Annual Operating Budget
The city council’s consensus agreement to raise the Ad Valorem Property Tax Rate has been suspended until Tuesday June 25, starting at 6 pm. Councilperson Coffey lobbed a large rock into the tranquility pond of tax rate concession. Ms. Coffey, to the obvious displeasure of the Mayor, announced the need to discuss the ad valorem property tax rate. “As far as the rate I believe the citizens are not happy with the rate increase”. Councilperson Deake entered the suddenly murky pond suggesting the water bill (utility bill) be increased by $5.00 and the property tax increased lowered. Councilperson Kearney said at least twice we have a consensus on the budget, why reopen this debate. Councilperson Rainey pointed out that a water bill increase impacts everyone in the city while a property tax increase impacts only those who pay their property taxes. The race was on to either amend the budget consensus or approve the consensus as is. To the Mayor’s chagrin the council voted to table approval of the operating budget until Tuesday night. The vote was 3 ayes, 2 nays, and 1 pass. One councilperson had an excused absence.
Demolition of four houses
The Council finally agreed to demolish four abandoned, dilapidated, uninhabitable homes owned by an out of state investor. The homes were once owned and occupied by Henderson’s middle income families when Henderson was a vibrate community. The four houses are symbolic of our areas’ forty years of decline. Councilperson Deake lamented the need to spending $30,000 of taxpayers’ money to demolish the houses; instead of spending the same money to improve the recreation department’s ball fields. Adding these are only four of the possibly a 100 similarly distressed properties that taxpayers’ money will be used to demolish. If some industry does set roots in our fair community there will be more than 100 vacant lots available for the emergence of a new middle class with vision and vitality. An aside, I did find the investor’s name in the May 2012 tax lien listing. So besides the $30,000 to demolish the homes there is also $4,670.99 in unpaid property taxes.
Agreement with ECS Carolinas, LLP to Perform Construction Materials Testing Services
The actual title is much longer and more obfuscating. Basically the construction company building the water reclamation facility requires an independent third party testing of construction materials (rock and concrete) to assure the city that proper materials were used and applied according to industry standards. This topic is more interesting for what we all learned about the filter fly (psychodidae). The filter fly is also called drain flies, sewage flies, filth flies. First a side trip about filter flies; “[t]he Filter Fly is one of the simplest flies to tie. And at times it is also one of the most effective you can use to catch many kinds of [fresh water] fish, from trout to bass to bluegills.” (source: jackgartside.com) The subject of filter flies started when Councilperson Kearny asked Mr. Frazier to explain the invasion of the flies. Mr. Frazier passed the topic to Mr. Swain who spoke eloquently and entertainingly of the filter fly invasion. The filter flies live happily in sewage filter beds; the larvae feed on sludge in the filter beds. Before you get all creeped-out about these creatures remember everything in nature is a food source for something else. Mr. Swain explained when construction dismantled some of the filter beds the flies emerged in the billions. Mr. Swain has spent much time and resources trying to gain control on the flies with little success. The flies are impervious to most insecticides including the banned chemical DDT. Ms. Rosemary Lewis, one of three public citizens appearing before the council, put a face before the council representing those whose homes have been inundated by the filter flies. When the council adjourned into a closed session, Mr. Swain and Ms. Lewis had time to discuss the filter fly invasion in her neighbors’ homes. I am not certain Ms. Lewis was satisfied with Mr. Swain’s answers. She at least had the opportunity to speak directly with the city’s authority on filter flies. The council postponed the decision to sign the contract until Tuesday’s continued meeting, giving Mr. Frazier time to get ECS to jump through some extra hoops.
Other Public Comments
Ms. Debbie Perinkson started her presentation saying, “I believe Henderson is in trouble. No new businesses, high crime, high taxes. Many of the good people of Henderson are leaving.” That should get everyone’s attention. She ended her presentation saying, “I think we need to collect taxes from those with the oldest amount due instead of alphabetically.” That is something the City has formally requested the County implement.
Allan Simons said he was a lifelong resident of Henderson. His presentation concerned the state of the athletic fields managed by recreation department. He said Warren and Granville Counties have far better ball fields than Vance County. He suggested the recreation department reach out to business for help and to lower usage fees.
One Stop Permitting
Under the tutelage of Mr. Griffin in the past six months the city has created, designed, developed, and implemented a One Stop Permitting process. Ms. Erris Dunston the project’s facilitator and spokesperson introduced the Council to the newly implemented One Stop Permitting process. Her presentation started with an introduction of all team members who came from across multiple city functions to design, develop, and implement the One Stop Permitting process that will improve the whole permitting process. Following Ms. Dunston’s presentation she fielded a flurry of challenges to the process by the Council. Mr. Griffin stepped in saying any improvement is a learning and development process. “You never get it right the 1st, 2nd, or even the 3rd time.” Adding this is unified process to improve the city’s permitting process. As implementation of the process is refined and enhanced the upper limit of One Stop Permitting is across town in the hollow halls of county governance.
Council Budget Consensus Letter
The attached is a scanned copy of the Report on 25 June Council Budget Consensus that Mr. Griffin distributed and discussed at the June 27th 2013 night’s city Council meeting. The first two bullet points in the second paragraph on page 2 of 2, caused the most consternation among the council members who understood the issue and the mayor. I heard Mr. Deake, Inscoe, and Rainey all say they wished they had received the document earlier. I have read the overview and the page sub-titled Budget Adjustment 7-A. I have no vested interest in the city’s budget unlike I do for the county’s. Maybe by posting this document those interested in the city budget have a bases to argue their agreement or disagreement without personal attacks and the underlying animosity so prevalent across the city and county. Read the letter here: http://homeinhenderson.com/2013/06/28/news/city-business/city-of-henderson-budget-consensus-letter-sent-june-27th-2013/
New Flash!
Mayor O’Geary approves the City’s budget.
The meeting opened with Mr. Griffin presenting the additional reductions requested by the four of the five Councilpersons attending the Tuesday evening meeting. (A copy of Mr. Griffin’s presentation will be posted later by HiH’s chief editor.) When Mr. Griffin conclude his presentation the Mayor recognized Councilperson Kearney. If you are keeping attendance Councilperson Kearney, and Peace-Jenkins were too busy to attend the Tuesday evening’s reconvened Council meeting that was intended to discuss the budget. Councilperson Brown who did not attend Monday or Tuesday City Council meetings found time to attend tonight.
Councilperson Kearney made a short rambling statement about people getting the services they pay for, adding that “some of these things are just smoke and mirrors”. By smoke and mirrors, I assume he meant Mr. Griffin’s very detailed explanation of the numerous cuts and what could not be cut. Councilperson Kearney moved to approve the original budget proposal. The Mayor immediately asked for a second. Councilperson Peace-Jenkins quickly seconded the motion.
The Mayor then called for a vote to approve the budget. The Ayes were 4 (Kearney, Peace-Jenkins, Brown, and Daye). On Monday night Councilperson Peace-Jenkins voted present. I never heard Councilperson Daye say one word during the Monday or Tuesday budget decisions. The Nays were 4 (Coffey, Inscoe, Rainey, Deake). A tie or a split vote depending on one view. The Mayor first made a short speech stating he opposed some the draconian cuts suggested by Mr. Griffin. He then voted with the four pro-budget councilpersons.
The 2013 -2014 City Budget was approved by the Mayor.
Well, very fair of the Council to wait for 8 members to be present to pass the budget, because it would appear to have been a big difference in the outcome had the five present had voted Tuesday night. Otherwise, the difference seems to be some wanting to hold the tax rate facing those who own their homes, esp. larger homes which they are not able to sell, as well as protect the still existing businesses, versus those that did not want to put the revenue increase across the board to all who receive the service, less this be more burdensome ( at least as a % of total income) to those of lower income. Let those who have more pay more. A classic struggle for a small community with little to no growth. I applaud all council members for this exercise in democracy, esp, those that attended all meetings and actually participated in the complex budget discussions,
Wonder what Kearney really meant by “smoke and mirrors”? Why could he not just state what was bugging him specifically? I applaud those that did not vote for this budget. Those that did not use the time wisely and work to find an alternative to taxing their constituents to death, need to be admonished.
I totally understand why the budget cuts offered did not make the final draft. However, another way could have been found. It boils down to finding stronger people to put in office and city leadership. The very same goes for the County.
Just left the most CROOKED area in the Vance County area……that being the Vance County Court House. I sat in the gallery for less than 10 minutes and I witnessed 1st hand the District Atty. say these words at least 4 different times….”The State will be taking a voluntary dismissal on these charges your honor”. My question is that if it warranted an arrest then why does the State just drop the charges? Answer:$$$$$$$$$$$$
It’s all about $$$$$. If you have it you can get out of most any crime in Vance County; including Murder. One of the cases the District Atty. dropped the charges was a jail case b/c the defendant was in his orange jumpsuit. I looked on the docket before I left the Court House just to see exactly what this particular guy was charged with and it was Assault Inflicting Serious Injury!!!! They say that Justice is blind and in Vance County it seems as if the DA’s Office and/or Judges are blind as well. Why would the State drop charges voluntarily on a defendant who was in jail for Assault Inflicting Serious Injury? Answer:$$$$$$$$$$$$. This was evident b/c when the Court Appointed Atty. was asked how many hours he had spent on this individual case; he answered 5 hours @ rate of $70 per hour. So the taxpayers will foot the bill for $350 for an atty. that represented a defendant whose charges were subsequently dismissed w/o rhyme or reason? You tell me where this is fair to the taxpayers of the State of NC? That’s just one example!!!! I’m sure there are many more just like this one!!!
Kudos to the Daily Dispatch for having the intestinal fortitude to run an article on the Front Page of the Sunday Edition about current elected officials who are TAX DEADBEATS!!!! It was funny to read some of the responses also. If eddie hits that Powerball Ticket he purchased yesterday at the store hopefully he will due what is his OBLIGATION and pay his &$#% taxes!!!! Peace-Jenkins blamed the charitable contribution of the houses that were donated to her Church by Rogers Group but if she knew they couldn’t keep up the tax obligation then why did she accept them as a gift? Intersting………and as you should have known that Cash wasn’t going to comment. Even if he had commented you wouldn’t have been able to understand what he was saying.
Way to go Mr. Bobbitt as you have been trying to bring these TAX DEADBEATS to light. Now lets see if they will tax them or continue to siphon off the lax tax code enforcement in Vance County.
Also, didn’t I just post a response to Copper Rain about sara coffey mentioning that she was a lifelong member of the NAACP within the first 5 minutes of ever meeting her? Well what do you know? Look at the letter she wrote to the Editor in Sunday’s Daily Dispatch!!! Getting prepared to try and garner the black vote again coffey?
I am very glad to know that some of the people who raised our property taxes do not pay their own. Automobile or Property, it must be paid. Been saying this for a while now…..why do we have people who clearly cannot manage their own affairs in a position to manage our city and county? Add our schools to that list.
Unfortunately, I have no sympathy for those elected officials who are tax deadbeats. They sit right there and raise (not lower) our taxes which takes food directly off our tables and then turn right around and fail to pay their own bill. Do not forget that a person who is guilty of not paying their property taxes has a say in how our public school system is run. And we are supposed to trust these people????
IF YOU CANNOT PAY YOUR OWN TAXES YOU SHOULD HAVE NO RIGHTS IN DECIDING HOW CITIZENS TAX DOLLARS ARE SPENT.
Can we “go on record” as saying that if you are an elected official and are over a year behind in paying your local taxes (property & auto) then you will be removed from office immediately? I think we have spent our time “going on record” for far less important issues. Why not this one? Accountability is necessary.
A developer factors in operating costs when purchasing real estate. If they expect everything to be free regarding a group of dwellings, there is a major problem. I wonder how someone expects to “own” a home or call themselves a “homeowner” when the entire project to get them to become one is paid by the government? When the public tax dollars dried up, so did the project. Who goes in to something like this with no Plan B? Just to be clear, foreclosure should never be an acceptable “Plan B”.
Less than 1,500 owed on a bill……and that was April. Now we are in August. How much work does it take multiple people to come up with that money? I cannot help but think of when folks try to describe a ridiculous chain of events by saying “Well, what had happened was……”
How do we have elected officials who do not pay their automobile taxes since 2007? It does not matter one bit if you still own the car or not. You owe the money. Cough it up. $63.00 is far less than $573.00 but the principal remains the same. Do people feel no shame in knowing their personal debt to the very community they govern is neglected? Makes you wonder how some people sleep at night.
Pay your bills. Take care of your own house and step aside. We need people who do not have those kinds of problems in local office.
I get that bills go unpaid. Collection agencies make their living off the fact people do not pay their bills. However, taxes are the money that is paid by the citizens and used to serve the citizens. It’s sacred and the lifeline of the very government that protects us.
What would it take to hire a collection agency to go after those citizens that do not pay their taxes? Do debt collection agencies get a cut of the money that is recovered? If that is an acceptable form of payment for those companies, then our overhead is taken care of. Lets get something like this going!
Will we ever get an apology or a believable reason as to why it happened at all?
Folks, this business of taxes not being paid by elected officials has been brought up before. In fact it was raised as an issue in the pre-election debates when the so-called New Direction was endorsed by quite a few West Henderson people, particularly the real estate interests who wanted the law dealing with rental inspections overturned. I guess some of the New Direction thinks that it means they don’t have to pay taxes. In spite of all of this publicity about unpaid taxes, I think every one of those who haven’t paid their taxes will stay in office.
All the rhetoric in the World is NOT going to get these people out of office, nor remove them from office. In order for this to happen, there must be a change in our State Constitution which will never HAPPEN as long has the Representative and Senator from this District are in office. I suppose this blog allows the few who post here to vent their frustrations without going nuts, but to continue to beat the same old horse over the same old reasons reminds me of school children fussing about a pop-quiz.
You have become so predictable it is sickening! Now, before you get on your “high-and-mighty” and your ego overloads your hind-parts, Let me say I am not repeat NOT agreeing with those who have not paid their tax, Preacher or Lay-person! What I am saying is rather than think of ways to publicly chastise them, think of ways to USE them. In other words, no matter how much you dislike them, you nor I can do anything to remove them from office. Now if we could get this County & City removed from the Federal Department of Justice having to approve every thing done to re-district this area,AND make all candidates run as AT LARGE rather than wards or districts, THEN they just might be removed. Otherwise, fuggetaboutit!
The action the Mayor did in the budget vote was about the dumbest thing I have ever witnessed from a body that is supposed to govern. The 3,5% increase adds approximately $63.00 to my taxes. You may say that is a paltry sum and I would agree, BUT. Using a per day thought process that amounts to 18 cents. to that add the tax I already pay, county and city and the total bill is, $2827.00, or $7.75 per day plus the added “TAX” of water/sewer/garbage @ $87.00 per month and my municipal payroll is another $2.86 per day or $ 3870.90 per year! total. I do not understand why the council and commission wait until almost the last minute to “work” on the future budget. There is no law that I am aware of that would preclude them starting the process in January each year. I wonder how many times any of them visit/inspect/ask questions of the employees to determine if there is a better, less expensive way to do things. I bet the answer is NOT EVEN ONCE!
actully Swampy, the budget process does begin in March. Staff begin to prepare what they believe they need for the coming year then. The reason the overall budget waits til then is so that you have a clearer picture of revenue, property tax and esp. sales tax, which lags two months, so even in April/May you are looking only at revenue through Feb.
Employees have an opportunity to explain better ways to do things everyday. It would seem budgets from staff come in higher every year, due to including wish lists of things they need or would like. The budget, from them, is an excellent way to SHOW how they could do things better or less expensive.
As far as the issue of back taxes, its a disgrace that people who would choose to be a part of a 35 million dollar city budget still owe revenue that could at least help with the situation: and then having the nerve to raise taxes! Even look at some of the challenegers for the upcoming city elections, you will find some that owe there. Maybe its a pre-equisite these days. I would be damn ashamed to sit there and vote on raising taxes on any one while not living up to my own obligation. Note:; apparently SHAME and OBLIGATION are not concepts known to some.
Detroit could happen here–.
In my opinion, budget begins with personal expenses.
Just think if the City of Henderson had the $1.8 million that it is owed by the Embassy Foundation. Now don’t bother saying that this was repaid when the library was deeded. The deal was, the City and County would be deeded the library free of debt and the City would be paid the $1.8 million which was referred to as a loan.
Now that the cat is out of the bag, in my summary of the 2012 tax lien data, I was aware that Mr. Cash ranked 69th in the top 100 of those owing the most in property taxes. I was aware that Ms. Peace-Jenkins’ was not in the top 100 for 2012; her overall tax liens are up there with the top 100. As for Mr. Daye his tax liens is significantly below the top 100 and Mr. Wright his tax liens are on vehicles, which was not listed in the 2012 tax lien data. If it were possible these four should not be allowed to vote for or against any issue before their respective body until their past due tax debits are paid in full. For a city council person to say I’m going to let the taxpayers take the hit for my poor business planning should be reason enough for her to resign. Besides the elected officials not paying their property taxes there were two individuals who through there multiple LLCs owed a combined $264,000 in back taxes almost a quarter of what the top 100 owe.
Swampy I think the voters across the county and city realize they should have better representation than offered by those presently elected. In some cases a stone would be better representative. Although over the past few years I have seen and heard some changes in the commissioners thinking. Tonight’s commissioner’s meeting includes one such example, water meters for county wide water.
Deception, I recall seeing four laptops in use at the July meeting.
Hopefully eddie will win some $$$ on the lottery so that he can pay what he OWES!!! If he has extra $$$ to throw down on some #’s then he should be able to afford the taxes he owes…regardless of the excuse he offered to the Daily Dispatch. Talk about a joke for an elected official!!! This guy takes the cake(probably ate it)!!!
Peace-Jenkins….if she couldn’t pay the taxes on the GIFTS(houses) that were donated to her by a local housing company(Rogers/Rogers) then she should have had said No Thanks!!! It seems as if she wanted some sympathy for making it appear that one of the houses was inhabited by a person who was down on there luck!! With these idiots continually raising taxes,water,sewer,and trash who isn’t a little lighter in the pocket? Is there any wonder why the city of Henderson is in the shape it’s in? Take a ride down most any city street and I guarantee you that your vehicle will need to get a new alignment. The streets are as bumpy as any dirt road I have ever been down.
And not to be forgotten is the infamous “a moron” cash!! This guy is comical to say the least. I was in another location within the city when he was attempting to carry on a conversation with the Arab owner of the business. The sad part was that the foreigner spoke better/clearer English than cash did. It seemed as if he was speaking another language so much that even the Arab guy had to ask him to repeat himself a couple of times. You can’t make this stuff up!!!! HILARIOUS!!!!
Mr. Bobbitt….what is your opinion about getting some sort of petition so that anyone who thinks that elected officials who are TAX DEADBEATS aren’t allowed to vote on any issue that comes before there governing bodies that concerns $$$. Do you think if it were to gather enough signatures that it could gain enough momentum so that it possibly becomes a reality? I have talked to 25+ adults today that said they would be more than happy to sign it!!! That’s not to mention the couple of children who said they thought it was WRONG too!!!! ROTFLMAO!!!!!
Why would someone take the time to attack me only to turn around and agree with what I said? Pitiful.
To Royal Rooter–What are the chances there is any record of the loan being repaid and deposited into the City of Henderson Account? Barring that, I guess we’d never know.
I agree with you–but maybe when pigs fly–or we storm the City Hall!?!