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Carolina Journal Radio No. 914: N.C. voters tackle taxes, bonds, alcohol measures

Carolina Journal Radio / Donna Martinez and Mitch Kokai
The Cross Radio
November 23, 2020 8:00 am

Carolina Journal Radio No. 914: N.C. voters tackle taxes, bonds, alcohol measures

Carolina Journal Radio / Donna Martinez and Mitch Kokai

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November 23, 2020 8:00 am

Elections for president, U.S. Senate, and governor grabbed the headlines. But North Carolinians addressed many other items during the recent election, including local referendums on issues such as taxes, bonds, and alcohol. Joseph Coletti, John Locke Foundation senior fellow, analyzes the results of local referendum votes across the state. While Democrat Joe Biden has declared victory in the presidential race, President Trump appeared to claim North Carolina’s electoral votes. Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper won re-election, but Republicans secured significant victories in other statewide races. In an online forum nearly one week after Election Day, GOP political consultant Jonathan Felts and Democratic counterpart Brad Crone assessed state and federal election results for a John Locke Foundation audience. You’ll hear highlights. COVID-19 has presented plenty of economic challenges, especially for those who lost their jobs in government shutdowns tied to the pandemic. During a JLF online forum, Ryan Ray of Jobs for Life discussed ongoing job-related challenges linked to the coronavirus. The COVID-19 pandemic has created special challenges — and opportunities — for cities across the country. Co-founder Greg Brooks of the Better Cities Project discussed recently for a JLF audience his group’s efforts to address important issues tied to the life-altering pandemic. With Cooper winning re-election, he’s likely to continue pushing counterproductive energy and environmental policies, Donald van der Vaart, John Locke Foundation senior fellow and former secretary of North Carolina’s Department of Environmental Quality, previews Cooper’s likely approach to energy and the environment in a second term.

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From Cherokee to current tax and the largest city to the smallest and from the statehouse into the schoolhouse Carolina Journal radio your weekly news magazine discussing North Carolina's most of public policy events and issues welcome to Carolina Journal radio why Michiko got during the next hour, Donna Martinez and I will explore some major issues affecting our state.

North Carolina voters back Pres. Trump and Republican Sen. Tom Tillis also reelected Democratic governor Roy Cooper professional consultants from opposite sides of the political aisle offer their assessments of election 2020. The covert IT pandemic through millions of people out of their jobs will hear from the head of a group working with the people who have the hardest time returning to the workforce. The coronavirus is led to life altering changes for cities across the country will learn how a group called the better cities project is trying to help communities adapt to change.

It will take a closer look at Gov. Cooper's likely approach to energy and environmental policies.

In a second term. Those topics are just ahead. First, Donna Martinez joins us with the Carolina Journal headline election night 2020 was not only good news for Republicans in the Gen. assembly, who were overwhelmingly returned to the legislature keeping their majorities in both chambers but was also a good night for bonds and for booze as counties and towns decided a variety of local issues. Joe Colletti is senior fellow with the John Mott foundation. He's been following the local election results and joins us to talk about what voters decided to do and not to do on election night Joe. Welcome back, but stopped about trends. First, what we see across our state anything that really popped out at you is Haworth think in this store were not so hot on this idea.

Choosing two things stood out one that voters were more than happy to have more things. Whether there was alcohol available to them or whether that was projects paid for by bonds what they were less enthused about was having counties, giving counties the authority to raise sales taxes to pay for those things. So I think there part.

I guess the message might be counties do these things make things available, but figure out a way to pay for that.

Without trying to increase taxes through the sales tax and make your decisions properly based on that. Let's talk more about the sales tax issue because this is been going on for a number of years now in North Carolina and usually every election cycle. We see some County multiple counties put on the ballot hike in the sales tax and so some counties actually done it more than once, and even detailing that but interesting that North Carolinians really don't like that idea is it because we all know were directly affected you go by something you can pay a little bit more money.

It's interesting that the will that the big trend is that the more people who vote. The greater the turnout in the election, the worse these the sales tax referendum do really.

So in the in the primaries you had about their eight of them on the ballot and they were they split half-and-half. There are five of them on the ballot this time, the overwhelmingly lost to accepting Allegheny County was lost by 22 votes, but if you but the lesson from it is that what we what people have seen across the state is that the sales tax does not have a specific used regardless of what county commissioners say they've seen at the views multiple times per week. We've spoken in the past about what happened in Buncombe County.

With that in Asheville where the county commissioner said were to use this money to pay for the community college and instead they put the money into the general fund and it took until the previous County manager was arrested and what and replace that the interim County manager said y'all don't have enough money anyway, even after doing all these things and so I think there's a lot of suspicion of what was going to be done with the sales and use tax revenues. In addition to the fact that yet since use.

You know that that's coming out of every purchase that you make so many times Joe these sales tax hikes are put forth by County commission saying hey it's for the kids were going to use it for education, but they are not required to stick to that. If they say that right that there is no requirement, no obligation for anything that they do with the money and and and and we sing with on the bond side that people are willing to pass bonds to to take care of the needs of school districts as long as they're convinced of that and so intensely there more willing to say will pay the higher property tax recognizing that the property tax just like the sales tax is paid for by everybody in the community but but leaving the responsibility to the county commissioners to be responsible with that because the sales tax provides and in most places, a law, it is worth a couple sense of this of the property tax and that's not how much of property tax. Most places looks increase in terms of the bonds borrowing money, essentially, so that comes with debt you have to pay that back.

It looks like it was transportation and affordable housing that caught voters attention how to those to you and Charlotte and in Raleigh there were in Raleigh.

There is, in both places they had affordable housing in Charlotte. They had some road projects there.

There were bonds for schools and in Guilford and in Carteret. Both of them had sales tax on their on their ballot as well and in Camden and so all of those really did well and there were also other bond projects. The only bond that that failed was in Cape Carteret where they were looking to build a trail but there are some pool and in color. We and in Jackson County. Some park facilities and other places so voters overwhelmingly said go ahead and build these things and whether that was a a coven. We just want to be out and we want new things roads to get out on the road. Obviously if you borrow money, whether it's in your personal situation borrow money to buy a house you have to pay it back with interest. Same thing goes for bonds for infrastructure housing. What about the long-term implications are these good deals for the communities that that is what the question remains in what are what will happen when these bonds are start to be have to be paid. Right now everybody is probably looking at.

We have low interest rates and help and they can stay until than everybody's expecting that they'll stay low but bonds aren't issued for months after the reproved they still have to be approved by the county commissioners to go forward and then they have to be sold in the market and then who knows what happens with so so there's an expectation I guess from everybody that the economy will continue to do well. That property values will continue to go up and that the that all of this can be paid for appropriately and and that's the question that remains in and I guess that's why folks are saying no to the sales and use tax because they know that that's not to be used properly, or they have an expectation and so if it's coming out of property tax. They know that the county commissioners in general will will have to face will fit face voters.

More on that. Let's talk about alcohol in North Carolina. This is the strangest thing.

How we handle alcohol in our state. Anyway I came from Arizona and I didn't know what an ABC store was Iraq that was like any you know Belk.

It took me a while to figure out. Oh, that's a government booster so alcohol was on the ballot in what way because of because of the way that North Carolina deals with with alcohol. The you can have a a county that does not allow in general alcohol sales, but then you can have towns within those counties that do allow sales and there were five towns and in cities across a number of counties that had the ability to sell alcohol on the ballot and to create a new a local ABC board and allow different things. Whether there was mold beverages, which is like Baron seltzer's weather that was on fortified line because there's also fortified wine which gets taxed at a different rate or whether there was mixed beverages or other things. With all of that all of the opportunities that places were looking for to sell alcohol were approved by large margins across the state. So, are there still places in North Carolina then where an adult cannot buy booze.

Right now there are there are number of towns and in addition, there is not a a place there's not a County where you cannot someplace in the county by it, but there are still a number of counties that are mostly dry except for a few towns and that in those towns within the county are still dry and a lot of this dates back to the prohibition days and our colleague John Sanders is written a lot about the issue of how alcohol is handled in North Carolina you could find that working also Joe Colette ESA work on local government. All of that@johnlocke.org Gokhale is senior fellow with the John Locke foundation. Thank you for joining us to say with this much more Carolina journal radio to come in just a moment tired of fake names tired of reporters with political axes to grind. What you need to be reading Carolina journal, honest, uncompromising, old-school journalism, you expect and you need even better, the monthly Carolina journal is free to subscribers sign up@carolinajournal.com you'll receive Carolina journal newspaper in your mailbox each month. Investigations into government spending revelations about boondoggles who the powerful leaders are and what they're doing in your name and with your money.

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It's fresh news if you'd like a heads up on the daily news sign up for our daily email do that Carolina journal.com Carolina journal rigorous unrelenting old-school journalism. We hold government accountable for you will go back to Carolina journal radio amateur coca expert analysts are trying to make sense of the 2020 election a pair of them from opposite sides of the political aisle recently shared their views in an online presentation for the John Locke foundation Jonathan Felts is a Republican consultant who worked as a political director for George W. Bush. Everyone is trying to oversupply everything did want to say Democrats got a subtle message that data suggest a functionalist from coattails, had a huge turnout going on and that's that's what made the difference here. Others want to say that it was a total reaction to Whitley against the protest supporting loan order message and the fact is, all these things can be true to the grade but I think that if you were to supply down one panel catchphrase, it would be that allow folks outside of the elitist enclaves and similar major urban areas. They felt like they were over six months you can go to church and oh by the way, if you try to go to church something and let Lexi consider you to be optical murder in that you're trying to form super spreader about yet the same people that had been lecturing people for months and months and months about coded and how he could get a church because a coven they can say a single thing in terms of haymaker riots major protests whether they be downtown Raleigh or uptown Charlotte where the maybe this can be super for events just like a doctorate rally there could be potential for for a code spread that one of his rallies.

Guess what you have just as many people crammed in a downtown Raleigh that also have the same attentional and when people were ignoring that on for little gain. It seemed like that really resonated really caused a lot of low back lot of folks and to be clear, I think I would need to be taken very seriously at that two parents with pre-existing conditions.

My wife and I are constantly juggling our schedule so as to make sure someone is in the clear, so to speak, to be able to help out if we need to do that her mom is a pre-existing condition as well as I take it very seriously. But again, the fact that Roy Cooper just constantly lecturing and hectoring people on and affect your and his whole campaign was Danforth doing it under Sanko it and therefore it was remarked to be presented at when he couldn't bring himself to say Hank major protests major gatherings for supporting a Democrat or Democrat principles that can still be bad from a code perspective and I think it's a lot of reaction about election results looked good on election night for most North Carolina Republicans. Does that mean for Democrats. Consultant Brad Crone address that topic. That's where the soul-searching begins. I don't thing the Democrats but they are moving more and more liberal every single day more and more to the left.

The use the same model for the last five elections of statewide level for legislative elections in Atmore.

You look at the performance map. There is the sea of red was about islands of blue all around your Metropolitan division. My point to the Democrats to spin this if you won't govern build a coalition beyond Metropolitan boundaries the donor base is their second-worst return on investment or the fact of the matter is just the Democrats don't have any type of operation.

Put them in contention in the district. Like Johnston, the Nash County Senate District 11 or down into the Cabarrus County house seats until they put that infrastructure in place and have a message that the voters are willing to buy going to continue to see electoral real birthday. That's Brad Crone at Democrat whose work is a campaign consultant for candidates in both parties and Republican Jonathan Felts offered expert analysis during a recent online presentation for the John Locke foundation else focused on one piece of the Democrats message that didn't seem to work, Medicaid expansion of the push Democrats estimate the one thing they consistently get folks he was a medication agent out and back in with a -2013 is keeping that that's that's been the constant theme.

I think that when he later recognizes. I think you get outside of the guineas urban enclaves of elitism. A lot of folks are simply they don't really know what that means and I think this is the wrong year to be running a government program as a little bit of panaceas will fix everything for the Carolinians annulus on them completely ignoring any facts and figures.

What not just my perception is reality. Yet the fact is this year more than just that you nearly year. As you know, because North Carolina if you want real children deal with remote learning. You had a good friend who was, and so the thing that we all take for granted. More schools are always on the work will schools they were suffering just like everything else was except that was impacting people just about more than actually ENCUMBERED if you will, and so severe only pay this number programs will work best with a panacea for us and then the average voter looking sign will this other government program school that's always work is not working at all for right now and so I think I think the Democrats that we need more substantive sums of message.

Crone agreed his fellow Democrats need to deliver a different message. Here's the message that they need to hear the voters in North Carolina won't school choice they will have the options to send their kids to the school that they think is going to provide them the best opportunity to get an education so they can be productive and prosperous in the 21st century, the Republican felt sets of thoughts about choices down from you. Love him or hate him. One of the exceedingly fairly faulted for is that he deftly takes very much of an all or nothing approach, but I would argue that in this campaign season Democrat presented an all or nothing approach usually at least totally with us on all these issues or are your gifts so speak and Republican candidates were presenting him him a more nuanced message Isis use more nuance with Indiana campaign tactics the estate agent for light but they were giving people a choice of yet we get there, I be in my basement around somewhere in there, and so not not a Republican was my scratch. I think in a swing district deftly work. Crone suggests his fellow Democrats need to learn some lessons. We need to have people running the campaign to understand thoroughly bringing in a bunch of 25-year-old young people who never stepped foot in the state. An example of that was Scott Brewer, usually state rep got proceeded down and rocking him Richmond and Montgomery counties.

This campaign manager showed up for work and said called and asked where the mourners where you want me made it for you to meet. So meet me at the office of campaign headquarters on Main Street in rock and so a couple hours later, the young man calls back and says I'm in Reidsville what was what was the address again is over in Rockingham County Senate. You have people who know the state of North Carolina. Our motto zesty, very, to be rather than sitting and Democrats have got to start learning that IEEE left agenda is not going to move the voters of Carolina Democrats want to compete they got to have a message where the centrist moderate voters unaffiliated persuadable voters have an opportunity to support them and to build out a base of support to build out a winning campaign to an example of that is Medicaid expansion time simply been told at the ballot box were not want to expand Medicaid in the state of our care on if you want to provide affordable healthcare insurance coverage for working families and the more Carolina parent compromise and work with them to find some type of measure that will help people rather than sit around saying my work were going to argue with you all day long.

Speaking of compromise. It's an issue that also attracts else attention. One of the frustrations I think that a lot of folks in the middle till about a low culture is the demand for instant acquiescence. There is there is another very little education effort suddenly just bone here we are. This is what we think you need to agree with us right now. Alex and I think that's a scalable press in the left right now, but I think that happens both on the left and the right and and I think all political candidates need to be aware that make sure they're not 8K comes across as very condescending, in my opinion, but also gets back to the point of yellow campaigns are now 24 seven. They never really go dormant and so is really critical that if you're a politician you need or use for a leader, you need to be costly messaging what your message is a threat. The process you might need to start small and work up to a much bigger goal but not in so many times here in North Carolina we think everything to be fixed with you on the last three days of the election. We drop her mail or digital things like that or will show up work things out behind closed doors in general simply meeting and then in August taken care of and so I think I think voters are met, demanding more and more accountability and they will more more answers, not just a simple note telling telling telling about or have anything from him. That's Republican consultant Jonathan felt.

You also heard from Democrat Brad Crone.

Recent speakers for a John Locke foundation online for it analyzed key messages from election 2020 will return with more Carolina journal radio.

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We are more connected than ever, but we have so much right at our hands at our disposal. Now that this seat we don't need to seek for information anymore. I will need to seek we have this sense that we are loved and cared for writing.

We get that in. How many likes of abuse we get from video because of the nature and so we just become way too reliant on a sense and I think that's a great way to put it this sense of community and tightknit design. We feel like you know I tell people I give you what was going on with me or in one form me of something you probably should put all Facebook expects that world going to get my relation with some people all right and and and and if we can.

If you don't get bear inside your almost disconnected now if you're not in the social media world and so yeah know in a tower would seem so much more connected, virtually, at least, I believe, were more disconnected than ever before we look at someone introduction like it they been no short-term, particularly long-term unemployed there. An identity crisis right ever really really struggling with man. I have not deployed my gifts and talents have not, you know provided for my family. I got really really struggling with some things and so you know we are in this season now of mental health awareness, you know, most people probably have a little bit of health things right and we look at that is kind of this. This is a test of the negative connotation to it, but we bought something at work where were struggling with the bid and so anxiety or fear.

I would like to go all the way to alcoholism or homelessness, but I me just anxiety notes Peter you know how someone responds to you when you're not performing like all of those things I think contributed so yet is the big things that are obvious.

There are a lot of factors again to help space that we may not really really pay attention to that makes it makes it even wider that we probably after a near fatal car accident self all fields losing everything and starting from starting all over from scratch. If you will know two things begin to change my life and gave me hope. Lovely hope is what we're after and it was information and associations.

You know I had a mentor come into my life. He said look paid out this get you some better information.

This begin to start changing your thinking. By the way you're applying information to your life and they had to help keep you encourage through that I put together put the right people around you. That's Brian Ray, Pres. and CEO of jobs for life in a featured speaker for a John Locke foundation online for a tackled job challenges and North Carolina overture before Carolina journal radio in about where doubling down on freedom at Carolina journal radio were proud to bring you stories that impact your life and your wallet.

And now get twice as much freedom when you also listen to our podcast headlock available on iTunes and@johnlocke.org/podcast Locke is a little bit different. It's a no holds barred discussion that challenges softheaded ideas from the left and the right light.

Carolina journal radio headlock is smart and timely but with headlock you'll hear more about the culture wars get some more humor as well. We guarantee great information and a good time double down with S. Listen to Carolina journal radio each week and listen to headlock to remember, you can listen to headlock@johnlocke.org/podcast or subscriber download each week iTunes Carolina journal radio and headlock just what you need to stay informed and stay entertained both brought to you in the name of freedom by the John Locke foundation book back to Carolina journal radio why Michiko guy COBIT 19 is created challenges for all of us. That includes the people who run city governments across the country and North Carolina.

A group called the better city's project is trying to help, cofounder and Pres. Greg Brooks took part in a recent online forum sponsored by the John Locke foundation. We think everybody in American Fork loop rear and happier life and the way to get there. As we held our core audience of city councilmembers Mares senior level staff report find practical and implementable and ultimately market savvy public policy to better city's project is drafted a new report responding to covert the 19th. The report was written as a response because my colleague and cofounder of Boolean. I work were talking through the impact and the thing that stood out media was that the country is full of that were, if not outright struggling very close to the point where there were struggling at 3 1/2% on what happens to us to be like like that when unemployment is an 11 I live in Las Vegas where the unemployment very close 30% right now and so a lot of a lot of our recommendation around they're all built around the pandemic endemic triggering event. However, everything in the area in terms of policy, there are all ideas that we would incur to adopt at any time they lead better outcomes both for the people need to manage the study and the people who Brooks says cities have adopted a range of responses to the pandemic. There are goodies that are being very fiscally prudent tapping into a bit of corn you will get through this crisis and there are larger cities that are not explicitly been in implicitly making this vision based around in my time working with local government found that one of the strongest laws in a crisis or or in Word, Christ could do something right there mass political pressure. What you doing to help people who are in distress with doing to help and this this is actually not one but two examples of what doing something responsibly looks like doing something right now I'm in the form of what we have to do is go, go, offer a 30 year tax abatement goal skyscraper out that wrong doing something to well you know we would be more resilient during all of this.

Somehow we'd had that transit… Those types of things are to smartest thing I think and do and the budget rated act and get out the way to spend who are trying their best to do whatever it takes.

That has big ramifications.

Things like economy were being able to start business work from home, things like that. Right now there are many number of family where their next meal is coming from in a couple weeks during that tenuous, and any little bit of viscosity that we can get out of the way all easier for people to be fluid divesting is going to be economically positive but politically, that's Greg Brooks of the better city's project. He discussed the role cities can play in helping entrepreneurs. I was an entrepreneur near. I appreciate any time you want to help out one of the things that really important not to short-term during the pandemic. Longer term would be a small startup I'm not talking about JCPenney fighting whether, but the person wants to hotdog cart wants to work from home, all on a side all those type of business room where there were researching the economy right now at one of the things we found there is virtually no shopping. We thought well maybe a little regulatory will economy the reality of her lower report going very small where ever they live as their business grows beyond the working out of the garage. They have a chance to shop that early experience with city and whether or not they feel like they're getting pear-shaped. What will shape their community that help them decide whether or not they're going to stay Brooks emphasized the importance of keeping an open mind about various public policy options that includes housing at the debate about so-called auxiliary dwelling units or use. There are multiple Same goal your strategic goal should be a resilient robust housing supply because studies were housing bubble and relatively easy to put all our cities that are more likely resilient and generally better during price that might look like a DUs in one part of the city might look like. Allowing multiunit buildings to be built where there was previously a single-family neighborhood and now a couple of empty lot. There are different paths to get your use of I'm a big believer in a DUs but they're not. I like that I am hearing that you recognize that the and morality.is needed in optimist by nature and I assume that every elected official is I start with the assumption they're doing what they believe is best, Brooks cautioned against throwing a lot of money toward expensive transit projects. I am not one of those while I print so we but what I will say for any city transit is always a liability and not right. Unless you were unless you're somehow magically build a new fixed rail system underneath Manhattan at your for the next 20 to 40 years so I'm really really pleased to see not just focus on on we have to build up what should city governments be doing in this time of economic uncertainty linked to covert, 19 what I heard was fiscal responsibility I or not make it more difficult for Joe and Jane to go about their life when times are probably pretty pop up already and I know I heard range of ideas that other cities might not make intimate community and that there's nothing more powerful, thinking past the current crisis to an out of date mode and thinking to okay if this has befallen us and change is baked into the net. What kind of change we want this time looks like helping yourself. This group today reality that's Greg Brooks, cofounder and president of the better city's project. A recent speaker and an online form for the John Locke foundation overture with North Carolina journals radio real influence.

You either have it or you don't and at the John Locke foundation we have it, you'll find our guiding principles in many of the freedom forward reforms of the past decade here in North Carolina. So while others talk or complain or name call. We provide research solutions and hope our team analyzes the pressing issues of the day jobs, healthcare, education, and more. We look for effective ways to give you more freedom, more options, more control over your life. Our goal is to transform North Carolina into a growing, thriving economic powerhouse, the envy of every other state research is how policymakers make decisions that ensure you keep more of what you are. Expand your choice of schools for your kids. Widen your job opportunities improve your access to doctors. The recipe for stability and a bright future for truth for freedom for the future of North Carolina. We are the John Locke foundation. Welcome back to Carolina Journal radio Donna Martinez Roy Cooper's clean energy plan is all about alleviating global warming by reducing greenhouse gas emissions plug-in electric vehicles as well as solar power, and even when those are key components of this plan. So should we expect to see more of all of these during Gov. Cooper's second term in office. Don Vandermark is the senior fellow looking energy policy here at the John Locke foundation just to talk about exactly what is in the Gov.'s energy plans, can program is Roy Cooper's plan, which he calls the clean energy plan is that essentially a state version of what we hear about from Alexandria. Conseil Cortez called the green new deal. It is in a lot of respects, it is not planned that's going to reduce greenhouse gases or alleviate climate change warming however leaders the group green new deal so yeah there are similarities. One is much, much of the global sort of low and Cooper's Discover watered-down version that's really interesting you would say that because it isn't the mission of the plan to do what you just said it's not going to do the ostensible mission is to do that.

I'm not even sure the ostensible illusion of the green new deal is that I think they're much more open about the fact that they're trying to restructure our economic model here in America to make it more of a socialist thought model and if you go all the way to the UN of the UN is quite open about that.

I think Cooper is a harder time may be pushing it. In that context. And so they're still up attending like it might have some impact on the environment.

Let's talk about some of the key pieces of the Gov.'s plan one from his electric vehicles and what is the intent to do and why is it that is so prominent in his plan. Well, maybe that there is some something he can actually do about that in terms of telling his agencies to direct their expenditures for automobiles along buying electric vehicles instead of later. Regular spark ignition gasoline engines have some control that he has no control over what you and I drive the green new deal would allow that he doesn't have a kind of authority Gov. in North Carolina is extremely powerful position also truly more virtue signaling than anything else was talking about the state fleet, the fleet of vehicles. Is that what he wants go all electric sure he tried to out of the author's and budgetary constraints on some showings it would have to be made with an executive order. I presume it is possible for agencies when they have to buy more vehicles that they can go electric in many circumstances and we talked before, and I've written on the fact that electric vehicles really don't make any sense from the standpoint, at least not now. Not while our marginal additional power needed to power those vehicles would come from fossil fuels. Just to give you an example China and India. Both are very interested electric vehicles but neither of them have domestic hydrocarbon supplies they have to import a lot of it. So for them it makes economic sense to to replace gasoline with coal method are doing the building coal power coal-fired power plants to provide the additional electricity that they need to power your new electric vehicle that makes sense from their standpoint. Coal was cheap and and they won't have to spend as many of their dollars importing at such a case here.

It's an important point, I think, to help people understand that it may sound really great to say okay were going to go all electric with the state fleet but then the question comes up. How do you charge them up and where do you do that explain that clearly you can years ago we did. We have a bit of a fire drill like this would we want to go to natural gas fired transportation vehicles. No problem.

That is to fill your trunk with Ted natural gas, and motor vehicle so you and your trunk. Your point was way to where to refill so you can have natural gas depots at our state's but if you have to drive to Nashville you would be guaranteed.

Coming back, and so there is problems there. The same thing is going to happen here like possibly being told to build a lot of these charting stations and the will to make money off that were not there yet and so there should be limited range capabilities going forward in the agencies will be in the position and say I know you want me to buy electric vehicle but I don't know make sense and stranded now down the highway. They're trying to get back to Raleigh right interesting. You also have them talked about recently that Gov. Cooper has made a pretty big move when it comes to wind power tell us about that. So just give you background offshore wind just when you talk so it was most expensive energy source actually offshore wind is even more expensive and there are no commercial offshore wind plants on the East Coast today. There is a pilot project off the coast of Virginia that they are evaluating and that's going to generate something like 12 MW winter all at full capacity, which is very rarely. So now Maryland, Virginia and governors of time to agreement. Try to push for offshore wind and other problems with that. You know when when they tried to do that off shore off the coast of Martha's Vineyard folks landowners there which I just wasn't the president of all you other landowners including the Kennedys. They didn't want to have to look at these massive 500 windmills of their procedures. Apparently North Carolina is not so favored and not Cooper's eyes. He's going to see if he can put some off the shore of Wilmington and often negative.

Now they are pushing them out to the police are pushing back about 27 miles which is about the view shed. Something to keep a close.

The other issue is this is a news alert.

There are hurricanes on the East Coast, especially on the Midlantic state. Windfarms have a difficult time with her and is one of the reasons we haven't seen the kind of proliferation of offshore wind you'll see from my native Holland where there are a lot of offshore wind farms solar power also is a key component of this time we we just have a few moments left here and give us the overview.

Why is North Carolina I'm at the top of the list or near the top when it comes to solar farms and solar power. Shortly after his wife is outpacing all the incentives are incentives are outpacing all the state of California.

It's rational behavior. If you can get taxpayers and customers electricity to pay for a large fraction of your profit and why would you try to develop that and that's in fact the situation here North Carolina talking about the clean energy plan here it's Gov. Cooper's plan.

Don has written extensively about that had John Locke.org and if I think so much for the show this week.

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