Surprise, Lee County! You Get Millions of Tons of Coal Ash for Christmas!

Lee County, NC, is high on the target list for immediate fracking for natural gas. Now it's also about to receive a snoot full of Duke Energy's coal ash. Are the citizens happy?

Duke Energy wants to put millions of tons of its precious coal ash into open-pit clay mines in both Lee and Chatham counties. Duke Energy has put in its applications for permits to its wholly owned subsidiary, the NC Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR), which is sure to approve them.

Some slick Duke Energy boys in expensive suits showed up earlier this month at a Lee County Commissioners meeting in Sanford and reassured the folks that everything was copacetic, that there was no danger, that ... blah blah blah. According to WRAL, the crowd of citizens who showed up to hear Their Slicknesses weren't buying what Duke Energy was selling. Every single speaker in the public hearing spoke against putting coal ash into Lee County, and they chanted "shame on you" at the end of the public hearing.

One resident spoke directly to the Duke representatives, “I’m sorry. I’m sure you’re all very nice people, but you are not here for the betterment of my community.”

Incidentally, Republican Rep. Mike Stone, a great champion for fracking who represented Lee County, lost his seat to Democrat Brad Salmon in the elections just passed. So there's that.

Whacking the Pinata

Remember this story about how one dickish Republican legislator from Lee County got a "local" bill passed in the General Assembly to fire four of the 12 members of the Central Carolina Community College Board of Trustees, because they were Democrats and were appointed by the local Democratic school board?

A judge, after hearing the evidence, including the politics very clearly at play, has said "Not so fast there, Rep. Mike Stone."

Fair-minded and constitutionally schooled judges all over the state are going to be saying that a lot in the months ahead, we trust.

Look What the General Assembly Did To Lee County

We hear about the new Republican majority in the General Assembly and what they did to Asheville's water system, and we hear about how they're trying to strip Charlotte of its airport, and we know about how they're forcing Durham to deliver water and sewer services against the will of the people to a huge mega-development outside city limits.

But some of their "smaller-scale" meddling in local government doesn't get the same news coverage.

Take Lee County and its local school board. See, Lee County has a majority-Democrat school board, and that fact apparently puts a burr under the saddle of the local Republican member of the NC House, Rep. Mike Stone, who was just elected in the Tea Party surge of 2010 and who has been drunk with power ever since.

Rep. Stone introduced three local bills in the General Assembly, all clearly intended to punish the Lee County School Board:

1. H490 forces the school board  — which has been officially non-partisan since it was established in 1967 — to hold partisan elections. 

2. H491 transfers control of school resource officers from the school district to the Lee County Sheriff's Office. The sheriff is a Republican.

3. H512 takes away the school board's power to appoint members of Central Carolina Community College's Board of Trustees.

H490 became law. H491 became law. H512 became law.

So much for local government.

But wait! A Lee Co. Superior Court judge has just granted a restraining order against H512 while a new lawsuit plays itself out.

The passage of local bill H512 ended the terms of four members of the Central Carolina Community College, specifically the four who were appointed by the Lee County School Board, and it furthermore decreed that none of those four people can ever be reappointed. Those four, one of whom was only sworn in a couple of weeks ago, have sued, alleging that H512 serves no legitimate government interest and is arbitrary and capricious.

"Arbitrary and capricious"? Why, yes, and perhaps there's still a judge in North Carolina who can recognize the truth of that. While H512 was singling out four people appointed by a Democrat-majority school board, it was leaving alone four other trustees appointed by the Republican dominated Lee County Commission. That's about as arbitrary as you can get. Also blatantly partisan, turning education, or at least the possibility of education, into a political pissing match.

Wednesday Smorgasbord

1. Union County: "There'll be no memorial to 'loyal slaves' on our courthouse lawn." Decision NOT "based on race." No, never.

2. Sen. Kay Hagan pleased to join the pro-business Washington think tank, ThirdWay.

3. Democratic Party Chairman David Parker wants the Republican Speaker of the NC House to investigate a possible conflict of interest by Rep. Mike Stone of Lee County, who set the agenda for a closed-door meeting featuring presentations by video-gambling interests while profiting personally in his own grocery store from video gambling.

4. State government employees: We're working people, too!

Landmarks in Naked Self-Interest

Meet Rep. Mike Stone, the Sanford Republican who led the closed-door meeting last week with video gambling lobbyists on Capitol grounds in Raleigh.

Mr. Stone owns a small grocery store where, until Friday night, he had "video-poker-style" gambling machines set up for the fleecing of his customers. He removed the machines Friday night after repeated calls from an N&O reporter.

Mr. Stone still has available in his store "a variety of sweepstakes games on desktop computer terminals. The games mimic the spinning wheels of a slot machine."

According to the N&O, "State law currently prohibits electronic machines and devices used for sweepstakes purposes," though Mr. Stone maintains that these particular machines are legal.

How come? Because they're his, and "Everything we do is legal." What he apparently meant to say was that he was taking advantage of a period when the anti-electronic gambling law is being litigated in the courts and isn't being uniformly enforced by local sheriffs.

So the "gambling lobby" is swarming in Raleigh, and as of last week Mr. Stone, who makes money on video gambling, was their chief facilitator: "...lawmakers ... are considering making video gambling legal or letting the state lottery run it. Gambling interests are trying to strike a deal and get permission to exist in exchange for more regulation and taxation. The political effort is ongoing and intense."

For his part, Mr. Stone is denying that he was the chief sponsor for the secret meeting. He's fingering Thom Tillis, which is sure to endure the 1st term rep with his leadership: "Stone downplayed his role in the meeting, and said the agenda was put together by the office of House Speaker Thom Tillis. Stone said he had nothing to do with the lineup of lobbyists: 'It came from Tillis' office.' "

So what about that, Speaker Tillis?