While a much used term in media and political circles, “pay to play” does fairly describe the interlocking circle of money and the support of political agendas in some cases. The specific “pay to play” case I am referring to is one concerning the proposed public safety center for the city of Raleigh. This building has been at the center of a political fight due to a tax increase to pay for it, the lack of a public vote to approve borrowing the money to pay for it and the high construction cost per square foot ($462).
The pay to play comes in when Harvey A. Schmitt the President and CEO of the Greater Raleigh Chamber of Commerce weighs in with a letter to the editor endorsing a tax increase and the building of the center without a vote of the people. Seems strange that a pro-business group would endorse a tax increase for a project with so little support in the community? Not so strange when you look beneath the surface. This could be nothing more than Harvey answering to a major funder of his organization.
The Greater Raleigh Chamber of Commerce receives about $200,000 per year from the city of Raleigh and has received this money for over 10 years to support “economic development” for the city. Schmitt’s compensation is reported to be around $400,000 a year. If true that means the taxpayers and businesses of Raleigh are effectively subsidizing 1/2 the salary of someone who is advocating for higher taxes.
Since the city is “paying” it seems only fair that Harvey would “play” for them.
http://www.newsobserver.com/2010/03/01/364039/wake-builds-tower-with-little.html?storylink=misearch
I know, it’s a running joke, right… But according to a new poll by ABC News, Tiger Woods’ favorable rating is higher than that of our own Gov. Bev Perdue.
In a basic measure of popularity, just 39 percent express a favorable opinion of Woods
overall, essentially unchanged from its level just before his apology and still vastly below its
peak, a remarkable 88 percent nearly 10 years ago.
According to our latest poll from February, only 38 percent of North Carolina voters had a favorable opinion of Perdue.
And if you remember back to last fall, Gov. Mark Sanford of South Carolina during the aftermath of his “hiking expedition” had higher poll numbers than Perdue.
So do voters really think sex scandals aren’t as bad as raising taxes, cutting education and slashing teacher pay? Or is there just something else about Gov. Perdue they just don’t like?
According to Alan Reynolds, senior fellow at the Cato Institute, the federal stimulus actually added about 2 percentage points to the unemployment rate. The jobs the stimulus was claimed to have created or saved can be mostly attributed to extending unemployment benefits and bolstering government programs such as Social Security and Medicaid.
Additionally the 4th quarter GDP report notes that GDP gains were attributed to private and fixed investment and not federal spending.
Yet Gov. Perdue is still calling the stimulus a success that “saved the country from a tremendous catastrophe” and continues to lobby for even more federal money to fund infrastructure and transportation projects.
All the while North Carolina’s unemployment rate continues to increase. According to the North Carolina Employment Security Commission’s latest reports unemployment increased to 11.2 percent in December – an overall 3.2 percent increase in the past year.
Late last Friday, the NC Department of Transportation released a new report that represents a major step forward for the department — they are now using a “data-driven approach is being used to score projects across the state” as opposed to its previous scoring system relying on political favor and cronyism for transportation projects.
This scoring system and a common-sense prioritization of transportation projects is one that Civitas and others have been recommending for years.
According to the report:
each project is classified under one of the Department’s three primary goals (Safety, Mobility, Infrastructure Health) and three tiers (Statewide, Regional, and Subregional). Projects classified as Infrastructure Health were further classified by Submode (Interstate Pavement, Modernization, and Highway Miscellaneous).
If you dig deeper into the rankings and pay particular attention to the rankings under “Mobility” (page 57) a distinct conclusion can be drawn — the Charlotte area has been neglected. 8 of the top 10 highest scoring projects are in the Charlotte/I-85 corridor.
The key here will be to see if NCDOT actually sticks to this ranking system and makes decisions based on this or will we see political pressures creep back into the system. I’m guardedly optimistic that road building in the state may have finally turned a corner.
Over on nccivitas.org the weekly online poll is yielding interesting results. This weeks question is “Should Republicans Attend President Obama’s Health Care Summit?”
The participants seem split between “no way!” and “of course!” and a smattering on the other choices. Head on over and express your opinion.
In our poll this month, we asked voters if Gov. Bev Perdue nicknaming herself as the “Jobs Governor” was an appropriate title for the Governor given her first year in office. Only 12% of voters said yes. 68 percent said no.
As for her favorability rating this month it comes in at a -5 (43% unfavorable, 38% favorable), about the same as it was in December (-5).
Perdue’s numbers have rebounded from her lowest points this summer when the rating was -14. This is mainly through her improved standing among Republicans where her unfavorables have fallen from a high of 72% in October to 56% now. Perdue is now back up at 50% favorable with members of her own party for the first time since April 2009.
Her overall favorability chart below:
Full press release with all the crosstabs here.
NC voters’ opinion of Pres. Barack Obama inched up in January and now is at 52% favorable, 37% unfavorable or a +15 spread, the widest its been since the beginning of the health care debate last summer.
Obama’s favorability rating basically fell off a cliff once the health care reform measure was launched last July bottoming out at a +3 in October and has been slowly climbing back off those lows. While his policies and proposals are widely opposed by NC voters, he still remains personally likable. But NC voters are separating their warm and fuzzy feelings for Obama the man and the icy cold feelings for his policies.
Chart of his favorable/unfavorable rating in NC:
Need a job? Today’s Wall Street Journal (subscription required) reports the federal government added 103,000 new employees last year and will add another 170,000 this year. That’s right while companies and households were cutting back to whether the recession, the Democrats and the Obama administration increased federal “civilian full-time” labor force 273,000 in the last two years alone. That’s a whopping 14 percent! Think there’s a disconnect between Washington and the rest of the country? Go ask the people of Virginia, New Jersey and Massachusetts.
I just returned from Ruffin Poole’s initial appearance in federal court before U.S. District Judge Terrance Boyle. Poole, advisor to former Governor Mike Easley, was led into the courtroom with his hands cuffed behind his back. Boyle read a summary of the 64-page indictment that refers to Poole as the “Little Governor” because of his role as Easley’s right-hand man.
The 51 charges against Poole include extortion, mail fraud, and money laundering, each carrying a maximum sentence of 20 years plus fines; bribery and monetary transactions in criminally derived property, each carrying a maximum sentence of 10 years plus fines; and racketeering, carrying a maximum sentence of five years plus fines. All parties agreed on the terms for Poole’s bail–$50,000 unsecured bond, that he surrenders his passport and any firearms, and that he restrict his travel to the states of NC, VA, and MD.
The entire court appearance lasted less than 15 minutes. The press outside the courthouse waited longer for Poole to appear and be whisked away by his attorney.
One must wonder when Al Gore and Bin Laden might just hold a joint press conference. From Bin Laden’s latest release.
In the tape, aired in part on Al-Jazeera television Friday, bin Laden warns of the dangers of climate change and says that the way to stop it is to bring “the wheels of the American economy” to a halt. He says the world should “stop consuming American products” and “refrain from using the dollar,” according to a transcript on Al-Jazeera’s Web site.
Bin Laden has seen the light, America is evil and he must stop global warming. Just as the rest of the world is waking up to realize the sham that is the climate change political movement, a guy who lives in a cave jumps on board . Makes me want to drive an SUV.