Column for August 25, 2011

Should a town be beholden to the State of North Carolina for every last decision? I say no. I was reading the article in “The Selma News” about about the Town of Selma’s desire to close the road around the railroad crossing on Preston Street by the old feed mill. I cringed when I read about how the Town Council decided to hold off on the vote until next month. I wish I still had the newspaper in front of me, but my two-year-old got to it, tore up the paper, and it got tossed in the recycle bin. I do recall that the town wanted to get input from the state Department of Transportation before taking a decision. I am all for having all the needed information before you prior to taking decisions, but that irked me a bit.

If Selma is an autonomous government agency, then it has its own jurisdiction and decision taking ability. I am told that Preston Street is a state road despite its length and termination points. It probably should be a town road, anyway. As much as I disagree with the proposed closing, I do believe that it should be Selma's decision to take, considering that the road is entirely within the town's jurisdiction.

There is a reason that each town has its own jurisdiction. I think back to when Selma was rezoning a parcel of land so that it could be used for industrial applications, specifically for an ethanol plant. I recall it vividly because I was on the town’s Planning Board at the time and was one of those who voted on that matter. I also went to the town council meeting about that decision. What irritated me about that meeting was that our neighboring town of Pine Level wanted to have a say in the matter. Speakers from Pine Level droned on for quite some time about their opposition to the ethanol plant. First, the agenda item was for a rezoning request, not for a debate over the merits of an ethanol plant. Second, this was a Selma matter within Selma planning and zoning jurisdiction, and not that of Pine Level. Selma can take its own decisions within its own jurisdiction, thank you very much.

As to the road closing request coming from a safety perspective, I do have experience in this area. Safety and risk management are part of my educational and work background. Sometimes there are acceptable levels of risk to take. Anytime you get into an automobile, there are inherent risks associated with travel of any distance. Yet we assume that risk regularly. How often are we going to shut down an intersection under the guise of safety? That railroad crossing has been decades and yet I don’t recall a single massive wreck associated with it in the news since I have been a Johnstonian. So to me, the safety issue is a non sequitur.

This safety claim reminds me of my very first column in this very newspaper about the Town of Selma spending thousands of dollars to take down an abandoned water tower for alleged safety and liability issues. The tower had been fine as it was for decades, but in a time of budget cuts and layoffs of town personnel, the town spent money needlessly at that point. It was reasonable, assumable risk at the time and could have been accomplished later in better financial times.

There are two more reasons that I personally oppose the closing of this railroad crossing. The first is freedom. I occasionally use this public road, for which I pay taxes for its upkeep. I despise the many roads that already dead end at railroad tracks in this town. How many more are we going to close? Shall we wait until only Pollock Street, Buffalo Road, Anderson Street, and Ricks Road remains as crossings?

Furthermore, I am not much for accommodating a railroad’s desire to close a road when they keep digging up our crossings almost every year, especially at Ricks Road. We have the worst crossing there now we have ever had. Another bad crossing is now near the train depot on East Anderson Street. Trenches with gravel tossed in them have been the norm now for quite a while and are simply horrendous. I can remember at least four times in as many years that the crossing at Ricks Road has been closed and torn up. Each time it’s never a quality job as was done on Peedin Road in Smithfield, on Buffalo Road, or even in the Town of Lillington.

Until all of our crossings are fixed nicely by all railroads that cross through our town and in a timely fashion, I would not be so willing to make accommodations for taking away more of our town’s access ways. As it is, I saw three signs on three different roads just this week warning of temporary crossing closures. Closing multiple crossings for construction has happened before, and I find that to be more dangerous in terms of cutting off emergency response by fire and ambulance equipment than any single crossing remaining open. It almost makes me want to see Railroad Days changed to some other type of festival. I can’t possibly be the only one who thinks that way.

Column for April 8, 2010

"If you can find it in the Yellow Pages, government should not be doing it." I have heard that saying many times and I am very much in agreement with that sentiment. Whether it is landscaping, trash pick up, water supply, or electricity delivery, if I can find it in the Yellow Pages, then perhaps it is worth investigating termination of government services and leaving such services to the private sector. That is unless our own governmental bodies can perform such services more efficiently and cheaply than private industry can.

For instance, if Selma wants flowers planted around our downtown (oops, perhaps I should call it "Uptown", but the "rose by any other name" principle applies) and town employees can do so efficiently and cost effectively as opposed to hiring a landscape crew, then I am all for it.

However, I am not as concerned about pansies in downtown as I am about our electricity bills. Last November, one mayoral candidate ran on a platform that included lowering electricity rates in town. Though I agree with that sentiment, short of selling off the town's electricity system, laying off employees, and letting Progress Energy sell us our electricity, it ain't gonna happen. But I am all for that very idea.

I have absolutely nothing against town employees working a job they are paid to perform. This is not personal; it is a matter of efficient government and personal finance. The town electrical workers do a good job at what they do. I remember when the last hurricane hit this area several years ago and I sat under my carport when a transformer blew out just a couple of houses over. We got to watch some town electrical workers quickly and efficiently replace the dead equipment during the eye of the storm, restoring electricity within a few hours.

My wife and I stared in amazement at our latest town electricity bill. It was the highest we have ever had in over seven years of living here in the booming metropolis we call Selma. For a fairly mild month and only a 29-day billing cycle, we were stunned. So I did a little research to see if things would have been cheaper if we got our electricity directly from Progress Energy instead of the town.
I have heard for several years that our electricity rates were not appreciably higher than those of Progress Energy were. In effect, the town is a wholesale customer through Electricities. State law allows municipalities to purchase power wholesale and retail to its constituents. The town buys low and sells high. I have no problem with a business making a profit, but when a town gouges its citizens, I tend to get irate.

I went to the Progress Energy web site and downloaded the current electricity rate. They currently charge $6.75 per month base rate plus 9.557 cents per kilowatt-hour. Selma customers pay $7.50 base rate plus about 13 cents per kilowatt-hour. I did the math and that equates to approximately $100 on my bill this month. Therefore, I paid an extra $100 in TAXES this month to the Town of Selma. Yes, I said taxes, not electricity bill payments. If it is above the normal cost that I can purchase through the local power provider and the town gets the revenue, then this is a tax, not a payment for product or service.

The good thing I can say is that the town has finally dropped the line item for a fuel recovery surcharge. Basically we had an extra charge for a long time that was called a fee when it was really a rate hike without formally calling for a rate hike or having to publicize a rate hike. Whether that surcharge was dropped or the rate was changed to accommodate the increase, I don't care, as long as the bill is more honest in presentation. We do, however, continue to have a sales tax. So we pay extra on our electricity rates and then get taxed on that overage, making it even more insulting. It is a tax on a tax.

Whenever Progress Energy proposes a rate hike for residential customers, they have to get that hike approved through the state utilities regulation authorities. When they decide to hike rates on wholesale customers, such as the Town of Selma and every other Electricities member municipality, I am told that no such approval is necessary. I got that straight from a former Selma Town Manager. That means that we are subject to much more capricious energy prices than retail customers are.

I have long questioned the value of owning our own public utility. When I lived in Smithfield prior to buying my house in Selma, I was outside of their town's municipal grid and fortunately could pay lower electricity rates. Since I now live smack in the middle of Selma, I am captive to higher rates.

I firmly believe that we as a town should investigate the savings we could have by eliminating personnel costs, operations, vehicles, facilities, and the like by not owning our own public utility. I am willing to wager that we could operate the town for a year on the proceeds of a sale of the town's power grid to Progress Energy. I am all for it and my tax bill will go down $100 a month. Of course that $100 differential is not deductible on my income tax return as local taxation, but it should be.

Column for Sept. 25, 2008

So Selma finally has a new Town Manager. Richard Douglas does seem to have an impressive résumé. Along with that résumé, however, expect impressive results.

The Town Manager serves at the whim of the Town Council. This means two things. First, he/she can be hired and fired at the Council's bidding. Next, it means that the employee is subservient to the Council and should take direction on administration while at the same time providing expertise to the Council for their authoritative decision taking.

Looking back, I see that we have had several town managers with diverse personalities and methods. Bruce Radford, now in Apex, was a bit more flamboyant and outgoing. Jeff White was much more reserved, and despite the heavy criticism he received, still served at the direction of the town council and mayor. Stan Farmer and I got along well and I thought he carried out his financial mission well, but I found him a bit obsequious, often afraid to offer a strong opinion. My interactions with interim Manager, C.L. Gobble have shown him to be articulate and knowledgeable, yet bold enough to offer insight and be contrarian if necessary.

I remember when the town laid off the entire Planning Department a few years ago. In talking to Mr. Gobble at the last Planning Board meeting, I learned that there were a lot of planning items left lacking with Stan Farmer's departure. Whether that was because of the lack of a planning department, the lack of planning expertise, or because of Mr. Farmer's general work load, I do not know for sure. What I do know is that Selma is only 3.5 square miles in territory and can not be so swamped with planning issues as to backlog the town's progress. After all, we do have plenty of Planning Board meetings get canceled because of a lack of agenda.

I recently got notice that the Planning Board would not be meeting this month until the new Town Manager and Planning Director are in place. I wonder, however, if these two positions need to remain and the same. If our interim Town Manager can push through the new Walgreen's project with it never coming to the Planning Board for a formal vote or review (not that the Planning Board has any authority whatsoever other than to recommend action to the Council either in the affirmative or negative), then I wonder about needing a separate employee to do so.

Jeff White was paid in the low 70,000 dollar range, if memory serves correctly. Stan Farmer was paid in the sixties to start. We just hired a new manager for $90,000 per year, and Mr. Douglas has a Master's Degree in planning as well as a good amount of experience in that field, from what I read in this very newspaper. If we are going to hire someone for that much money more than we were previously offering, and we are now in a time of an economic slow down, then I believe that we, as tax payers should expect more for our dollars, which are harder to come by. This is especially true when we have been hit with nearly a dime's increase per $100 valuation in property tax with another property valuation coming around the corner.

I have seen towns with a lot more square miles and close to 100,000 population paying not much more than what we in little old Selma will be paying for our new manager. Don't get me wrong, I do not begrudge any man getting as much salary as he can negotiate. This is absolutely nothing personal with Richard Douglas, since I do not know him and probably have never met him before. It is, however, an issue of public trust. My mortgage escrow rate just went up because of a higher tax rate (again), I see areas of neglect in town (as I have previously addressed in this very column), and yet I see that we are going to pay well over a third more in salary to our next Town Manager than we did our last one. For that, I expect more effort and customer service. We, the citizens, are the customers.

One request that I would have for Mr. Douglas as he starts his new job is not to allow the political bullying that we have seen in this town for the past three years push him too far. I would hope that he would not let strong personalities railroad him into taking wrong decisions or going contrary to what he knows to be the proper course of action according to Selma's best interest. I would hope that he would show the same degree of boldness shown by Mr. Gobble and speak on behalf of the taxpayers, the future of the town, and not be obsequious.