Take Over the Town of Boone? Why, Easy as One, Two Three!

 

What's emerging in the Boone Town Council elections of 2021 looks for the world like a secret handshake between the administration of Appalachian State University and big real estate developers.

1. 

A new political action committee (PAC) has emerged among real estate interests which says it will endorse chosen candidates for the Town Council elections and spend money to help elect them. The PAC is very open about favoring real estate development and also about becoming a political ally of AppState. What? At least one member of the ASU Board of Trustees (Tommy Sofield) was prominent among guests at the PAC's launch. And the PAC has named itself "AppalachianPAC," maybe to help student voters believe that Sheri Everts Knows Best. (Too clever, by half.)

2. 

AppState owns some fairly large tracts in Boone that are zoned "U," a Town of Boone zoning designation which means AppState is free to build pretty much anything they desire without a mechanism for public input. Some of the sites on the map below are "U" zones ripe for development. Chancellor Sheri Everts recently sent this graphic to every ASU student, with a lengthy marketing survey: Where would you think you'd like to live in Boone if it wasn't a dormitory, and in what kind of apartment, and would you patronize businesses on the ground floor of your brand-spanking-new apartment building -- businesses including restaurants, five&dimes, dress shops, coffee shops, etc.? 

What catches my attention on this map is the inclusion of the old Watauga High School site on Hwy 105. Big site -- huge opportunities. It became ASU property in 2017. The university paid Watauga County $18.3 mil for it. It's a prime spot for something big.

Here following is the top portion of that map that Everts emailed to students, with a direct question: 

Did you notice that wording: "how interested would you be in renting or purchasing in that location?" Does that raise a red flag for you? AppState wants in the real estate market in a big new way? And suddenly its self-interest in putting a heavy thumb on the electoral scales appears all too obvious.

3.

The AppState administration very recently petitioned BooneTown's planning regulators, and the existing Town Council, to rezone some 8 parcels in downtown Boone from B1 (central business district, with plenty of restrictive regs that developers don't like and which a big powerful university doesn't like either) -- they asked to be rezoned to the much freer "U" zoning. You remember the building of the new College of Education in 2007 smack in a residential neighborhood? That was because it was zoned "U" and the Town of Boone couldn't stop it. You dig me?

To its credit, the sitting Town Council turned down all but one of those most recent AppState rezoning requests. They did approve one, the rezoning of the old Legends nightclub site. That rezoning to "U" makes some sense, especially if you thought the Legends site would make a logical and appropriate spot for a new university dorm. But, kiddies, Sheri Everts ain't interested in any more stinkin' dorms.

Just incidentally, all five of those sitting Council seats are up for election next month -- all five. The stakes couldn't be higher, the temptations more biting, to try to take over that Council and change BooneTown's look even more forever.

New Sheriff in BooneTown?

 

A new Political Action Committee (PAC) -- calling itself "Appalachian PAC" -- has decided to get involved in the Boone Town Council races this year with endorsements (unclear at the moment whether they also intend to give direct money donations to individual candidates, but they're raising money). Their under-developed website brags that they're "non-partisan," but the evidence so far suggests something more complicated. With Bill Aceto and Stacy C. Eggers IV ("Four") as donors and guiding lights, "non-partisan" isn't the first thing that comes to mind.

"Oh, look, there's Luke Eggers too!" Photos taken at the PAC's "launch" party and posted to their Facebook page show a careful, mixed guest list, with Democrats and Republicans (for example, both Eggers and Tommy Sofield, who ran with the Republican team for Watauga County Commish in 2020) and independents -- some of whom might have more of an investment connection than a shared political ideology. The "launch" party was clearly weighted toward real estate brokers and business developers. 

I have questions about their goals, let alone their intentions. The website is short on policy statements, long on generalities that raise more questions than they answer: "Our goal is to elect pro-business and pro-university candidates in local and statewide elections." The banner across the top of their Homepage: 

UNIVERSITY • BUSINESS • COMMUNITY

The repeated emphasis on university, an odd leg on this three-legged stool -- that just stops me cold. AppState needs political help? Well, yes, in their view, which actually answers another question: How does the university need/use real estate developers? AppState and its 20,000 students are always needing habitation, and increasingly the university administration looks to the local rental market to supply a lot of their needs. Dormitories are expensive to build, expensive to maintain. And why go to that expense when there are plenty of developers ready to supply another kind of dormitory space -- stuff that advertises 4 bdrm/4 bath -- at no expense to the university but $700 a pop from the students who rent those units.

Some guys correctly identified the university as a cash cow many years ago.

I'm apprehensive if those same guys intend to make the laws of Boone more conducive to their goals.

Chelsea White Out as Candidate in Dems NC11 Primary

 

It's a technicality, but one that can kill a candidacy.

Chelsea White, the newest Democrat to announce (on Sept. 19) that she would enter the 2022 Democratic primary in NC11, has discovered that she didn't change her voter registration from Unaffiliated to Democrat within the 90-day window before announcing.

Per North Carolina General Statute 163-106.1, a candidate must be affiliated with a party “for at least 90 days as of the date of that person filing such notice of candidacy.”

So she's withdrawn before ever really getting started.

There are still seven other Democrats all contending to be The One to take on Madison Cawthorn in 2022.

Nothing But Embarrassment in the Arizona Audit, But It Won't Matter

 

How anti-climactic could you get?

Rep. Keith Kidwell knows there
was pro-Democrat fraud in North
Carolina elections last year. He just
hasn't found it yet.

It's been obvious for months that the Great Arizona Election Audit of Maricopa County did not turn up what its promoters hoped for, which is why Cyber Ninjas kept putting off the issuance of a report. It was just gonna be too embarrassing. So they delayed and delayed and hoped -- what? -- that some evidence of nefarious goings-on in Biden's favor would suddenly drop out of the ceiling tiles, covered head to toe with bamboo fibers?

Already on Twitter, a Trumpist said "Ridiculous! Audit the audit!" A "fringe" GOP Arizona state senator by the name of Wendy Rogers "was one of many audit believers trying to change the conversation: She announced her support for an audit of Maricopa’s neighbor, Pima County" (Matt Shuham). (Point of order: How would anybody pick out one Arizona state senator as "fringe"?) But of course the Trump people will refute the truth by assertion alone. That's the Trump M.O. Assert anything you think of, and the stupid will believe it: "Satanists also wear masks and stand six feet apart. Just sayin'."

Or they'll ignore the truth and continue to peddle the fiction of voter fraud because it pleases the ignorant. Even Texas now is auditing last year's election in four urban counties -- "urban" meaning Black or non-white, of course -- because winning isn't the only goal for authoritarian regimes. Some Republicans in Raleigh want an audit here, because it wasn't enough they won seats in the NC House and Senate and seats on the highest courts and a slew of Council of State offices. They didn't get the Governor. Must have been fraud. 

Rep. Keith Kidwell (R) from Beaufort/Craven has demanded access to the state's voting machines, alleging fraud in NC that attempted to benefit Democrats. "Kidwell ... said in an interview ... that he is confident there was at least some fraud in the 2020 elections. He just wants to find out how much, he said, and who is behind it." That's what they thought about witches in Massachusetts. The lack of evidence proves the conspiracy is working, no?

On Facebook, Kidwell's group has suggested that it may actually be state or local elections officials who are committing fraud: “The House Freedom Caucus is now focused on BOE officials and the specific precincts themselves. We absolutely think tampering happens in North Carolina.”

Where Republicans run things, delusion is king and no honest public servant is safe.

UPDATE

See: it doesn't matter what the facts are.

"Former President Donald Trump falsely claimed during a rally in Georgia on Saturday night that the results of the Arizona election "audit" concluded that President Joe Biden lost in Maricopa County, despite the report clearly stating that Biden won with 1,040,873 votes—99 more votes than shown in the certified ballots." (Newsweek)

 

The Daily Show Went to Johnston County

 

Greg Abbott and Beto O'Rourke

 

Every time I read something about Texas in this Trump era, I get a stab in my heart, because I grew up there and still have connections. There's no earthly excuse for my native land to be so cussedly, dangerously backward.

I came across this yesterday

The Lincoln Project, an American political action committee formed in 2019, made up of former and current Republicans, issued a statement questioning why their TV ad [blasting Gov. Greg Abbott for his bad handling of COVID], funded for $25,000, did not run on ESPN during the nationally televised Texas vs. Rice college football game. The group said the ad was pulled 10 minutes before it was expected to run, despite ESPN's legal team clearing it beforehand.

The ad was pulled, citing a "university-made" decision. And a spokesman for Abbott told The Dallas Morning News he had nothing to do with the decision. Still, the Lincoln Project asserts that Abbott, a Texas graduate who appoints members of the school’s board of regents, played a part in the ad not running and said it plans to file a public records request to determine that. [USA Today]

So I found the ad: 

You might be forgiven for thinking that Gov. Abbott might could maybe be beaten in 2022 by a good, well funded Democrat. You would think that already perhaps, before seeing the Lincoln Project silent condemnation of his criminal ineptness. For Abbott's been a visible and willing advocate for backwardness of a shocking stripe, the curtailing of ballot access and the ending of legal abortion. The abrasive impact on independent voters of these policies perhaps accounts for the University of Texas poll that found Abbott moving underwater for the first time this summer, his approval rating sinking to 41% with 50% disapproving.

Could Beto O'Rourke be The One? 'Cause he's running, have no doubt. Hans Nichols at Axios wrote:

O'Rourke's entry would give Democrats a high-profile candidate with a national fundraising network to challenge Republican Gov. Greg Abbott — and give O’Rourke, a former three-term congressman from El Paso and 2020 presidential candidate and voting rights activist, a path to a political comeback.

"Comeback"? O'Rourke lost the Texas Senate race to Ted Cruz in 2018 (O'Rourke got a respectable 48.3% of the vote),  and then his presidential bid fizzled in 2020. So less than four years later, yes, we're talking "comeback"? Though it's not as though O'Rourke retired to a monastery. He's been active and out there on voting rights especially and he's lent his name and sweat equity to Democratic candidates for the Texas state legislature. Plus he's a proven, exceptional money magnet. Who else would have a better chance, taking it to Greg Abbott? Abbott pushes many buttons on the negative partisanship consol, and money will flow to any star Democrat willing to challenge him. Beto might have the appeal to pull it off. (Hope springs.)

July 17, 2021: 

Despite Cawthorn, Johnston Co School Board Votes To Keep Mask Mandate

 

The Johnston County School Board last night reaffirmed its mask mandate for all public schools. The vote was 4-3, with Democrats Kay Carroll and Terri Sessoms, joined by Republicans Al Byrd and Lyn Andrews, providing the majority.

Congressman Madison Cawthorn, roving far outside his own district in search for fame and money, led a march of anti-maskers to the Johnston County school board meeting last week to demand an end to the masking policy. The school board postponed a vote until last night because vice-chair Terri Sessoms could not attend last week's meeting.

Three More Dems in the Primary Race Against Madison Cawthorn

 

Community organizer Chelsea White has announced that she will seek the Democratic nomination for Congress in the 11th CD next spring. According to Ballotpedia, she's the 8th Democratic candidate in the primary. Here are the first 7, with links to WataugaWatch's profile of them:

Jasmine Beach-Ferrara (D)

Jay Carey (D)

Katie Dean (D)

Eric Gash (D)

Bo Hess (D)

Josh Remillard (D)

Brooker Smith (D)

 (For Katie Dean and Brooker Smith, see below.)

Chelsea White is the Western Regional Organizer and Communications Coordinator for Transform NC, a labor and climate statewide coalition. Since August, she has also been involved in the We Are WNC community group dedicated to flood recovery in Cruso and Canton.

She has a Twitter account but not much else yet for campaign infrastructure.

White made her announcement of candidacy on Sunday at a rally against Congressman Cawthorn at the Haywood County courthouse. A group of Haywood County Republicans held a counter-rally at the same location.

Katie Dean trained as an engineer at the University of Georgia and owns an auto-repair business with her husband in Swannanoa. She has a website and a professional looking video introduction:

Brooker Smith is so far a name on a list with no internet presence that I can find.

Bruce O'Connell Might Steal Some of Cawthorn's Support

 

11th CD candidate Bruce O'Connell

While the other three Republicans running in the 2022 primary for Madison Cawthorn's seat seem moderate by comparison (described here and here), Bruce O'Connell, the well known Pisgah Inn host, comes off as (much) more conservative, not so much for the policy positions (though we do get standard-issue MAGA compost -- protect guns, build the wall, "Critical Race Theory" BAD, etc.). He seems Trumpist-lite more for what he doesn't say about Cawthorn (and he says a lot). 

O'Connell's list of Cawthorn's faults makes no mention of his sanctioning of violence against the US government and his participation in the "Stop the Steal" movement which led to violence, property destruction, and death. Cawthorn was there at the rally on January 6th. He spoke. He ginned them up to accept BLOOD as part of the compact for making American great again. He's implied his belief that force can be legitimate public reaction. 

But candidate O'Connell makes no mention of any of that -- says not one word about Trump or that whole election mishegoss. O'Connell's only concerned about Cawthorn's lack of maturity, particularly his adolescent behavior: he's mouthy and disrespectful, slacking on his chores, partying instead of working. Teenage stuff. O'Connell makes no acknowledgement that what Cawthorn models is dangerous to our very democracy.

Maybe that blindspot comes from this: O'Connell's main fame came with running the Pisgah Inn on the Blue Ridge Parkway for decades -- running it well -- and then defying the government shutdown in 2013, declaring on social media and in the press that he would not give in to government "tyranny." He kept the Inn open -- the land and building are actually owned by the Federal government -- until Park Service cars blocked the entrance to his parking lot. He had to give in. Which makes him sympathetic to the insurrectionists on January 6th? Or at least willing to give them a pass and forget they ever fulminated into mass violence? 

Here's a small irony: The government shutdown of 2013 was engineered by hard-right conservatives to show their contempt for Obama's government. Bruce O'Connell's defiance was showing contempt for government shutdowns. In 2013 it was all Mark Meadows's big show. He led the Freedom Caucus into bullying other Republicans to get in line. O'Connell has no cause to admire former Congressman Meadows, who was what a conservative was supposed to be in 2013.

For historians, let alone believers in science, O'Connell is just wrong in opposing a vaccine mandate: "I believe the choice not to get vaccinated does NOT infringe on other's rights. I understand many will disagree with my position, and that is what freedom is all about. The freedom to disagree. I do not want to live under a Dictatorship." Small problem with that particular freedom: It's based on a lie. Unvaccinated people do pose a threat to others. That's just a fact. And that's why government has mandated vaccines against any number of childhood diseases going back a century.

Bottomline for me, after spending several hours on his website: I can't help thinking that O'Connell will be an attractive candidate. The popularity and high ratings of the Pisgah Inn suggest he knows how to use his personality to win people over, and his Trumpist boilerplate might be enough to coax former Cawthorn Republicans to come away from the dark. The problem of four total candidates, all with their own winning qualities and commensurate followers -- sorry to say it, means Cawthorn wins the primary with a plurality.