Early Warnings Of Unsustainable Taxation
For years the Pulp has had postings beating the drum on how unsustainable it is to expand your local taxes faster than the income of your citizenry. It’s simple economics really. If you double the taxes while citizens increase their median income by half, then you are reaching ever deeper into their pockets. At some point there’s little disposable income left. Their homes are mortgaged to the hilt. However, in a “facts optional” political atmosphere, it’s what you want and how you feel about getting what you want that matters.

None other than Mr. Mike Nelson proclaimed while running for commish in 2006 that people in Orange County “want a high level of services and that requires taxes”. That was back when he had to explain how Carrboro taxes (not tax rates) more than doubled under his mayoral leadership.

Back in the open forum days of the Pulp, the usual crowd of political apologists (Mr. Fred Black, Ms. Terri Buckner, Mr. Joseph Capowski (as “Weaverguy”), Mr. George Entenmann, Mr. Marc Marcoplos, and Ms. Ruby Sinreich) all sung the praises of Mr. Nelson and howled about how Orange County was different. Here people wanted the “high level of services” and knew they must pay more for them. The fact that other counties and towns offer equal or better services at lower tax burdens was assiduously ignored.

Cracks Show As Even UNC Professors Feel Your Pain
The cracks in the Orange tax-and-spend foundation are finally showing. In a recent Chapel Hill News editorial, Mr. John J. Pringle, (C. Knox Massey Professor of Finance (Emeritus) at the Kenan-Flagler Business School at UNC) laid out the case supporting the Pulp’s proposition. Orange County had practiced, and is practicing, unsustainable taxation. Mr. Pringle pointed out that median house prices in the US averaged 2.1 times median income for two decades prior to 2001. Housing prices almost doubled to 4.1 times median family income post 2001. When the housing bubble burst by late 2008, prices had fallen by 25% for the bubble peak, according to a widely used national home price index used by Mr. Pringle.

Mr. Pringle cites his personal experience, “since 1993 when we moved into our house, our property tax has increased 249 percent, while during this same period the consumer inflation index increased 46 percent. Over the 15 years, inflation has averaged 2.5 percent per year, while our property taxes have increased by an average of 8.7 percent per year. In a single year, 2005, our property tax increased 42 percent, and from 2000 to 2008 more than doubled.”

Did income keep pace with this taxflation? No. “During the peak years of the housing bubble, from 2000 to 2006, house prices nationally rose 88 percent, while personal income rose only 30 percent. Social Security income is tied to the Consumer Price Index, which rose 17 percent.”

Orange Tea Party?
Will an “Orange tea party” tax revolt happen, much like what happened in Boston, Massachusetts in 1773? No. Unlike King George III, our local politicians are much more skilled in straddling fences and speaking out of both sides of their mouths.

Most importantly, the local media and political apologists will be sure not to place any responsibility for the present tax mess on incumbent local officials. Without someone connecting the dots, “It just happened”.

Mike Nelson – Archtypical Politician Without Responsibility
Sociopathic behavior is acceptable if exhibited by a politician. Deception, dishonesty, feigned interest may still be repulsive for many in personal interactions, but as a society, we accept such behavior in our politicians. It’s considered “part of the game”. It’s okay to say one thing and do the opposite. It’s okay to pretend to be what you aren’t. It’s okay to say you’re against tax rises while promoting a new tax.

After a decade of doubling the tax burden in Carrboro, in 2006 Mr. Nelson ran for the commish spot as the next rung in his climb for political glory. When questioned about his taxation record, he confidently responded that here people want a “high level of services” and know “they must pay more for them”. In part, his confidence exuded from a reliance that no one in the local media or political establishments would question his statement. The fact that other counties and towns offer equal or better services at lower tax burdens would not be mentioned.

After being elected in the Democratic primary, Orange County having one party rule, in 2007 during his first commish retreat, Mr. Nelson opined ”We need to dig down and find out really why we've had 18 years of tax increases. Eighteen years in a row is a long time.”

Then one year after speaking aloud about 18 years of tax increases, in 2008, Mr. Nelson was advocating for another tax. Mr. Nelson, like his successor as Carrboro mayor, Mr. Chilton, advocated vociferously for the ill-fated and highly rejected local option transfer tax. He even used the case of his retired elderly mother to support taxing home sales even more, claiming he would raise property taxes less, even though the proposed tax wasn't requried to be revenue neutral. Eluding Mr. Nelson’s steel trap financial mind is the fact he has raised the county tax burden more than the funds the transfer tax would've yielded. (See Carrboro Citizen Nelson Transfer Tax editorial.) Quite an accomplishment Mr. Nelson has achieved in less than one term in office as commish.

Retreats must be especially insightful times for Mr. Nelson. For in 2009, one year after asking for the transfer tax increase, Mr. Nelson again felt bad about county taxes. He noticed that the county is spending faster that county property taxes are rising. (Mr. Nelson ignored the fact that property taxes are rising faster than median income.) He was concerned that county spending would rise 5.8% annually over the next five years while property values were projected to rise just 3.9%.

In Mr. Nelson’s immortal words, ”I have a fundamental, philosophical, ideological problem with the way this organization had done budgeting. It's brought about tax increases.” This revelation comes from the person who oversaw a doubling of the Carrboro tax burden, far outpacing both median incomes AND property values in Carrboro. (See N & O Nelson Philosophy Story.)

A Hope For Change - Coming Campaign Converting The Image of Tax-and-Spenders Into Fiscal Conservatives
With 2009 bringing about a confluence of a local municipal election and a severe recession sliding into a depression, Pulpsters should be alert in looking for the coming campaign to remake the image of local incumbents. Local media and political apologists will create a wave of disinformation portraying incumbents as “holding the line”, “showing a tight fist”, and the ever popular “making the painful cuts” with regards to local budgets, and thus, local taxes. That these incumbents used the good times to build a bureaucratic infrastructure unsustainable even in the good times, much less the bad times, is irrelevant. That they raised your taxes way beyond increases in your income even in the good times is, likewise, irrelevant.

Pulpsters should not expect to hear cogent explanations as to why taxes have risen so in the last decade, except, of course, here at the fiercely non-partisan Pulp.

Nom de plumes, the use of an anonymous or false name to concel one's identity, are a hallowed American tradition in the expression of ideas. Why? Because those who can’t stand the author’s message often resort to attacking the author. If you don’t know who the author is, then who do you attack? Usually, the answer is the party publishing the message.

In most progressive communities, the concept and heritage of anonymous publishing would be embraced. One must judge the message alone on its content. One can’t engage in judgment based on the messenger if anonymity is involved. Knowledge of the author cuts both ways. For many unthinking or dogmatic progressives, who the author is decides acceptance of the message. If the author is liked, then the message can be accepted without serious thinking. If the author is disliked, then no matter how insightful the message, it can’t be accepted.

Locally, the Orange Chat newspaper blog of the News and Observer has been struggling with how to deal with posters not using their real names. One of its posters uses the nom de plume “elvisboy77”. He is a self-described “International Man of Mystery” who is “big in Japan”. In the words of Chapel Hill News editor Mark Schultz, “elvisboy77 is our most prolific commenter. He cuts through the prevailing political logic. And he occasionally offends.”

Translation, elvisboy77 doesn’t agree with most of the Orange Progressive commentators dishing out “groupthink”. He or she has crossed pens with such local political pundits as Mr. Fred Black, Mr. Marc Marcoplos, Mr. Brian Russell, and Ms. Ruby Sinreich.

Interestingly, all of these luminaries want to know, who is elvisboy77? Do they want to know in order to applaud him? No. Do they want to know so as to help him in his private endeavors? No. Do they want to know to better understand his message. No. They want to know for one purpose. They want to see if they can apply pressure for him to stop.

Chapelboro is a factory town. If elvisboy77 is a UNC employee, then how simple would it be to make him stop? If, elvisboy77 is an N&O reporter, as one reader thought, then how simple would it be to make him stop? Nom de plumes are all about freeing the author from coercion or extortion. How easy is it to get to someone through their children, who must attend a system dominated by Orange Progressives?

For Mr. Marcoplos, ”I don't understand why anonymity is being celebrated & encouraged here when there has been considerable effort to get contributors to register and to achieve more honest dialogue. … His posts most resemble stall graffiti. He is also Exhibit “A” on the type of tripe that gets posted when someone doesn't have the guts to post under their own name.”

Yes, for Mr. Marcoplos, who supported Alderman Dan Coleman in not resigning when he lied to the public about using his car to assault a woman, honest dialogue requires knowing the author. As Mr. Marcoplos said to elvisboy77 in Orange Chat, ”So elvisboy, you realize that your anonymous comments will have less effect on changing the problems you comment upon than if you took full responsibility. So the net effect is that all these people choosing anonymity becuase [sic] of fears of backlash, actually facilitate the system that wants to discourage critical feedback. So what to do? I doubt criticizing those who take responsibility for their statements, but disagree with you, is going to help - this even erodes what's left of your anonymous credibility.”

Ms. Sinreich, follows her ad hominem habits for those who don’t agree with her. She has accused elvisboy77 of being a former Pulp poster under the nom de plume of Jessie Beard. That it’s not true is of little importance. (Back in its open forum days, Ms. Beard published facts about Ms. Sinreich’s privileged upbringing, her bourgeoise rentier, trust fund poseur status, which didn’t match her Chapelboro persona of coming from humble beginnings. Ms. Sinreich vehemently objected to the publication of contrary facts.)

Curiously, the miasma of Orange Progressive conspiracy involves this humble publication. Apparently, the mastermind behind the Pulp is none other than elvisboy77, at least it was in the mind of Mr. Russell, Ms. Sinreich’s spouse. Thankfully, that erroneous assumption has been put to rest by none other than elvisboy77. In his or her words, “That cracks me up.”

While a US Airways commercial aviation pilot masterfully glides an engineless jet into the frigid Hudson River with no fatalities, UNC aviation experts glide the AHEC airport home to Carolina North from a “flight to nowhere”, with no fatalities other than the hubris of those claiming a “great victory” over UNC.

For months Orange Progressives made much ado about the “relocation” of the UNC airport from its present Carolina North research park site that it has occupied for decades as the Horace Williams airport. The spark for the airy Pavlovian tinder of Carolina North development was the introduction of an airport authority bill into the North Carolina General Assembly by Orange County Representative Verla Insko et alia. The bill allowed the UNC system to create airport governance boards to finance, build, or operate new airports that would “support the missions of The University of North Carolina, its constituent institutions, or the University of North Carolina Health Care System”. Such an airport authority would be a political subdivision of the State. Orange County Representative Bill Faison later amended the bill to allow such a UNC system airport to be built in just one county.

Pulp readers should note what the bill actually does say and does not say. It does not require the closure of the Horace Williams airport. It does not require the building of any airport. It allows any number of new airports to be built ANYWHERE in the state. It does allow the Horace Williams airport to stay where it is and not fall within this new airport authority.

Local progressives immediately went into an entirely predictable Pavlovian, Chicken Little “sky-is-falling” response. Although the bill was not simply a “Horace Williams relocation” bill, local progressives immediately dredged up a 2005 report by the airport engineering firm Talbert & Bright. Instead of seeing a number of potential sites for potentially relocating the Horace Williams airport, local progressives saw only one site, one near the hamlet of White Cross, just west of Carrboro.

Reading that one of the recommended sites for a relocated Horace Williams airport was in White Cross, former OWASA director, former real estate advertiser columnist, OWASA profiteer (aka local builder), and nearby White Cross resident Mr. Mark Marcoplos predictably went into full conspiracy mode. In the local media he labeled the “airport relocation” process as reckless and claimed the current economic downturn is due to that process. In the local media he blamed UNC's "clumsy machinations" for reassessment appeals by people claiming they will be near an airport when no such airport site has been selected. Just google “marcoplos UNC airport” and one can see the profundity of impressive progressive observations by Mr. Marcoplos offered up at will. Unfortunately, all of those observations are based on an assumption that UNC will relocate the airport to White Cross. While a possibility, there’s a low probability to that event happening, a factor totally ignored by Mr. Marcoplos.

What Mr. Marcoplos failed to say (if he absorbed it at all from reading the Talbert & Bright report) is that while building a new airport would cost around $50,000,000, improving the existing Horace Williams airport as the defining centerpiece of the Carolina North research park would cost only around $6,000,000. Why is this fact important? Because UNC alumni power brokers have all along indicated a preference for keeping the airport where it is. Mr. Marcoplos likes to believe that Chapelboro isn’t a company town, controlled by UNC. (To an Orange Progressive, if you feel that something isn’t true, then it isn’t true.)

Pulp readers who want to have an understanding of how the Horace Williams airport drama might play out should take the long view on the Carolina North research park development process. (Be sure to focus on the research park aspect of this process.)
First, UNC identified the salutary benefits of wrapping a hegemonic satellite campus extension around the concept of an economic development potential of a university research park (such as North Carolina State’s Centennial Campus).
Second, UNC identified the Horace Williams airport site as a potential site for that UNC research park, which became known as Carolina North.
Third, UNC announced the Carolina North site for a research park.
Fourth, UNC conducted extensive on-site visitations and consultations of other publically owned, bio-medical university research parks such as those at the University of Virginia, and University of Maryland at Baltimore, et alia.
Fifth, UNC announced the potential moving of the Horace Williams airport to the Raleigh area commercial aviation airport (RDU).
Sixth, UNC hired Talbert & Bright to prepare an engineering report that shows the options available.
Seventh, UNC concluded that an RDU move would not serve the needs of the UNC AHEC system in Chapel Hill.
Eighth, UNC legislative supporters (a phrase which includes Representative Insko, a darling of local Orange Progressives) introduced an airport authority bill.
Ninth, local Orange Progressives provide predictable negative response.
Tenth, UNC announces that a modified airport relocation process will ensue taking into account the no White Cross location Orange Progressive feelings.

With the relocation tinder in place and the Pavlovian sparker ready to blather and rail against anything UNC would do to ruin his backyard, the firestorm against locating a new airport was lit and blazed to the skies. Lots of noise was published by the local media. Predictably, the local Orange Progressives declared a “great victory” over UNC. The local media even proclaimed how they “made a difference” in changing the process. They certainly did. They helped UNC get exactly what it wants.

What’s that? What does UNC want? It wants what its important backers have always wanted, to keep the airport where it is and to upgrade it as the crown jewel in the Carolina North research park.

Curiously, the local media has never bothered to find out what UNC found out when it talked to the heads of other university research parks. Other university officials associated with such research parks were amazed to find out that UNC would abandon having a limited use, private, general aviation airport in the middle of a research park. They would love to have such a distinguishing feature available for their research park. What an incredible recruitment tool! Yet, UNC was just giving it away.

So while the Pulp doesn’t have the “smoking turboprop trail” of a filed airport relocation flight plan from Horace Williams to Carolina North, it does have the ability to connect the dots. The Pulp does respect the marionette ability of UNC officials to manipulate the strings of local Orange Progressives so as to set the airport relocation glidepath firmly down at Carolina North.

It's conjecture until the shell is lifted from the table to reveal the location of the pea, but educated prognostication is what life requires to excel. Who better to declare that there is no other site outside Chapelboro for the AHEC airport than those shouting the loudest to close the AHEC airport down? (Remember, RDU is not an option, no matter how much greenhouse gases are emitted by local Orange Progressives.) If there are no Orange County options outside the present location, well that leaves the present location.

Game, set, match.

In the Winter Orange County Democrat party guide, the front page articles are about water needs and the drought gripping Orange County.

Former OWASA director, former real estate advertiser columnist, and OWASA profiteer (aka local builder) Mark Marcoplos extols the virtues of OWASA in calling for you to reduce your water needs year round, whether or not there is a drought. While Mr. Marcoplos closes with a mention of shifting perspectives on growth (“understanding the carrying capacity of the bioregions”), he makes no call for translating that understanding into limits on growth.

Local Sierra Club president, anticipated county commissioner candidate, and “three blind mice” candidate for the Eubanks Road trash transfer imbroglio, Bernadette Pelissier, likewise, shows little concern for controlling development, instead wishing to control your life.

The salvation to local water needs is conservation, conservation, conservation. She glows ecstatically over asking the state legislature to approve local town ordinances that would require a homeowner to retrofit low water use plumbing fixtures at the time of a sale. For Ms. Pelissier, the currently approved alternative (a town or OWASA offering financial incentives) won't do the job. Better just to command you to spend money (thousands of dollars for non-mud hut owners). Use the stick, not the carrot. She doesn’t even offer the carrying capacity fig leaf. Yes, the local Sierra Club asks you to conserve water so others can move here and join you in conserving water.

No word on whether or not a grant has been applied for by the local tax-exempt Sierra Club to study the conundrum of supposed conservationists promoting land development.

No word from John Muir’s gravesite regarding the tachometer readings recorded on this latest pronouncement from the local Sierra Club.

Listen to the Audio Party Guide.

There's no better look at the contorted perspective from which an OPie views the world than this special bit of logic from OWASA apologist and profiteer, builder Marc Marcoplos.

”Wow - that link to Squeeze the Pulp alerts us to the smear campaign they are gearing up toward Bernadette Pelissier. In a bizarre rant, they sought to blame her for everything they deem wrong with the county, including the wrongful proposed siting of a transfer station on Eubanks Rd., before she has even served as a commissioner. One might ask, where the hell have they been for the last decade with their passion for environmental justice? Maybe if they had stepped up a little sooner than this year and actually done some organizing instead of blowing smoke then maybe they could have effected change. It looks like at least we'll be treated to some nose-holding entertainment by these local swiftboaters and slimebaiters.“

Notice how Mr. Marcoplos ignores the following facts:
1) Ms. Pelissier was on the Orange County planning board approving developments without once mentioning the carrying capacity of the land for water consumption.
2) Ms. Pelissier was on the Orange County planning board approving developments without once speaking up about where the trash from those developments were going and who was being affected.
3) Ms. Pelissier was on the OWASA board and never once mentioned the carrying capacity of the land for water consumption.
4) Ms. Pelissier was the head of the local Sierra Club and declared that there was no environmental injustice issue surrounding the Eubanks Road landfill.
5) Ms. Pelissier was invited to hold a Sierra Club forum on the Eubanks landfill issue and ignored the invitation.
For all these acts, Ms. Pelissier is to be excused because in Mr. Marcoplos' mind, “she wasn't a commissioner yet”.

In a classic OPie move, the problem is not the message, but the messenger. If only the Pulp wouldn't mention these INCONVENIENT TRUTHS, then all would be well.

Perhaps the most revealing move by Mr. Marcoplos, who has never once shown up before the Orange County Commissioners advocating for the people who live around the landfill that receive his trash, is that he accepts without question that for over ten years the commissioners have been unable to correct their injustices. He reserves his enmity for those who point out the problem.

No, the local Orange County swiftboater award goes to Mr. Marcoplos, poseur and apologist extraordinaire! (See Phictionary).

I got news for you, waterboy. Ms. Neloa Jones is serious about getting environmental justice in Orange County. And when those who back her and her cause are done, your eco-posing, developer rights support group stroking (local Sierra Club, see Phictionary), do-it-if-it-sounds-good, clear-cutting, carbon neutral breathing, fellow clubber Bernadette will not have a ”pot to Pelissier” in. At long last, the ǘberProgressive, usufructing anarchists like you and your buddies that have trashed this little town have competition from people who have their feet on the ground.

If that makes you nervous, then maybe you should quit drinking the cumbayah cool-aid. Since you are such a highly skilled builder, perhaps you can go stock up on R-40 insulation. You'll need something to deflect the heat that is coming.