When there’s a drought the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Utilities Department (CMUD) raises rates because conservation efforts lead to reduced water usage and less income. When there’s an abundance of rain, the utilities department raises rates because the wet weather yields less customer demand and declining revenues. When the weather is spot-on perfect, CMUD raises rates because that […]
City officials trying to pitch a nearly $8-million shortfall for next year’s budget as a sign that Charlotte is in relatively good shape are either completely delusional, or they think the public is a collective gang of ignorant buffoons. Look, folks, just because your neighbor was in a car wreck that left him hospitalized with […]
Color me a cynically, clinically insane conspiracy nut, but there’s a neuron firing in my brain’s Machiavellian lobe that says Mayor Anthony Foxx’s e-mail to council warning off sexual harassment of city staff has as much to do with politics as possible perversion. Not that politics and perversion are mutually exclusive. Foxx’s message, sent last […]
Revisions that the city council approved Monday night to a program that provides loans to small businesses sparked debate about whether the initiative was more focused on social engineering and exerting government control over the private sector, than on creating new jobs for a community battered by high unemployment. With the approved program revisions in […]
In an email sent over the weekend to all 11 members of the Charlotte City Council, Mayor Anthony Foxx warned his colleagues to not sexually harass city staff. The letter makes no reference to either who might be doing the alleged harassing, or who is being harassed. Even with a $70,000-a-year spokesperson, Foxx is declining […]
The findings of a citizens’ Water Solutions Task Force released this week reveal that a lot of folk in Cornelius apparently enjoy long showers and really green lawns; that Charlotte’s utilities department has problems with defective meter readers; that the city has for years been raiding the utilities treasure chest to pay for capital projects […]
Charlotte and Mecklenburg County’s largess with your money gets special notice this week from the North Carolina Institute for Constitutional Law’s Corporate Welfare Weekly newsletter. The Queen City and the state took top honors in partnering to hand out about $80 million in promised incentives – read government-speak for bribes – to lure Siemens Energy […]
The Charlotte City Council earlier this week approved nabbing $7.4 million from the city’s capital reserve account to help balance its current-year general fund budget, which city staff estimates is light about $8.5 million. Declining revenues – what policy wonks euphemistically call “economic deterioration” – are being blamed for the budget shortfall. City staff assured […]
Hey, it works in Amsterdam to turn some decent coin, why not Charlotte? Intriguing piece here from “Financial Armageddon” on how cash-strapped municipalities are ramping up collection of enforcement taxes to help fill empty coffers: For example, a federally funded ticketing blitz in the state of Virginia resulted in a total of 6996 traffic tickets […]
Let me get this straight: Police Chief Rodney Monroe has steadfastly refused to release the personnel files of a rogue cop accused of committing numerous sexual assaults while on duty, but the chief is more than ready and willing to bare the inner workings of his department’s homicide division on national TV? That’s the story […]
