Boone Joins Raleigh in Requiring Masks in Indoor Public Spaces

Yesterday both the Raleigh City Council and the Boone Town Council voted to require masks for everyone visiting establishments open to the public. In Boone, council members Nancy LaPlaca and Dustin Hicks continue to oppose the measure while members Furgiuele, Clawson, and Ulmer voted for mask-wearing, as numbers of both infections and hospitalizations continue to rise across the state.

Even so, Boone is tiptoeing toward enforcing compliance: "Violation of the restriction would be punishable by an infraction, but police would be directed to first educate upon the first offense, and then give a warning before citing someone with an infraction. The restriction is slated to take effect at 9 a.m. Saturday, June 20, with enforcement of any penalties to be delayed by an additional three weeks" (Watauga Democrat).

Ashley Smith, the founder of ReOpenNC who is not from Boone, displayed her astounding level of intelligence on the issue by burning a face mask and posting it to Facebook. Yeah. That'll show the tyrants!

What WON'T Become Law in North Carolina This Year

John Wynne, the Civitas conservative who writes occasionally for Thomas Mills' PoliticsNC, was lecturing liberals yesterday morning that we should be thankful for literal small favors: now that "crossover" has been crossed over at the NC General Assembly, that means that several really awful pieces of legislation are now dead for 2015 because they failed to "cross over" -- that is, they weren't passed by at least one of the General Assembly's two celestial bodies.

In other words, we should thank Gawd, because things could be much worse.

Wynne's three examples of Republican political thuggery that won't become law this year:

SB 705: Ensure Fair Sale of Dorothea Dix Property – This bill, if passed, would have revoked the deal made by Governor Pat McCrory and the City of Raleigh for the Dorothea Dix property. Some senators felt Raleigh was getting the land for cheap and wanted to sell it for a higher price. In the end, the bill’s sponsors decided to drop the bill, saying essentially that while they’re not fans of the negotiated sales price, the deal has been done and the state should just live with it.

SB 593: Improve Professor Quality/UNC System – Would have required professors at the UNC system to teach 8 courses a year, focusing more on teaching and less on research. Bill sponsors argued that students deserve the attention of their professors and shouldn’t have graduate student TAs doing all the work. Opponents, including many in higher education, feared that it would wreak havoc at research institutions like UNC-Chapel Hill and NC State. This week, the bill was withdrawn and referred to a legislative study bill. Expect a lot more bills in the future aimed at higher education reform. This one was just a bridge too far, even for most Republican legislators.

HB 348/S550: Religious Freedom Restoration Act Because everyone already knows a little bit about RFRA, there’s no need to go over in detail what it would do. This, and similar legislation in other states, was basically a bone to throw to religious conservatives and was expected to pass easily. That is, until GOP legislators saw what happened in Indiana and got spooked. Social media activists and the high tech industry mobilized against the bill and tainted not only the State of Indiana, but also the words “religious freedom”, delivering another impressive victory for the LGBT movement.

Yes, you godless liberals, you should genuflect toward the Capitol and thank your Republican overlords that the water torture was suspended temporarily for the city of Raleigh, for college professors, and for gays.

We guess that any time the Republican Horde can curb its hatred of our capital city, higher education, and gay people is an almost, nearly good better day. Like ... we didn't get hit by a tornado, an earthquake, or the plague, so why the hell aren't we happily oblivious citizens?

This Week in "Eff You!" Government

Sen. Ralph Hise

A trio of Republican members of the NC Senate don't like Raleigh or the governor or public parks, so they've introduced a bill to set aside the $52 million deal that McCrory negotiated with the city of Raleigh to turn the Dorothea Dix property into a public park. The three senators -- Louis Pate, Ralph Hise and Tommy Tucker -- want the property sold to the highest bidder, with the minimum acceptable bid set at $52 million. Eff you, Guv, and double eff you, city of Raleigh, and eff you to infinity, lovers of public parks.

Another Republican trio in the NC Senate --Shirley Randleman, Joyce Krawiec, and Warren Daniel -- introduced a bill imposing more restrictions on abortion and on the doctors performing them. Eff you, pro-choice women.

A third Republican trio in the NC Senate -- Jerry Tillman, Bob Rucho, and Bob Rabon -- introduced another round of tax cuts that will disproportionately benefit the very wealthy and profitable corporations and pile on another $1 billion revenue shortfall to the revenue shortfall NC is already experiencing from the 2013 tax cuts for the rich. “We need to get below South Carolina, which this bill will do,” said the unintentionally hilarious Sen. Tillman. Sen. Rucho said "the details of how the state would deal with the reduced revenue have not been worked out." Eff you, schools and people who depend upon the social safety net, because you shall surely suffer.

Kevin Siers, in the Charlotte Observer, April 1, 2013

How To Increase Unemployment and Alienate Your Friends

People down in the trenches of North Carolina towns and cities are beginning to notice what's afoot in Raleigh with this new radical Republican majority in charge. Unemployment has already gone up under these people -- remember that they passed the state budget two years ago, over Gov. Perdue's veto, and they're about to pass another one.

By attacking the ability of North Carolina cities and towns to thrive, they're attacking employment itself in this state, the economic engines that make everything go.

So you can't blame Blowing Rock town council member Jim Steele, a Republican, who wonders out loud, "...Why are we messing with this [snatching city assets in Raleigh, Charlotte, and Asheville and making economic survival for the cities as difficult as possible] when we've got in our state so many other things that need to get accomplished?"

Good question.

Here's a pretty thorough over-view article by Jim Morrill on the entire 2013 war on North Carolina's cities.

Do "Cut-and-Run" Republicans Have a Clue?

Yesterday the full North Carolina Senate tore to shreds the lease that had already been negotiated, drafted, and signed for the City of Raleigh to take control of the former Dorothea Dix insane asylum site for a public park. The Senate Republicans carried that vote without the help of two Republican senators from Wake County who "cut and ran" from their party's position: Senators Chad Barefoot and Neal Hunt.

Gary Pearce wrote some wise analysis of those renegades this morning:

Barefoot and Hunt might look safe politically. They have good districts. They have a big money advantage. 

But, to keep winning, they have to win moderate Independents. The kind of voters who don’t like partisanship. The kind of voters who might see the legislature as a bunch of rural Tea Party extremists who hate cities in general and Raleigh in particular. The kind of voters who see Republicans nationally as a gang of vengeful, angry old white men. 

Barefoot and Hunt have to worry that a future opponent might figure out that there are a lot of well-heeled people in Raleigh who are mad enough to give big money to a Democrat – or to a super-PAC helping Democrats. 

They also have to worry that, in 2014, President Obama’s OFA might pump a lot of money into North Carolina. Or that, in 2016, Hillary Clinton might set off a Democratic tidal wave among moderate Independent women in their districts. 

Hunt and Barefoot have no control over a lot of that. They could control how they voted. So they voted with Raleigh and against their fellow Republicans.

The War on North Carolina Cities

Laura Leslie at WRAL puts her finger on the trend, and she only scratches the surface of what's rolling from Raleigh all the way to Boone and beyond.

Got a Signed Lease? That Means Nothing To the GOP in the General Assembly

During her last days in office, Governor Bev Perdue inked a deal with the city of Raleigh to turn the 325-acre Dorothea Dix property, a former mental asylum, into a "destination park" in the heart of Raleigh and for all the people of North Carolina.

"A group of local business leaders and civic boosters known as Dix Visionaries had lobbied for years for Raleigh to gain control of the Dix property for an urban park, and the group recently pledged $3 million to help the city create a master plan for the site," wrote WRAL.

But with our new over-lords in the General Assembly, a signed contract isn't worth the paper it was printed on. Dual bills were introduced yesterday in both the NC House and the NC Senate to simply eliminate that contract and, we assume, sell the property to the highest bidders for condos, strip malls, megaplexes, and big car dealerships.

"Words cannot express how disappointed we are with the introduction of a bill that would put the preservation of the Dorothea Dix land in jeopardy," Dix Visionaries said in a statement. "This lease was not a politically partisan act. Dorothea Dix Park was created by support from the Council of State, mayors, elected officials, business leaders, community groups and an overwhelming majority of citizens across North Carolina."

"It's almost heartbreaking," Raleigh Mayor Nancy McFarlane said. "The city went into this in good faith, and we expect the state of North Carolina to honor their contractual obligation."

"Good faith"? It would be nice if this bunch in power had any.

Someone influencial in Raleigh tweeted yesterday that this is really a big "F You" directed at Bev Perdue as her parting gift from a congregation of selfish children prone to tantrums.

McCrory: Occupy America Has No Right To Public Property!

Pat McCrory, The Man Who Would Be Governor, has decided he needs to scold the city governments of Charlotte and Raleigh for "allowing" Wall Street protestors to occupy public property in those cities.

"Throw the bums out!" McCrory cries, doing his best impression of Aunt Pittypat.

Grappling for a logical reason to back up his "OhMyGawdPeopleAreRisingUp" disdain for public protest that doesn't reflect HIS views, McCrory naturally hits on "they're dirty," which is where the unimaginative always go first, and then McCrory gets a bright idea: he's really against these protests because of the danger this will mean when the Democrats come to Charlotte in 2012 for their National Convention.

Really? BWAAAA-ha-ha-ha!

[A pause while we wipe the tears of merriment from our eyes.]

Thanks, Mr. McCrory, for your touching concern for our safety, but we'll take our chances with the Great Unwashed who actually want a say in how government at every level makes its decisions.

Woo-Hoo

Raleigh, N.C., makes the list of best places in the country to launch a small business. (I'm thinking ... a major yard-art manufacturing installation.)