CRVA, CMS, BOCC: Assorted Acronym Lunacy
Jeezums – I leave town for a few days of fun and sun at the beach and all kinds of bat guano crazy breaks loose. Where to start?
How about with our esteemed city council and mayor, which for weeks have been gnashing teeth over the out-of-control and unaccountable bureaucracy at the Charlotte Regional Visitors Authority, learning that the same CRVA had demoted – not fired, mind you – its beleaguered chief, Tim Newman, and will hire a replacement chief, adding yet another layer of bureaucracy and potential expense to the mix.
So naturally, councilmembers this week approved releasing the remaining CRVA funds ($7.5 million out of nearly $10 million) that were being held hostage as leverage for change at the CRVA.
So to recap, the CRVA gets another high-priced bureaucrat in addition to retaining its old high-priced bureaucrat (Newman was pocketing $300K-plus), promises to change the way it’s doing business – supposedly to stop handing out questionable bonuses, outrageous perks and expensive freebie meals, concert tickets and other goodies – and gets its full funding of taxpayer loot.
Wonderful. Nothing to see here; move along. In this case to the west side of town, where the council voted (with Republicans Warren Cooksey and Edwin Peacock in sensible dissent) to dump $3 million into a parking deck for Johnson C. Smith’s $29 million Mosaic Village, a mixed-use development of retail space, student dorms, office space, and an arts center. The $29 million apparently wasn’t enough to cover the tab for a parking deck, so the city stepped in with some largess pulled from its so-called Business Corridor Fund, which is supposed to be used to help jumpstart investment in economically distressed parts of town.
Funny, but I could’ve sworn the $37 million Foxx-Faux Streetcar project was supposed be a catalyst for economic development along the same Westside corridor. My mistake.
In exchange for its $3 million gift, the parking deck, which will be built by Griffin Brothers and leased to the university, will have about half of its 403 spaces dedicated for public use, the rest being reserved for university parking. So that’s about $13K a parking space.
What a deal. But nothing compared to the perpetually under-funded Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools, where miracle of miracles the supposedly stone-broke school system has once again magically found a windfall of tens of millions of dollars. After, of course, scamming the Democrat-controlled board of commissioners into approving a tax hike that sent an extra $26 million to CMS. Because, you know, CMS officials said they were flat busted and facing a $100 million budget shortfall.
Only not so busted, it turns out, that they couldn’t avoid threatened draconian cuts and hire back hundreds of teachers and classroom-support positions, as well as looking to hire hundreds of new positions, to boot. All tolled, the district was able to restore 1,665 teacher and instructional-support positions.
Bottom line: the district’s final adopted budget tops out at $1.17 billion, up nearly 2 percent and $19 million over the 2010-11 operating budget, which, by the way, was up nearly $10 million from the previous year’s budget (recall that was the one where CMS officials said they were – wait for it – stone broke).
The latest round of CMS Money Magic should come as no surprise to anyone, except maybe the dolts on the board of commissioners who were gullible enough to buy CMS’ annual display of poor-mouthing. Sadly, using teachers and students as expendable pawns to line the district’s coffers with taxpayer dollars has become standard operating procedure for CMS.
Speaking of wholly political and unsavory machinations, local Democrats have been trying their absolute best to tinker with redistricting lines to flip a traditional GOP-leaning suburban stronghold on the board of commissioners.
Democrats on the county commission’s redistricting committee reportedly had concocted a plan that would have realigned south Mecklenburg’s District 6, currently represented by Bill James, into a gerrymandered animal that would better favor, shockingly, Democrats.
The redistricting committee was set to forward its four recommended maps to the board of commissioners, controlled by a Democrat majority, for consideration. But the Republican members of the committee feared the plan that wreaked havoc on District 6 would take center stage and be rammed through for approval; so they took their concerns and their own map – one they say combines the best aspects of the four developed by the committee – to the GOP-led General Assembly.
A bill is currently working its way through the legislature that would allow state lawmakers, instead of the Democrat majority on the county board, to set new commission voting district lines.
The four GOP members of the county commission redistricting committee (Bryan Holladay, Larry Shaheen, Lee Teague and Mike Walker) released the following statement:
After a great deal of soul-searching, the Republican members of the Ad Hoc Redistricting Committee decided to inform local members of the state delegation from the Matthews and Mint Hill of a proposed plan by Democrats on the committee that would severely harm the interests of those towns. A plan we feared would be railroaded through the County Commission.
The Democrats had proposed a plan that created a new, radically different District 6 that winds from Matthews and Mint Hill through central Charlotte then all the way over to South Blvd. The Republicans repeatedly asked for either an explanation or a revision to the plan. At our final meeting and after subsequent requests, neither was forthcoming. It became obvious there would be none.
Our primary concern centers around the impact on the southern towns. Dividing them between two separate districts and tying them to significant areas of Charlotte far from them would dilute their voice on the County Commission and potentially deny them their due from County services such as schools and parks.
Over the course of last week, it has become apparent from email discussions on the four plans agreed to be sent to the Commissioners for consideration that the Democrats real intention was to use their majority on the Committee and the Commission to influence the type of Republican elected from this district. Phrases such as “change for change’s sake” and “an opportunity to elect a candidate of their choice” were bandied about. Their hope seems to be to see someone more to their liking at the expense of the southern towns.
We decided we had to take some action so we discussed the issue with the state House and Senate members from Matthews and Mint Hill. They shared our concerns. At their request, we combined the best aspects of all four plans into one fair, legal, and logical plan that minimizes the change from the current districts, produces compact districts that allow all for better interaction between commissioners and their constituents, meets all the guidelines from the County Commission, and keeps communities together. It is a good-faith effort to create six fair districts, not just three or four of them.
This plan has been introduced in the House of Representatives by Representative Brawley with the support of Senators Rucho and Tucker. We applaud the actions of these representatives to protect the interests of the southern towns and the southern part of Mecklenburg County against the redistricting plan proposed by the Democrats.
OK, that’s it for now. I’m back in full swing later this week, refreshed and cleansed by cool beach winds and an occasional dip into the LandShark lager pool.
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