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Key Issues
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Other Important Issues
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Roads & Schools: Our Failing Public Infrastructure
Today at our house in Fuquay Varina, all the lights went out, followed in seconds by a loud boom. It took us a few minutes to figure out that a local electric transformer a mile or so away had probably exploded, most likely from an overload in the 99 degree heat. It took about 2 hours to restore electricity in our neighborhood.
Last week, a bridge collapsed in my childhood home state of Minnesota. I grew up just outside of Minneapolis and crossed the Mississippi River many times on I-35. Over 5,000 bridges here in North Carolina are substandard, dozens of them here in Southern Wake County.
Last summer, Swift Creek, Lake Wheeler, and Lake Benson were flooded with millions of gallons of raw sewage after a pipe break in the Cary Sewer system. Cary plans to expand this system to run many more miles of pipe with raw sewage passing by Apex and Holly Springs to end up in the middle of the New Hill community, almost 15 miles away.
In 2006, only 68% of North Carolina students entering the 9th grade in 2002 graduated with a diploma 4 years later. In this age of global competition, high school dropouts on average earn less, engage in more crime, use more public services, suffer poorer health, and are less engaged in the civic life of our communities.
Most citizens expect our elected officials to take care of the “Bread and Butter” of government: Roads, Schools, and Public Utilities. This is the mundane, boring, expensive, but occasionally disastrous area simply called “Infrastructure”.
But often our elected officials neglect their responsibility to care for our public infrastructure. They engage in partisan bickering, work on private agendas, obstruct common ground solutions, and bow to wealthy special interests instead of focusing on the basic needs of our community.
Let’s put our common interest first and work together to finally address the challenges of growth, aging, and past neglect and make progress on improving and sustaining our Roads, Schools, and Public Utilities.
And if we don’t? Transformers explode, bridges collapse, pipes break, children fail, and we, as a community, lose.
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Our tanking economy
It is well known that the business cycle goes up and down. Many of the government policies put in place over the last century have the purpose of smoothing out the "boom & bust" nature of any vibrant economy. Prudent policies protect our poor and middle class, even out tax burdens, and invest in our long term prosperity.
But we are now suffering from the recent shock in gas and grocery prices, increased job losses, and mortgage foreclosures. The mainstays of the American dream of home ownership, a decent education, and jobs with advancement are fast slipping away.
While we can wish that we as a nation had prepared better for the future with low or no deficits, better average fuel economy for our cars, and better regulation and enforcement on mortgage lenders, we have to start where we are right now, and apply the hard lessons to the future.
North Carolina is in better shape than many other states. We have been conservative in budget forecasting and put surpluses into our rainy day funds and investments in our future. That means we can be pro-active in providing real relief to those that are hit hardest by the slumping economy. We already have capped the gas tax and implemented the Earned Income Tax Credit.
We need to do more to help families facing foreclosure and expand our job training programs. We need to raise the exemptions on property tax for seniors, and expand them to make affordable housing available to everyone.
Whether economic times are good or bad, we need to continue saving and investing in the future of North Carolina and its great people.
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Trust & Ethics: Our Broken Government
The public’s trust in those elected to operate our government, from either party, has eroded severely. Frankly, this lack of trust and dissatisfaction is well-deserved at all levels.
At the federal level, we have a Republican Administration that violates civil liberties, flaunts the rule of law, and misleads the public and Congress. We also have a Democratic Congress that continues to enable this bad behavior and fails to hold the Executive Branch accountable. Our Supreme Court votes cases along partisan and ideological lines. Most recent Federal corruption cases have been of Republicans, but some Democrats have also been tainted by scandal.
In our own state, we’ve seen the “defacing stain” of Jim Black’s illegal activities, and that cancer spread with the expulsion and conviction of Thomas Wright. We’ve also had a whole slew of very questionable actions from other legislators, lobbyists, and public officials. Some of these, such as special budget provisions and funding a legislator’s “day job” or family scholarships with taxpayer money, may be strictly legal, but are obvious conflicts of interest or shortcuts that damage the credibility of our lawmakers. Most of these failures are of my fellow Democrats, but Republicans have a share of unsavory activity as well.
In order to restore our trust and pride in our government, we need to place the business of the people above personal and partisan interests. We must have the highest ethical standards, both in the law and in the daily conduct of our elected officials. Those in a position of power and trust must be held personally accountable when they fail to serve with unquestionable integrity.
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Valuing Hard Work
In my “day job”, I am a professional working at the business and technical interface of a large company. I see the business needs to balance investments in equipment with investments in people. However, our current laws too often value capital over labor. To maintain our shared prosperity and the basics of the American dream, we must restore the balance of valuing hard work over wealth.
Treating workers fairly is not only fundamentally right; it is also good for business and our community. Good salary, benefits, and safe working conditions expand the middle class, reduce turnover, and improve productivity. Rather than living hand to mouth, workers and their families can improve their lives and our community.
A basic constitutional right to free association also means workers need to be free to join unions, to collectively bargain in good faith, and be free from intimidation by employers or the government.
A special word about North Carolina State Employees: First and foremost, the way we treat our state employees should be a model for how we expect North Carolina businesses to treat all their workers. Unfortunately, the opposite is true.
State employees are effectively denied access to unions and collective bargaining. Salary and benefits are sorely lacking and are first on the chopping block come budget time, instead of fully funding the statutory Pay Plan. Classes of state employees are being carved out and denied standard legal protections. The burden of funding the retirement system and dependant health care is put on the shoulders of state employees.
This poor treatment of state employees has resulted in high turnover to private and even local public sector jobs. State workers strain under increased work and case loads. It becomes difficult to provide the effective and efficient services the people and businesses of North Carolina deserve. It is not just bad for state employees; it is bad for North Carolina.
In business or government, we need to put hard working employees at the head of line.
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Public Health: Our Overwhelming Insurance Burden
Protecting the health of all citizens is an important responsibility of government because our health can be impacted by many things out of our individual control. But in our current system, businesses are expected to shoulder a single major burden: health insurance.
Frankly, this system is failing. More businesses are moving the burden to their employees, reducing benefits or choices, or not offering health coverage at all. And employer based health care leaves so many of our most vulnerable without care: children, the poor, the disabled. These uninsured people then rely on expensive subsidized emergency care which adds cost to those already paying. It is an inefficient use of tax dollars and the emergency health care system.
Everyday, our best jobs are outsourced to countries where basic health care costs are completely paid for by the government. This allows businesses to both save money and to focus on the core of their business. But this leaves America and North Carolina at a competitive disadvantage for jobs and businesses.
Like most large problems, this one can be solved over time with incremental changes. The recent creation of a high risk insurance pool is a great beginning. But we must go further to expand health insurance coverage especially to children. We also need to fully fund Medicare and Medicaid, since money spent for regular and preventive care is an investment in reducing the use of costly emergency care, not to mention saving lives and creating healthy, productive citizens who can then fully participate in their community.
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Public Safety: Tough on Crime
Many politicians take the easy way out to claim they are “tough on crime.” They think that simply jacking up the penalties for crimes is enough. It’s not.
What is needed is to look at the many root causes of criminal behavior. Obvious causes are addiction, alcoholism, and mental illness. Poverty, dropouts, and joblessness also can lead to greater crime rates. Treat these underlying conditions, and many crimes are prevented before they can happen.
Rehabilitation needs to be a focus of our justice system. Simply warehousing criminals in prisons creates a revolving door of crime and endangers our communities. We need to prepare offenders to be productive members of society upon release, and follow through before the challenges of life outside lead them back to a life of crime.
Preventing the next crime is the right way to be “Tough on Crime”
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Public Health: Outsourcing Mental Health
Today, the Raleigh News and Observer started a series on the sad state of Mental Health “reform” in North Carolina. The 2001 plan was to move care out of central State Hospitals into local communities and have private providers deliver much of the care. This reform was poorly planned, poorly executed, and most telling, went forward with too little oversight.
It shows the Achilles heel of “outsourcing” services, whether you are a company or the State of North Carolina: There must be clear incentives to the vendor to provide the best possible service at best cost. If there is not, the free market system will tend to deliver the least service at “what the market will bear.” And you need to watch them closely! As I learned in the US Navy: “You get what you inspect, not what you expect.”
My heart goes out to those mentally ill and their families who have suffered during this 6 year debacle. And it only makes sense for all of us to ensure the mentally ill get the right help right away. All of North Carolina has been robbed by this on-going failure.
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Annexation
Issue: Annexation and Arrogance
The privilege of North Carolina towns to involuntarily annex adjacent unincorporated property into the town limits could be a valuable tool to manage growth, share expensive public utilities and services, and enhance property values long term.
However, many towns have severely abused this privilege with high-handedness before annexation and foot-dragging on providing promised services afterwards. This level of arrogance and neglect is simply wrong and needs to be addressed by our General Assembly.
I think the best way to address this now is the proposed one year moratorium on involuntary annexation, currently in committee in the NC House. During this moratorium, ensuring that property owners being annexed have a strong voice in the process, are treated with respect and fairness, and are delivered the promised services should be a legislative priority.
I urge our General Assembly, including my opponent, to pass the annexation moratorium and a study of annexation issues and solutions during this short session.
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Open Space
I grew up in a small lake front home in the suburbs of Minneapolis, where I could enjoy swimming, boating, and fishing. I would visit my grandparents who lived in a rural farming community, and was introduced to farm life. I spent many summers in my youth camping in the pristine Boundary Waters Canoe Area of northern Minnesota. As a young Cub Scout, I went on hikes in nearby parks and natural areas. I developed a deep appreciation of nature, agriculture, and the real value a variety of local open spaces can give a community.
This appreciation of natural areas, parks, farmland, and rural living attracted me to Southern Wake County and my home in Fuquay-Varina. We have many working farms, large stretches of still natural land, and several parks that add greatly to our quality of life. But as all of North Carolina grows, these sources of critical open space we all enjoy are under great pressure.
Farm lands appraised in the same way as nearby sub-divisions of high demand suburban homes create large tax burdens for our working farmers. These high values can also make it difficult to pass along local family farms from generation to generation. As I listen to the many farmers I will represent in Southern Wake County, I hear their concern that soon the only crop they can afford to plant is houses.
We are also running short of natural and park space. Often, the few open space requirements we have for development are waived and bought off. However, these “land banks” are getting near worthless as local land values continue to skyrocket. And if every acre is built on and paved, what space is left to buy for parks and natural areas? Additionally, Wake County’s best hope for a future large urban park, the Dix property, still is under threat of sale and/or development.
We need to commit to supporting our local farms and working farmers, putting teeth into our preservation of nearby open spaces for parks and natural preserves, and protecting all of the Dix property for a future as a world class destination park.
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Immigration: North Carolina's Challenge
"Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"
This is what greeted my 10 year-old great-grandfather when he and his family sailed into New York Harbor in 1893. They stepped onto Ellis Island without documents. They were quarantined, processed, and then sent on their way to build our country. After a few years, they filed naturalization papers and became citizens. My ancestors were looking for a sanctuary country and they found it in the United States of America.
In the 1920’s our country slammed shut the golden door. Visas and quotas were instituted, and it became illegal to enter America without proper documentation. This slowed down immigration across the oceans, but did not stop many from crossing our southern border. By1986, most undocumented immigrants were from Latin America, and almost 3 million were granted amnesty and allowed to become citizens.
Since 1986, it has been illegal for employers to knowingly hire undocumented immigrants. But that has not stopped over 12 million more undocumented immigrants from seeking a new life in our country, again, most coming across our southern border. Due to poor enforcement, unscrupulous employers are skirting the law to hire, and often times, exploit these workers.
One thing is very clear to everyone: America has a serious problem with immigration. The real question is: what do we do about it?
I think there are areas of common-ground agreement. First is that the real solution rests with the Federal Government. That does not mean we can’t come up with creative ways to adapt while the US Congress twiddles their thumbs.
We also need to increase the enforcement of existing laws, especially as they apply to employers who attract and profit from undocumented workers. Again, this is at the Federal level for the most part, although we can ensure our state and local enforcement agencies assist wherever possible.
On that note, criminal immigrants in prison should be deported after completion of their sentences, not released back to our streets. This is just common sense.
Improving our border security is an important priority that again falls to the Federal government.
There are some very tricky issues around what state and local services North Carolina should provide or deny undocumented immigrants and their families. Denying driver’s licenses seems smart, except that undocumented immigrants will drive on our roads regardless, and without a drivers license, they will be uninsured and their vehicles will be unregistered. This impacts us all.
How about educating undocumented immigrants and their children? We certainly want all children in public school rather than running the streets, joining gangs, and becoming a large burden to our society. But what about higher education like our university and community colleges? Do we treat them like our many other foreign students, or completely deny them the access to improve and educate themselves?
If we force our state’s undocumented immigrants into the shadows, we are asking for larger problems with crime, gangs, public health, civic involvement, exploitation, and even tax collection. Until Congress acts, North Carolina must step up to the challenge of effectively governing all the people in our state, including our undocumented immigrants.
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Diversity
Our world, our country, our state, and our local communities are a vast mix of different people.
From comfortably rich to desperately poor; from black, white, and every shade of brown in between; from well-educated to totally illiterate; from robustly healthy to terminally ill; from young with innocence to old with wisdom; from devoutly religious across a vast sea of faiths to completely non-religious; remotely rural to crowded urban; male and female, straight and gay in a range of gender identity and sexual orientation; political activists on the right or left to the politically apathetic and disaffected.
Regardless of where a person is on any of these spectrums, they deserve respect, opportunity, and equal treatment under our laws. Additionally, it is important to expose ourselves to people who are not like us. When we do, we often find there is much we have in common with our fellow human beings.
I look forward to representing the wide diversity of people in District 37 and to meeting as many of them as possible during this campaign.
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Transit: getting around without a car
The citizens of District 37 live on the outskirts of Raleigh, which means just about the only way to get around is to pay $4 a gallon for gas and drive. This makes the condition and congestion of our neglected road system very important, so roads are a key issue of this campaign.
However, our future has to be about providing many more options to get from point A to point B. Our local communities have done very good jobs revitalizing downtown areas with expanded sidewalks, bike paths, and greenways, with more planned. Even replacing a single weekly trip with a walk downtown can make us healthy, shop locally, and take another car off our crowded roads.
Another good way forward is to expand public bus service. Buses are not only great ways to reduce road congestion, especially during long commutes, but they give seniors, young people, and others without automobiles mobility. To be successful, busses must run frequently; bus stops must be convenient, safe, and attractive; and they must tie into an efficient regional system of moving people around.
Finally, the Triangle region needs a rapid transit system. If we are to serve a growing population, a regional system that ties together our major cities, towns, and RTP must be started now. Train, light rail, and bus rapid transit all will have a part to play
in a 21st century Triangle rapid transit system.
With walkable communities, good public busses, and regional rapid transit, we are ready for our transportation future.