From the office of Rep. Chuck McGrady, a Republican member of the state legislature from Hendersonville:

The North Carolina Metropolitan Mayors Coalition presented Rep. Chuck McGrady with its Legislative Award in recognition for his outstanding work on behalf of local government during the 2011 Legislative Session of the North Carolina General Assembly. The award was presented at the Coalition’s recent meeting in Charlotte at which the Mayors celebrated the 10th Anniversary of the Coalition.

Asheville Mayor Terry Bellamy presented the award to McGrady citing his successful effort to protect local government decision making on billboards in Senate Bill 183.

McGrady offered an amendment to the billboards bill on the House floor to preserve local governments’ role in permitting billboards, and his amendment passed with bipartisan support. He then served on the conference committee and successfully battled to keep a substantial portion of the amendment in the final bill that became law.

“I never expected to become as active as I was on billboard legislation, but having served as a Flat Rock council member and Henderson County commissioner I knew giving local governments a role in the permitting of billboards was important to my Henderson County constituents, “ McGrady said.

Founded in 2001, the Coalition promotes the interchange of ideas and experiences among municipal officials for continued development of urban areas. In addition, the Coalition works with state officials to encourage the expansion of urban areas as livable environmental sound and economically viable.

By Susan Andrew on 01/03/2012 12:33 PM
Mountain X

(NEWS RELEASE) — North Carolina State Senate President Pro Tempore Phil Berger is defending the recent grassroots victory over forced municipal annexation. Senator Berger has informed the mayors of several cities and the North Carolina League of Municipalities that should the cities continue to fight this new law in court, the General Assembly – which holds the sole Constitutional Authority over municipal boundaries – will simply create permanent municipal lines to stop these cities from imposing forced annexation.

“Senator Phil Berger and the North Carolina Senate have taken a principled stand that they will not allow stubborn mayors and city officials to ignore our recently-enacted victory over forced municipal annexation,” explained Dallas Woodhouse, Director of Americans for Prosperity – North Carolina. “The annexation reform coalition, which Americans for Prosperity was proud to be a part of, worked on this issue for years and should not have to tolerate city officials refusing to abide by a law that is under sole discretion of the North Carolina General Assembly.

“After years of abusing taxpayers, the Cities that make up the North Carolina League of Municipalities lost this fight in the court of public opinion and the General Assembly. They should not be able to use taxpayer money to receive a third or fourth bite at the apple. We applaud the leadership of the North Carolina Senate in the strongest possible terms.”

WWAY on Thu, 12/22/2011 – 2:56pm.

We have little sympathy for two appeals, by Fayetteville and five other cities, of the legislature’s recent curbs on involuntary annexation. Fayetteville’s was especially ill-advised. But the real travesty now is Senate President Pro Tempore Phil Berger’s threat against the litigants.

Unless the cities drop their appeals, Berger warned in a letter to the six mayors and the N.C. League of Municipalities, the legislature will do to the annexations still pending what it did to others earlier in the year: prohibit them through special legislation.

There is no doubt that the lawmakers have authority to do that. Municipalities are creatures of the legislature. No other body can create or abolish one. The annexation statute itself is an act of the General Assembly. But things changed when the issue moved into the judicial realm.

If Berger succeeds, the legislature will have made itself part of an ugly misuse of legislative power to intimidate plaintiffs into abandoning actions already filed.

About that litigation: Berger says in his threatening letter that he’s only trying to ensure that “taxpayer money is not wasted on frivolous and abusive legal maneuvers.” But if the appeals really were frivolous, two things would be true.

First, they wouldn’t be before the courts, which do not try frivolous cases and which sanction those who initiate them, often by assessing costs against the plaintiffs.

Second, Sen. Berger wouldn’t be afraid of the outcome. In fact, he’d look forward to having his work ratified at the appellate level.

The only thing that’s abusive about this is the senator’s bullying. Furthermore, he’s distorting the proper perspective on North Carolina’s annexation law.

Yes, the legislature can create and do away with cities. But there’s no provision for flash-freezing one by routinely impeding its annexations for spite or for votes.

The whole context of the law is orderly urban growth through annexation. Expansion is the marrow in its bones. (Even abolition has been carried out only at the request of the municipalities that were ultimately abolished.)

As we’ve said from the outset, the logical follow-up to the statute’s revision would have been for the self-described reformers to identify the tools they want cities to use in continuing the work the statute mandates.

Trying to frustrate an attempt to test the constitutionality of the revision is politically petty and contrary to good governance. The appeals are awaiting disposition in a branch of government equal to Berger’s, and should be heard on whatever merits they possess.

After that, it’s his show.
Published: 12:02 AM, Mon Dec 26, 2011

Fayetteville Observer

RALEIGH, N.C. — North Carolina voters may never feel more loved — or pestered — in 2012 by politicians and others anxious to persuade them on electoral choices.

The state is on the cusp of an unparalleled year in politics, anchored by the Democratic National Convention gathering in Charlotte in September, when President Barack Obama will be nominated for a second term. North Carolina was already poised to be a battleground state because Obama won it by just 14,200 votes in 2008.   

 There’s the likely rematch between Democratic Gov. Beverly Perdue and Republican Pat McCrory, which has the markings of a fierce contest between two political veterans who four years ago waged the closest gubernatorial election since 1972.

The Republican majority in the Legislature will aim to keep hold of both chambers earned in 2010 for the first time in 140 years. Democratic incumbents in Congress will be fighting for survival because their seats became vulnerable when new maps drawn by state lawmakers favored Republicans. All seats for Congress, the Legislature and Council of State are on the ballot.

“It has the potential to be a perfect storm. You just have all of those races at various levels (and) all being very competitive simultaneously,” said Eric Heberlig, an associate political science professor at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. “That is just going to magnify the level of media attention …. We’re going to be sick of campaign commercials by next Election Day.”

By the spring, millions of additional campaign dollars also could be injected into the state before a referendum on the May 8 primary ballot to place a gay marriage ban amendment in the state constitution. Advocates consider the vote a bellwether on gay rights in the U.S. It’s possible the primary could be delayed if Democrats and civil rights groups persuade judges the redistricting maps must be redrawn or are likely unconstitutional.

The Democratic convention begins Sept. 3 in Charlotte and Election Day will be Nov. 6.

The convention is expected to bring 35,000 people to Charlotte, including 6,000 delegates and 15,000 members of the media worldwide. The 2008 Democratic convention in Denver brought a $266 million benefit to its metropolitan area.

Advocates on both sides of the political aisle welcome the weeklong convention, which will help energize and organize the Democrat faithful heading into November, said Scott Falmlen, a Democratic consultant and former executive director of the state Democratic Party.

State Republican Party spokesman Rob Lockwood said the event will give GOP activists the opportunity to link more closely what he calls the failed policies of Obama with Perdue and other Democrats because they’ll be together.

Falmlen said Perdue would be wise not to distance herself from the president, who became the first Democrat since 1976 to put the state in the party’s electoral column. The Obama campaign already has four offices in the state and is working on voter registration drivers and other gatherings to attract volunteers that helped Perdue edge McCrory in 2008.

“The Obama campaign is going to be putting all kinds of resources into North Carolina that will have residual benefit to the governor and every Democrat on the ticket,” Falmlen said.

McCrory, the former Charlotte mayor, is certain to attack Perdue for her handling of the state economy and will attempt to capitalize on any link to the national Democratic Party. At the convention “the rest of the state will see much of the very liberal ideas that are coming from the federal government that the current governor agrees with,” McCrory said in a recent interview.

Perdue, on the other hand, appears ready to link McCrory to the General Assembly’s Republican leadership, whom she’s blamed for thousands of public education job losses and for health care cuts in the GOP-penned budget that let a temporary extra penny on the sales tax expire. Perdue says she’s fought to protect education.

“The 2012 election will be a referendum on these two competing visions for North Carolina’s future,” Perdue campaign spokesman Marc Farinella said. “North Carolina’s voters do not share the anti-education values held by McCrory and the Republican leaders in the Legislature.”

As far as governing, the Legislature’s session to adjust the second year of the two-year budget begins May 16 and likely will go six to eight weeks. Senate leader Phil Berger, R-Rockingham, and House Speaker Thom Tillis, R-Mecklenburg, still view the Republican majority’s job to control spending and reduce regulation to get the state’s economy out of a ditch they say was caused by Democratic overspending and taxes.

Perdue’s record 16 vetoes in 2011 chronicled the enmity between the Democratic administration and the Republican majority. Working together in 2012 could be even more difficult in a hyper-political environment.

Perdue “wants to continue to do things in the way that the Democrats who had controlled this state for generations did things,” Berger said. Since the Republicans ran on something different, he added, “it becomes difficult to bridge that gap.”

Senate Minority Whip Josh Stein, D-Wake, said Republicans could choose to work in the 2012 session to pass legislation designed to attract emerging economic sectors to the state. Stein said Republicans spent their time imprudently in 2011 on issues such as abortion, the gay marriage amendment and trying to repeal the Racial Justice Act.

“Pursuing an extreme agenda is just not the right priority when we are facing double-digit unemployment,” Stein said.

 Both major parties have high expectations for November 2012 that should rev up their political bases.

 Republicans want to hold the Executive Mansion for the first time in 20 years, retain control of the General Assembly and stop Obama from winning. Democrats want the Charlotte nomination of Obama to guide him and Perdue to re-election and for the party to take back the Legislature.

“If you’re interested in politics,” Berger said, “these are years that get your juices flowing.”

 By GARY D. ROBERTSON, Associated Press

 When state lawmakers were sworn into office in January, Democrats no longer held legislative power in North Carolina.

For the first time in over a century, Republicans would control the state’s purse strings and its chief policymaking apparatus. The GOP wasted little time in letting folks know that it was a new day in Raleigh.

Within weeks, they were working to overturn long-standing polices affecting guns, elections, abortions and medical malpractice lawsuits.

By spring, Republican legislators had left no doubt: Their control of the North Carolina General Assembly would dominate the political news of 2011, and they had no plans to approach their new power with trepidation.

GOP control of the legislature inevitably led to clashes with Democratic Gov. Beverly Perdue, who didn’t hesitate to pull out her veto stamp.

Perdue, in her third year in the governor’s mansion, still faced questions about her campaign’s use of donor-provided airplane flights in 2008. She also continued to struggle with less-than-stellar poll numbers in the face of a tepid economic recovery.

The year brought bigger problems for former U.S. Sen. John Edwards. A federal grand jury indicted him on campaign-finance related charges. The fallout from scandal at the State Bureau of Investigation’s crime lab also continued in 2011, with a prominent murder defendant given a new trial because of tainted evidence from the lab. And the Occupy Wall Street protests spread from New York to several North Carolina cities, with small bands of protesters taking up residence on public squares.

The Republicans’ haste to get busy making their mark on North Carolina public policy was perhaps understandable. They had been waiting 120 years to control both chambers of the General Assembly.

As they took office, a long-time nemesis did not. Marc Basnight, the Dare County Democratic who had been Senate leader for 18 years, decided to give up his seat rather than sit on the back bench.

Considered one of the most powerful politicians in state history, Basnight had suffered from a nerve disorder that affected his speech and balance during his final two years in office. Still, it was the remarkable Republican success at the ballot box in 2010 — and not his health — that finally ended the longest reign ever for a North Carolina legislative chamber leader.

When Republicans took power, the new legislative leaders came as no surprise. The Senate elected longtime minority leader Phil Berger, a Rockingham County lawyer, to head the chamber. New House Speaker Thom Tillis, a retired business consultant from Mecklenburg County, was a relative newcomer to the legislature but had headed up House Republicans’ political fund-raising efforts.

The new leaders got the legislature up and running quickly, with committees named and meeting within a matter of days of convening. A whirlwind of significant and sometimes controversial legislation followed. So did long-winded floor fights, particularly in the House, with Democrats pitching fits of displeasure.

What followed was legislation putting new restrictions on abortion and loosening restrictions on gun owners. Workers compensation reform and new limits on medical malpractice awards — which had been kept at bay by Democrats and a key political ally, trial lawyers — came as well.

GOP legislators also passed bills limiting involuntary municipal annexation and overturning a cap on charter schools.

They also demonstrated a penchant for returning to Raleigh multiple times after initially adjourning in June. One of those reconvened sessions led to the passage of a proposed constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage, a move that gay-rights activists called unnecessary and demeaning.

Perdue ended up vetoing 16 bills, including the state budget bill and the abortion restrictions. The legislature overturned six of the vetoes, getting help from Democrats to achieve the required three-fifths majority.

Perdue and the new legislative leaders had begun the year talking about cooperation. By the end of the year, the two sides were accusing each other of eschewing compromise for political advantage.

Even an attempt to lure a tire manufacturing plant to the state turned into game of political finger-pointing. Perdue accused Berger of scuttling the deal by nixing an incentives deal; Berger accused the governor of insider political dealing that damaged the state’s chances.

Perdue had other problems outside of her relationship with the legislature.

After months of rumors, a Perdue campaign aide, Peter Reichard, pleaded guilty to corruption charge connected with improper campaign flights and an off-the-books campaign worker. That worker and a key Perdue donor also face criminal indictment.

The state prosecutor heading up the case said Perdue had cooperated with the investigation and that no evidence link her to any wrongdoing. Still, the indictments were another page in a long-running book of recent campaign-related political scandals in the state.

With an election year looming — and a potential rematch from 2008 with former Charlotte Mayor Pat McCrory likely — the dour economy did Perdue no favors. Most polls continued showing her approval rating among state voters at no more than 40 percent.

The year wound down with John Edwards still saying that he would fight criminal charges connected to political supporters who provided cash to his former mistress, Rielle Hunter. Edwards’ indictment followed a long federal grand jury investigation, and a trial was scheduled for early 2012.

In cities from Asheville to Raleigh, Occupy Wall Street protesters were variously arrested or given official permission to encamp.

Durham novelist Michael Peterson, convicted of murder in 2003, was given a new trial based on a judge’s ruling that an SBI crime lab technician had committed perjury. That ruling followed an audit questioning lab blood evidence used in 230 criminal cases.

And the year ended with a court battle looming over newly drawn legislative and congressional districts that could give Republicans an even greater advantage in the 2012 elections but which Democrats say are unconstitutional.

Political events, of course, don’t respect calendars, and a number of these story lines will continue into 2012.

Sunday, January 1, 2012

byScott Mooneyham

The North Carolina Metropolitan Mayors Coalition has given state Rep. Chuck McGrady its 2011 Legislative Award for his work on behalf of local government.

Asheville Mayor Terry Bellamy presented the award at the coalition’s December meeting in Charlotte, citing McGrady’s success in protecting local government decision-making on billboards in Senate Bill 183.

McGrady offered an amendment to the billboards bill on the House floor to preserve local governments’ role in permitting billboards, and his amendment passed with bipartisan support. He then served on the conference committee and successfully advocated to keep a substantial portion of the amendment in the final bill that became law.

“I never expected to become as active as I was on billboard legislation, but having served as a Flat Rock council member and Henderson County commissioner, I knew giving local governments a role in the permitting of billboards was important to my Henderson County constituents,” McGrady said in a prepared statement.

Founded in 2001, the mayors coalition promotes the interchange of ideas and experiences among municipal officials for continued development of urban areas. In addition, the coalition works with state officials to encourage the expansion of urban areas as livable environmental sound and economically viable.

From staff reports

Published: Monday, January 2, 2012 at 6:20 p.m.

Last Modified: Monday, January 2, 2012 at 6:20 p.m.