News-Record.com

Doug,

Better yet what was Becky Smothers done to manage growth in North High Point? Do you call allowing subdivision after subdivision being built and no schools or roads being planned and no thought being put into where children would attend school good management?

Was the plan to bus all along?

Who represented North High Point during the behind the scenes meetings to implement and gain “community support” for the plan?

Did anyone notice or care that the children who would be bussed did not have representation during these presentations?

Would a fine caring public leader allow the community most impacted by the HP plan not demand some taxpayers in North High Point know what was being planned for their families and communities?

Lucky for the NHP citizens the school board can only bus the kids and not force entire families to move downtown.

Let's face it the current political face in High Point has a socialist agenda!

At least one current member of the High Point city council publicly spoke in support of the High Point Plan in September 2005 at the redistricting forum held at Penn Griffin.

Does this mean Becky Smothers supports the High Point Plan? She says she has the support of almost the entire council, including the member speaking in support of the plan.

Does the city lack authority over the county school system? Yes

Can the city influence policies only through the power of persuasion? You bet it can that is exactly why the city council member spoke in support of the High Point Plan at a public meeting!

Let’s end special interests real or perceived!

No wonder the News & Record endorsed Lisa Stahlmann…..

VOTE for STEVE WOOD and TIM BROWN!

BROWN FOR DOWNTOWN! WHAT CAN BROWN DO FOR YOU? HE WILL FREE OUR CHILDREN FROM THE ABDUCTION/LOTTERY THAT IS FORCED ON ONLY THE CITY OF HIGH POINT WITH THE BLESSINGS OF THE CURRENT MAYOR AND CITY COUNCIL.

SHAME ON THEM!

BROWN FOR DOWNTOWN--BROWN FOR DOWNTOWN--BROWN FOR DOWNTOWN-BROWN FOR DOWNTOWN-BROWN-BROWN-BROWN

Did anybody else get a flyer from Becky Smothers saying she's going to help education?

Becky - TOO LITTLE TOO LATE!

VOTE FOR STEVE WOOD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Here's what the Becky flyer says,

"I have a very real interest in the quality of education that is being offered our children and it did not being when I filed for re-election."

Right, it began when Steve Wood stated he would help the education of children in High Point. Let's face it, Becky, you've been mayer since 2002 and you have NEVER done a single thing for education. NOT ONE SINGLE THING!!!!

VOTE FOR STEVE WOOD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Just a note from the 'Mystery Man'.

"Off the Record" response to the basic idea of Council self-imposed spending limitations sounds like 'much of a muchness'.

With respect, the blogmaster's obfuscatory rhetoric to the contrary, a Taxpayer Protection Act, or as it is sometimes called, a Taxpayer Bill of Rights (TABOR), is rather simple.

Why raise the 'referendum' bogeyperson?
It's an up or down vote resolved by Council.

Any surplus in the General Fund would go to the citizens in the form of a tax decrease. Open-minded folks might recognize the simplicity and the similarity to zero based
budgeting concepts.

Fiscal exigencies, crisis management tools
are included.

(Contact Mayor Danny Leverette, Spring Hill,
TN, to see how it has worked in a neighboring
state and town).

The question about High Point being the "Tax Capital of the Triad"? Here are the effective tax rates for the three cities (as reported in a local fishwrapper):

High Point------ 59.30
Greensboro------ 56.75
Winston Salem -- 48.50
(Check with respective tax offices)

"Having the Triad's highest property tax bill is a handicap." (Enterprise editorial, 8/03/05).

All I am proposing is removing this 'handicap'.
What is so earthshattering, kneeknocking about a tax rate lower than our neighbors? It once was that way.

Private residents don't get incentives, do they?
Returning budget overage to the taxpayers is one critical tool available to the budgetmakers to
prevent such 'bracket' creep that brings our fair city to this dubious distinction---for the first time in history.

Yes, the 'mystery man' declined an interview with both papers.

The request reminded me of an old Ronald Reagan
story. During the presidential campaign of l980, the liberal NY Times would not let up on the future two-term Republican President. So RR finally wrote them a note, saying their coverage
was so lopsided, he couldn't do anyting right and
asked that surely they could give him the benefit of the doubt. Sure enough, the next week they wrote in an editorial, "We doubt he will be of any benefit to the country."

What candidate in his right mind would want to meet with a stacked deck dressed up as an
'editorial board'?

AMEN "Mysteryman"

And that "editorial board" consists of one person: Dougie-can-do-no-wrong Clark.

Poor Dougie, so afraid his city is going in the crapper. Crap ON, Crap Off--THE CRAPPER!!!! Well it surely will Dougie if you keep people like Dorothy Kearns and Rebecca Smothers around you, and then you endorse their clones. (StahlMANN).

Steve Wood and Tim Brown actually CARE that our children are being ABDUCTED and bused AGAINST their will!!!!!!

Becky has REFUSED to get involved with the schools and NOW if she even thinks she can utter the word school and get away with it she's a bigger idiot than I thought. She told me with her own skinny lips that "school issues are not her concern".

BROWN FOR DOWNTOWN AND WOOD FOR MAYOR! I will MOVE out of HP if Smothers gets re-elected. I refuse to even spend money in High Point. For 2 years now I have been VERY careful not to spend a DIME in Furniture City. For 2 years I've had to live where I cannot have a neighborhood school and my Mayor gave her seal of approval to SHIP MY KIDS ACROSS TOWN!!!!!! Becky welcomed the Socialist School Board members to just drive their bus into High Point and start carting our kids all over. Did Becky ever question why High Point gets such a great school "plan"???? Becky, are you BLIND???????????? It's funny--or NOT so funny, how Ms. Bernita Sims can publicly endorse the High Point plan but our MAYOR says that she cannot comment????????? And now your clone Lisa Stahlmann also thinks council members should just play nice about school issues and sit around and worry where market shoppers will park. In the meantime our kids are getting screwed UP and Down!!!!

And YOU StahlMANN, where were you 2 years ago??? Where were you LAST year??? Don't pretend that NOW the school issues concern you. You didn't care when my child was in a lottery!! NOW you pretend to care, you just want votes!!! Your kid is in private school so you want me to believe that you're concerned about the kids being bused to Timbuktu???

Give me a BREAK!!!!!!! Dougie might fall for your sack of lies but I'm DONE getting burned!

Brown and Wood are the only two that can save our kids. They will stop the communist take over of High POint! Maybe they'll bring the squirrels back too Doug!

Steve, if mysteryman1 is you:

Thanks for weighing in. Communicating with voters, via any forum available, is a good idea for candidates for public office.

Why did I raise the "referendum bogeyman"? I thought you raised it in your letter to the Enterprise. If not, what did you mean by saying you would ask the citizens to support your Taxpayer Protection Act?

You can call the two editorial boards a stacked deck if you like. True, you weren't likely to get either paper's endorsement, and you didn't. Is that the result of some sort of bias? I'd say it's more the result of familiarity with your political career all these years. At any rate, the interviews would have given you an opportunity to attack Becky Smothers' record right there in front of her. If she's done such a poor job, it should have been easy for you to point out her failures. Ah, but then she would have had a chance to answer you directly. That might have been too risky for you.

Anyway, from the posts I get on the blog it seems you don't have anything to worry about. You'll win in a landslide.

It is more like Dougie-do-right than Dougie-can-do-no-wrong!!!!

Yeah, Doug, we are all going to do the RIGHT THING AND VOTE FOR WOOD/BROWN.

Gilda, What smartass doesn't realize is that either way, he loses. If Wood is elected the choice plan is gone and poor Doug's socialist agenda gets squashed...if Becky wins, more folks leave High Point and take their highly sought after white children with them.

High Point will be only known for Lazy Boys and lazy girls that can carry a tune...but can't read.

I am watching the boards redistricting, watching the election and biding my time. If the (sh) "IT" plan does not get chopped I am out too.

End the kidnapping of our children!

I was out of town and unable to answer some questions that were raised by Mayor Smother's flyer. Here is the response that I sent her this evening:

November 6, 2005

Dear Mayor Smothers,

I am sending you this e-mail and am forwarding it to several people who have had questions regarding the content of your letter since receiving it. In particular, most questions have been regarding your comment about "arranging meetings between leaders from the ABC group and civic/business community".

The meetings you were referencing happened prior to my accident. I don't have the particular date, but I think they were in the spring of 2004. One was between John Faircloth, you , Michael Murphree and myself. The other was held at the High Point Museum with quite a group of distinguished leaders of the High Point community. For those meetings, I appreciate your assistance.

I must also add that during that period, your opponent, was the Chairman of the Education Committee in Raleigh and also was of assistance to our organization.

Unfortunately, neither of your help was enough to get the Guilford County Board of Education to stop the ill-conceived, under-funded, lottery that buses North High Point's students all over the city. Distrust of elected officials and cross town residents will continue until a child knows where he or she is going to school based on their address and not their "free and reduced lunch" meal status!

Additionally, I want to make it clear that neither I, nor ABC, has endorsed any candidate in this election. In fact, at this point ABC is a dormant organization. I assume the PAC will be active again before the school board elections in 2006.

My reason for not endorsing anyone is simple. I personally do not believe any of the candidates has been involved with, or has a solid grasp on the education system in Guilford County, in general, and High Point in particular. Hopefully, your workforce preparedness study will reveal what all of us in North High Point and Jamestown have been saying for the past several years. The Guilford County School system is FAILING to provide a sound basic education to the kids in Guilford County. Because of that FACT, High Point will continue to suffer until our elected officials take a stand.

Best of luck on Tuesday.

Tim Mann
Ward 6

What are you saying Tim?
WHy not support Wood? Are against the Choice plan?
WHy not support the real candidate who is against it?
If the non existent ABC group will not endorse then I a resident of NHP will!!!
Calling all residents of NHP .

VOTE WOOD!

Another candidate, this Lisa chick running in Ward 6 is playing the same game as Smothers--The game of "let's pretend the schools are a concern all of a sudden".

It's NO coincidence that Smothers and this Ward 6 chick have cutesy, matching campaign signs. They want ONE thing--VOTES and now they think that by acting concerned about all those poor children that have to be bused, they will get votes.

They disgust me. The ONLY candidates that have come out of the gates with education issues on their platform are Steve Wood and Tim Brown. BOTH of these gentlemen have placed the mistreatment of High Point's High Schoolers at the top of their campaign agenda. ANY candidate that uses this topic to garner votes BUT never gave a DAMN about our students before should rot in hell. Our students have already been raped once by the school board, NO politican WANNABEES will do it again! I can spot FAKE concern a mile away Lisa and Becky!!! LEAVE THE KIDS OUTTA YOUR CAMPAIGN, THEY DIDN'T SEEM TO BE OF ANY CONCERN TO YOU BEFORE WHEN THEY WERE HAVING LOTTERY TICKETS SHOVED DOWN THEIR THROATS!!!!!!!

The ONLY choice for Mayor is WOOD and the ONLY choice for Ward 6 is BROWN.

Let me repeat: BROWN and WOOD

Doug I posted this on another strand in response to a comment you had written. Here is the cut & paste:

Doug,

How could the intent of the High Point Choice Plan have been to "unite" the city? (If somehow anyone imagined this, it failed miserably.) Here are some of the components of the plan:

1. Long bus rides.
2. Three separate "magnet-like" programs and no homebase, traditional school like the rest of the county
3. An experimental plan unlike any in the U.S.
4. A plan that treats High Point
students/families very different from the rest of the county.
5. A plan that takes children OUT of their surroundings and community and creates a hardship on families who have to:
a. look for car pools
b. rearrange work schedules because of the busing schedules and day care
c. puts poor children at a disadvantage who do not have transporation to attend sports and after school activities
d. makes some parents have kids at schools in 3 different parts of town if they have younger kids too

6. Rips away the traditions of all 3 high schools by those kids who wanted to attended "their" high school, just like those kids in other parts of the county and in Greensboro have the privilege to do (i.e. Grimsley vs Page traditions)

7. 800 plus parents came out against the plan

8. Suspension rates have increase in the HP high schools

9. Test scores are down

You stated that the residents of North High Point did not want to be the rest of the City. You get it. Bingo. That is their true CHOICE. They moved where they want to live, shop, go to church and yes, go to school. The students, 100% of them at Central and Andrews, got their first choice to go to THEIR school. That is a major difference. No one forced the children of Central alumni to leave their IB Program and get on a long bus ride to North High Point and attend SW or to Andrews. Correction on the citizens of North High Point opposing being part of downtown High Point. You have MANY students at SWH who live in the county (and no city); they chose to live in the county and NOT in High Point. For many, many reasons. And they do not want to go to the 5th or 6th closest school because of some experiment with their kids to appease the politics. The reason that they do not want to be part of downtown High Point, is truly their own true choice. The "why" is not important.

The plan, to date, is failing miserably.

And if some people think it was to "unite" this is a joke. It has taken a 180 degree turn in that effort.