Special interests 5, taxpayers 2: Commissioners raise taxes three cents | Eastern North Carolina Now

   Publisher's Note: This article by the Beaufort Observer is accurate in its assessment, honest in its intent, and well written in its complete capture of the tenor of the events that transpired this night ... a fine piece of journalism.

    In a marathon session, the Beaufort County Commissioners voted 5-2 to raise taxes next year. The vote came after a six-hour session last night (6-20-11). Voting to raise our property tax rate by three cents were: Jerry Langley, Jay McRoy, Al Klemm, Ed Booth and Robert Cayton. Vote against raising taxes were: Hood Richardson and Stan Deatherage.

    The action came after several dozen speakers urged the board to fund their particular special interest while the others demanded that taxes not be raised. In the end the special interests won out, with the Economic Development Commission (EDC) coming out on top while three million was left under the table.

    It was a crazy session. The majority scrapped much of the work that had been done in five "workshop" sessions and horse-traded how much to give special interests, using the schools as the catalyst in their smoke and mirrors which saw them arbitrarily pull revenue out of their hat where there had been no money before.

    The action began with Hood Richardson and Stan Deatherage offering a detailed proposal to adopt a budget with no tax increase. That was promptly defeated by the Gang of Five. Jerry Langley then offered his version of changes to the Manager's recommended budget which ended reducing the five cent proposed rate increase by a penny, while making marginal cuts to the EDC. That proposal was also defeated.

    Then Jay McRoy offered a "split the difference" budget that restored many of the cuts that had previously been made in workshop sessions, some of which he had voted previously to make. The mainstay of his proposal was to manufacture phantom revenue increases. It too was defeated.

    Al Klemm then followed suit with another version similar to McRoy's only to see his defeated also. Then the horse trading began.

    Langley called a recess and various commissioners huddled in the hall ways and in anterooms. Soon after returning to a session which saw Langley, Klemm and McRoy whispering in little huddles; while the public and other commissioners sat in the dark, the three shifted phantom revenue against increases and decreases in specific line items. The pattern then emerged.

    What became obvious was that Klemm, McRoy and Langley, seated across the stage from the other commissioners, juggled the amounts they wanted to give the special interests, then adjusted the Sheriff department's and schools' budgets to accommodate what they proposed to give the special interests such as donations to the municipal recreation programs, chambers of commerce, Arts Council, Citizens on Southside Together, Veteran's park, Belhaven Museum, Sidney Dive Team, the Highway 17 Association, NC 20, and the EDC.

    Much of the discussion centered on the EDC. To stave off cuts to the EDC, Klemm and McRoy tinkered with small adjustments to departments that had already produced most of the reductions in expenditures and increasing projected revenue along with minor changes to the donations.

    Deatherage, realizing that the first round of voting had not yielded a consensus, offered a poker move to get the other commissioners to show their hand. He offered a motion to raise taxes two cents on the condition that the EDC be cut, with the funding put 'on hold' pending a reorganization of the EDC. The move was designed to expose McRoy and Klemm's protecting the EDC. The gambit worked with the Gang of Five voting it down, effectively putting the EDC above all other considerations. With the EDC safely preserved McRoy, Klemm and Langley horsetraded tinkering with the donations and phantom revenue. When that failed to produce a 'split the difference' tax increase they juggled some more, including squeezing the county departments that had already been decreased. This produced a phantom increase in fund balance of $70,000 and the difference was made up by adjusting the schools. That motion then passed 5-2.

    Richardson and Deatherage had offered, in the initial proposal, a provision to appropriate the schools' funds restricted to "Purpose and function" in order to provide a means of the Board of Commissioners being involved in how the School Board adjusts it final budget to accommodate state allotments and use of nearly three million in unbudgeted funds. That motion had been rejected initially and the Gang of Five refused to add it to the final adoption. Thus, while the adopted budget shows a phantom reduction in the original Manager's recommendation for the schools of $461,800 in capital outlay and $325,000 in current expense, those numbers do not reflect over $3.5 million the School Board has available to it to adjust its final budget. Richardson argued vociferously that the Commissioners should be involved in how the Lottery money, federal stimulus and fund balance are applied to the schools' budget. The Gang of Five refused after they had protected the EDC and donations to special interests.

    After the horsetrading ended and the final budget was adopted Richardson blasted the majority saying that "...what you've done is use the taxpayers' money (tax increase) to pay off your pet supporters to insure your re-election and used taxpayer money to do it."

    So in effect, the Gang of Five made protecting the EDC their number one priority, and then doled out donations to their favored special interests and used phantom 'smoke and mirrors,' as Richardson characterized it, and the schools to raise taxes but not so much that they will not be able to say "we cut all that we could cut but just did not have enough to avoid a tax increase;" while ignoring three million in reserve funds.
    The "final adjustment" to the original proposed budget.
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Beaufort County Commissioners, by a vote of 5 to 2, raise property taxes by 6% County Commissioners, Government, Governing Beaufort County Video of speakers at the public hearing on the county budget


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