The budget that Superintendent Peter Gorman says he will present to county commissioners will include a request for an additional $16 million over and above the $317 million in county dollars Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools received this year, while simultaneously including options for cutting $80 million in state and local money. Gorman, who last year received a […]
“Pay no attention to what he says, rather watch what he does.” This guidance about President Barack Obama has been attributed to Washington Post columnist and Fox News contributor Charles Krauthammer in a private speech he gave in June 2009 to the Center for the American Experiment. A detailed summary of the speech was distributed […]
With Mecklenburg County struggling under crushing loads of debt and facing a massive budget shortfall, Republican commissioners are concerned that their Democrat colleagues may use the county’s threatened triple A bond rating as an excuse to hike property taxes. Similar to a homeowner’s good credit rating, the county’s premium bond rating allows it to borrow […]
While some Mecklenburg residents have been pitching in to raise money for the county’s beleaguered library system, donating nearly $250,000 over the last few weeks, a group of literary scofflaws has been headed down a decidedly different financial path. About 10 percent of folks who use the library owe roughly $176,000 in fines for overdue […]
A Historic Time In America The events in Washington the past few weeks that included protests on the West Front of the Capitol, a close vote for passage and then the President signing the healthcare bill into law marked a pivotal point in the history of America. While Fidel Castro and other socialist and communist […]
Again. For the ninth consecutive year. Wonderful. The recently released John Locke Foundation’s “By The Numbers: What Government Costs in North Carolina Cities and Counties” report shows Charlotte perched at the top of the state’s heap, with the highest local government cost per person. Charlotte’s local taxes and fees totaled $2,587 per resident for the […]
The Daily Diatribe: Rio Tinto, the Australian mining company, shamed itself by firing its top iron salesman to China along with three former Chinese colleagues moments after they were convicted by a Chinese court for bribery. Whether or not the men were guilty begs the question. The Chinese court system, long known, for being kangaroo […]
The attorney retained by the City of Charlotte to investigate whether a city councilmember sexually harassed a city employee was a huge financial contributor to the campaign of the mayor whose cryptic e-mail prompted some councilmembers to call for an investigation. Valecia McDowell, an attorney with the influential and politically connected law firm Moore & […]
The Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department apparently is flush enough with cash to come off the hip for spiffy, new dress-white uniforms for its command staff, but not to pay dozens of sergeants who have worked overtime. Thirty-two CMPD sergeants, in fact, have filed a lawsuit that claims the Police Department and the City of Charlotte owe […]
President Barack Obama last visited Charlotte on the eve of his election victory in November of 2008. On April 2, 2010 he is returning (presumably on the theme of jobs and the economy) two weeks after Mayor Anthony Foxx and a group of local business leaders visited the White House to talk about the Charlotte area’s […]
