Dare County officials ambushed by state budget “deal”
Boy, this hot mess of a backroom “deal” on the state budget is continuing to
deliver in the surprise department:
Following in the footsteps of Nags Head and Manteo, leaders of the other four Dare County municipalities released a flurry of letters and resolutions on Sept. 21 voicing their staunch opposition to a provision inserted into the state budget that would curtail the towns’ ability to regulate housing developments.
The budget item, which applies only to Dare County and to the $35 million the state awarded to the county to build affordable housing, was just discovered on Sept. 19 by surprised local officials—sparking considerable speculation about who is responsible for it.Dare County Manager Bobby Outten has told the Voice and town managers that the county had no role in creating the budget provision, nor any knowledge of it. […]
Who’s responsible? I’m willing to bet that one of these folks knows. I’m also willing to bet that a close crony or campaign donor is also behind it too.
Sometimes it’s good for Raleigh to step in. Locally, we’re held hostage by some anti-development nuts who slapped never-ending moratoriums on all commercially-zoned property in town. People who had jumped through all of the regulatory hoops and played by the rules were being screwed. All they could do was pay their property taxes and fume. Development deals were in danger of dissolving thanks to the crazy moratoriums. All it took in our case was a threat of action by Raleigh. What appears to be going on in Dare is much more serious and alarming.
MORE:
[…] The mayors’ letters were addressed to NC House Speaker Tim Moore and Senate President Pro Tem Phil Berger and to Dare County’s legislative delegation—State Representative Keith Kidwell, State Representative Edward Goodwin and Senator Norman Sanderson—as well as Dare County Board of Commissioners Chair Bob Woodard.
As summed up in the those letters of protest, “This law would mean” that county’s six municipalities “could not enforce their zoning regulations on any affordable housing project funded by Dare County under the $35 million the state allocated to them…No height limits, no restrictions on lot coverage, no setbacks, no parking standards, no limit on density, etc.”[…]
Height limits can be related to fire safety concerns. Local fire departments may own equipment that reaches only SO high.
MORE:
[…] At their Sept. 20 meeting, the Manteo Commissioners approved a resolution opposing the budget provision (Section 24.8) and Nags Head Mayor Ben Cahoon wrote a letter declaring that the measure “will strip our towns of the ability to govern their own fates.”
A day later, those same sentiments emanated from leadership in Kitty Hawk, Duck, Kill Devil Hills and Southern Shores. They included the call for the state legislature to remove that housing section from the budget. And in the event that did not happen, letters called on Dare County “to disavow itself of the Legislature’s action, and to refuse to support or fund any project which does not go through a local municipality’s site review and approval process.”
Aside from its resolution and letter from Mayor Ben Sproul, the Town of Kitty Hawk, on its Facebook page, urged residents to reach out and contact the members of the Dare County legislative delegation to voice their opposition. Letters were also signed by Duck Mayor Don Kingston, Kitty Hawk Mayor Craig Garriss and Southern Shores Mayor Elizabeth Morey.
One mayor who voiced a pessimistic view on efforts to reverse Section 24.8 was Manteo’s Bobby Owens. While characterizing its insertion into the budget as “just dirty politics,” during the Manteo Commissioners’ Sept. 20 meeting, Owens also stated the legislature “can do it [and] they’re going to do it…It is what it is. We’re going to lose.”[…]
How is this ANY BETTER than the Jim Black-era crap we threw out in 2010?
Two of their legislators are staunch conservatives who do not play these games. The third one is an establishment type who formerly served in the McCrory administration, but I suspect he would not have blindsided the other two. This may have been a sabotage effort from the leadership, as the two conservatives often oppose the leadership’s pandering to special interests, and this calculated to hurt them in their home districts. It is good that it was caught before this crap got passed in the budget.
This bill came out of Saine’s committee, and it would not surprise me if it were a shot at one of his opponent’s for Speaker.
This is just another example of why the whole Berger and Moore leadership teams need to be rooted out of power. They are Tammany Hall on steroids..
Kidwell threw his “fit” at the convention over Whatley. Whatley who has proven himself to be a representative of himself and his cronies such as Tillis. Kidwell owes favors to Dare locals/investors, so is hands aren’t clean.
The reality is that all the power players in budget matters are hostile to Kidwell right now, either because they are running against him for Speaker, supporting someone else who is, or backed liberal issues that Kidwell opposed. They are not about to do him any favors in last minute budget matters but might well be up for a knife in the back. This was not in the House budget. It came from the Senate, and Berger;s inner circle is particularly mad with Kidwell at the moment. Don’t forget that Senator Norm Sanderson also has gone against the Berger diktat on a number of issues, too, and screwing Dare County like this hurts both Kidwell and Sanderson. This is the leadership pitching a tantrum and playing dirty.
Kidwell appears to alienate potential friends while constantly making new, implacable enemies and in doing so, has put himself into an isolated position. Not very strategic-minded and that will limit any future aspirations he may have.
This travesty clearly came out of the Senate, NOT the House. It was NOT in the House version of the budget but was inserted in the Senate. It was be interesting to know who in the Senate was responsible. If it was Norm Sanderson then somebody suckered him, as this is not normally something one would expect out of him. I suspect the culprit may be elsewhere in the Senate.
Given RINO Sen. Paul Newton’s unsuccessful Senate bill to strip all NC local governments of zoning power over “affordable housing”, doing this to Dare County is a very dangerous precedent for the entire state. There have also been rumblings from the wind and solar grifters about removing local controls over wind and solar farms, and this is an awful precedent for that, too. Connecting those dots, Newton was also a very big player in ramming through NC’s Green New Deal. He is a retired exec from “woke” energy monopoly Duke Energy. Also, “woke” Berger staffer Brent Woodcox was involved in the Green New Deal legislation and actually heads an organization called “YIMBY” (Yes, In My Back Yard) which is specifically aimed at putting low cost housing in middle class neighborhoods.
There is always more than one way to skin a cat. If Dare BOC can’t get local approval, get it from Raleigh. Ram it down the throats of the citizens of Dare. Who are the investors in this project? Who has worked at the General Assembly and still has contacts? Think real hard! Who owes whom a favor? It’s pay to play.
I wish that Dare would subsidize my mortgage. My taxes have gone UP, Insurance has sky rocketed, not to mention groceries, gas, and utilities. But hey Dare BOC, take my tax dollars and build these houses without local consent. It’s the Republican way! Oops, that’s not right. That’s the democrat way.
Where did this lousy idea originate? It is nationally part of the Democrat playbook to shove low cost housing into middle class neighborhoods by taking away local control. In North Carolina, it reared its ugly head this legislative session in Senate Bill 317, a “bi-partisan” bill sponsored by both Democrats and Chamber of Commerce type Republicans, one of whom, Paul Newton, is a key leadership lieutenant of Senate President Pro Tem Phil Berger. https://dailyhaymaker.com/jones-st-varmints-launching-bipartisan-assault-on-free-market/
SB 317 would have imposed this lousy concept statewide, but that went nowhere so they seem to be trying to sneak a test county into the budget instead. None of the SB317 sponsors volunteered any of their own counties for that role, and instead it is being dumped on Dare County.
This nonsense was NOT in the budget when it went through the House, and the big proponents of the concept are all in the Senate, so it is almost certain that this time bomb was planted in the budget in the Senate, with the hope it would not be noticed until after the budget passed. It was a really nasty trick to blindside the local legislators whose district is involved.
The reason Dare County was picked on is probably related to sour grapes of the cabal trying to impose casinos on North Carolina. All of the behind the scenes legislative budget players who had the power to hide this in the budget are part of the casino cabal, and Dare County just happens to be represented by legislators who opposed the casinos. In the Senate, Norm Sanderson was one of the few who dared vocally oppose the casinos, as he had also opposed the Berger cabal on Obamacare Medicaid expansion. In the House, Rep. Keith Kidwell has been one of the leaders in the group of 30 representatives who held firm and blocked the casinos. This reeks of a very nasty payback against Sanderson and Kidwell over their stance on the casinos. Casinos were Senate President Pro Tem Berger’s wet dream, and it blew up thanks to conservative opposition. This stab in the back is the result.
Correction disappointed, it is the corrupt way.
Guys, MORE Ukraine $$ support came from these Rs:
Rouser
Foxx
McHenry
Hudson
Murphy
Edwards
Don’t let them deceive you they are Conservative or Conservatives!
Connect the Dots. Commissioner House promised Jordan Hennessey that the housing project would go through for him and his investors. When the towns would not cooperate, Jordan had to pull strings in the General Assembly. Who would that be? Kidwell.
Since this stinkbomb appeared in the Senate version of the bill, not the House version, that is where the connection was made. Due to his leadership against the casino issue, Kidwell was not on the best of terms with the House leadership to do that, and even less so the Senate leadership. If Jordan was involved, his background in the legislature is with the Senate, not the House.
It is hard for me to believe that Sen. Norm Sanderson would have been involved in this because there is currently a huge political controversy ongoing in his home county of Pamlico over low cost housing. Their county commission voted a few weeks ago to endorse a grant application for “affordable housing” in Pamlico County on a 4 to 3 vote, the third time it came before the commission, with two Democrats and two less conservative Republicans supporting it, and three more conservative Republicans opposing it. I hear this may lead to some primary challenges and their local newspaper is full of controversy on the subject. One of the concerns is ending up with illegal aliens in the new low cost housing. Norm would have been particularly sensitive to this issue in Dare because of the ongoing firestorm over it in his own home county.
There are a number of players in the Senate who are tight with Berger who have a history of wanting to kneecap local governments on zoning for “affordable housing” That would include Berger’s “woke” staffer Brent Woodcox, who is head of a group called YIMBY that wants to jam low cost housing into middle class neighborhoods, and RINO Sen. Paul Newton who introduced a bill, SB 317, to override local zoning control statewide to push “affordable housing.”. These are the people who would have had the inside track to stick this scam in the Senate version of the budget.
Hannig and Kidwell.
That makes no sense whatsoever. Hanig has been in the doghouse with Berger over a variety of issues beginning with the Obamacare Medicaid expansion. Plus he does not even represent Dare County. Kidwell is even more in the doghouse with Berger due to his leadership role in fighting Berger’s casinos. And this happened in the SENATE, not the House. Whoever did this was someone with a strong “IN” with Berger and that is NOT either Kidwell or Hanig. It is probably not Sanderson either, as he has not been toeing Berger’s line too much either.. The only legislator in the region who seems to be on decent terms with Berger is Ed Goodwin, but he does not represent Dare County, and this happened in the Senate, not the House.
As angry as Berger has been in this late budget process over his stinking casinos, he was NOT going to be doing any favors for casino opponents like Kidwell or Sanderson.
CORRECTION. Ed Goodwin does represent a small sliver of Dare County in the Duck / Southern Shores area, and seems to still be on the good side of Phil Berger, having been evasive on Berger’s casinos. While there is a remote possibility he might have had something to do with this, it is much more likely to have come from someone in the Senate structure who is tight with Berger and not hostile to the casinos.