service on the commission. At the end of the meeting, at-large Councilman Robbie Perkins reappointed her. Councilwoman Mary Rakestraw, who had appointed someone to fill the seat the previous month, complained about meeting procedures that night.
Rakestraw, who favors reopening the landfill, and Abuzuaiter are onetime political competitors. Rakestraw edged out Abuzuaiter by only 623 votes to secure one of the three at-large seats on council in the 2007 municipal election. Two years ago, Rakestraw opted to run in District 4 instead.
The commission remains fertile ground for political aspirations. Abuzuaiter is making her third bid for an at-large seat this year. Nancy Hoffmann, who was seated as the commission’s new chair tonight is one of two challengers vying for Rakestraw’s seat representing District 4. And Wayne Abraham, a former commission chair, is running at large.
Hoffmann’s campaign theme plays on a sense that the current majority on council has fallen short on inclusion and sensitivity. Her website declares, “I will respect the citizens and return their voice to council discussions.”
Abraham has spoken out against the landfill on a number of occasions, and his website plainly states his position in an issues bullet: “Dump the White Street dump.”
Meanwhile, members of the human relations commission have struggled to make their work more relevant and accessible to citizens, but the board remains a somewhat obscure outpost in Greensboro’s civic scene.
Tonight’s meeting was held at the Global Learning Center on the campus of Bennett College as part of the commission’s effort to bring its meeting out into the community. It took place at 5:30 p.m. instead of the normal time of 11:45 a.m. so that people would have an opportunity to attend after work. Wade said staff intended that the meeting be publicized by the city.
Yet no press release was sent out by the city’s public affairs office or posted on the city’s website. The audience for the meeting consisted of Kee, former Councilwoman Goldie Wells, two other residents and a reporter.
“One thing we were striving to do is have meetings out in the community,” Abuzuaiter said. “It seems like every step of the way it’s been difficult. It’s been frustrating that sometimes the information doesn’t get out in a timely manner. I believe more citizens would come if they knew about it.”
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