Meet the new boss
For all their talk about the importance of limited government and local communities having more control over their own destinies, the new boss in Raleigh is acting much like the old boss.
Memory loss is a common ailment among legislators, often coinciding with ascendancy to Raleigh and the ability to rule like gods over local governments.
By law, everything is pretty much a creature of the state – the towns, the school systems, the counties and, naturally, the university. As a result, the state can giveth and taketh away as it pleases. Once it dawns on a lawmaker that they can plug about any budget gap or tweak a social issue or two by simply passing the task and cost on to a lesser power, the temptation to do so is overwhelming.
Thanks to a new majority eager to rearrange the furniture, we’ll see a slew of such measures in the coming weeks.
This is not to say that such measures are always misguided. The annexation moratorium, for instance, was driven in part by some pretty nasty examples of land grabs by municipalities. But in the details of the budget and the way it is handling local legislation, the legislature is showing a disinclination to give ear to the pleas of its children.
In the budget that comes out today, costs across a spectrum of government services are likely to be shifted on to the counties and towns. And health care and mental health services now funded by the state are at risk of being reduced, leaving counties with the decision to either go it alone or cut programs. One example of this would be if the state decides that in North Carolina, Medicaid will no longer cover dental needs. Orange County, which recently consolidated its dental clinics and is making significant improvements to the Hillsborough facility, could be faced with covering the cost of care or shutting down the clinic.
In their haste to balance the books without even considering raising taxes on the many millionaires among us, the House and Senate majorities, along with some willing co-conspirators across the aisle, are going to gut services and pass a budget rife with unfunded local mandates. Then they’ll take their leave of Raleigh and go home and no doubt mingle proudly with the little folks who sent them there.
A well-deserved honor
It is hard not to admire Jackie Helvey’s dedication to the little town of Carrboro. As she told the Carrboro Board of Aldermen Tuesday night, she does what she does out of love.
So the town made it official: Carrboro hearts Jackie Helvey.
She got a little weepy as Mayor Mark Chilton read out an extensive proclamation in her honor and had to remove her trademark black rims and dab her eyes a few times between the whereases.
Helvey, who, as Jacquie (“the other Jackieâ€) Gist pointed out, is not going anywhere and is in fine health, will have a whole week dedicated to her, an honor that’s likely unprecedented in southern Orange County.
And though she’s stepping down from the Carrboro Arts Committee, don’t expect her to change a whole lot.
The first week of May might be Jackie Helvey Week in Carrboro, but Jackie won’t be taking it off. She’ll still be taking pictures during Carrboro Day, updating carrboro.com, preparing for the 2ndFriday Artwalk, holding forth on her radio show on WCOM and just being Jackie Helvey. And for that, we’re all pretty grateful.
Thanks, Jackie. You deserve the honor and more.