News-Record.com

Howdy folks. We're once again in catch-up mode here at Capital Beat due to illness. (My two-year-old made the wife sick; the wife gave me a cold; and the cold kept me from talking much above a croak on Thursday and Friday. Fun for the whole family.)

Now onto business:

• In case you didn't wade through the scattering of press releases I posted Friday, Shirley Frye of Greensboro was appointed to the lottery commission but declined the honor. That leaves the commission down one commissioner.

  If she had accepted the post, it would have been one of the few times I can think of when Greensboro had more members on an influential state board than Charlotte did.

• Have you heard about the drought? Yeah, you're probably living with water restrictions of some ilk if you live in a big enough community. Well, Gov. Easley says state workers should live with those restrictions too. I'll check and see if the sprinklers are on today when I wander by the old capital building.

• I blogged a bit ago about some ongoing consternation over the NAACP state elections. A couple phone calls that I couldn't answer on Friday said that the dispute was over. Skip Alston, who lost his post as state president, confirmed this morning that the national office had dismissed the complaint. (Side note: That also appears to be the Wilmington Journal's assessment of things, if you read through this whole article. It's a little surreal to see this blog quoted in the story, but there you go.)

• My colleagues over at Inside Scoop post this year's endorsement letter from the Simkins Pac.(PDF) (For those of you who don't know, the PAC is a group of influential African American political and business leaders.)

  Check the signatures. Alma Adams, a representative in the NC House, signs as chairman. I'm not sure if she is the first ever, but she's the first woman I've seen in the past five years listed as chairman of the PAC. In any event, the post seems like a pretty big mark of approval for the Greensboro Democrat from the venerable political group.

Well, it’s time for me to go get into some new trouble. As always, drop me a line with what’s on your mind at mbinker@news-record.com . And if you’re hanging about Greensboro for the City Council elections tomorrow night, I’ll see you there.