News-Record.com

Good for Mike W.

The Repubs made their point and should have moved on after the first vote. Mike apparently understood this.

I do not know if Mike Winstead reads Blogs, but the comments I am about to make are for him.

First of all I fully second David's comments: "Good for Mike Winstead."

I finally got around to composing a letter to the editor about the commissioners and received notification from Becky Layton that the News & Record plans to print it soon.

I have posted a few comments about the commissoners on the newspaper's Blogs, but I also wanted to make comments in print for those who may not check out the Blogs.

My letter harshly condemns the way the Guilford County Commissioners have conducted business since around 1990, the approximate year I began paying attention to local politics.

So far, to my knowledge, Mike Winstead is the only current commissioner who may not deserve my sweeping condemnation of the way commissioners act and interact.

Winstead is a Republican, and I am a Democrat, but I am completely open-minded to supporting any commissioner of any party who chooses not to lower him or herself to the typical level of boorish commissioner behavior.

The way that the Democrats have handled the entire Jenks Crayton affair has lost them my support. If complaints have been made against Crayton, they should be investigated, but the way that Democrats have pursued such an investigation is absolutely disgusting.

I was openminded about Bruce Davis when he began his chairmanship, but he has clearly demonstrated so far that he is competing for the dishonor of worst chair in recent history--and he may well be on track for winning that distinction despite previous poor examples of leadership in that position.

I am not real familiar with Winstead yet, but I am hopeful that he may represent a different, much more positive breed of commissioner than our county has been used to for way too many years.

It may ultimately be difficult for Winstead not to become "guilty" through his association with fellow commissioners, but his ultimate vote on the consent agenda may represent a willingness to "do the right thing" instead of merely following his party's lead.

I do not know how strong a personality Winstead possesses or what kind of leadership skills he owns, but I would love to have even just one commissioner willing to put our county and its citizens ahead of party and self.

With a board as negative as the county commissioners, it is difficult not to give into the temptation to play the same game the same way that everyone else does.

Winstead will become an instant hero of mine if he manages to prove himself a better person and a better representative than our county is used to finding on the board of commissioners.

Winstead might further distinguish himself by becoming the first current commissioner to Blog.

Jeff Thigpen has a Blog that I believe he began his while still a commissioner, but he has perhaps wisely moved on to a more respectable elected office. (My general opinion is that Thigpen was one of the more honorable commissioners our county has had in recent history; his worse offense to my knowledge was probably his guilt by association with less honorable commissioners of his own party.)

I am fully curious to learn who Mike Winstead is and what he is all about.

A Blog would be an excellent way for him to allow citizens to get to know him as a person and a representative.

If he is unfamiliar with Blogs, Winstead should consider checking out Sandy Carmany's and Jeff Thigpen's Blogs--so far, their Blogs represent the most consistent, most personal Blogs maintainted by local politicians.

Winstead may also want to check out the Blog maintained by David Hoggard, past and potential future political candidate.

By creating and maintaining his own Blog, Winstead would have the potential to communicate more directly (and more often) with our county's citizens.

Right now Winstead strikes me as perhaps the best current commissioner we have, but he is too fresh on the scene for us to know this for sure.

Being better than other commissioners isn't much of an accomplishment any way because of the poor way in which they carry themselves and conduct business.

A Blog might elevate Winstead to an even higher level and allow him to set a positive example for fellow commissioners to follow.

(There is no guarantee that other commissioners will follow in anyone's positive footsteps, but they clearly need someone to model how to behave and how to represent.)

If Winstead ultimately takes the high road, maybe it will inspire current commissioners to turn over a brand new leaf. (That might be hoping for the impossible, but there's always hope!)

Or perhaps his positive example will inspire better citizens to run for positions on the Board of Commissioners in the future.

I admire Winstead for his vote on the consent agenda, and I hope he will give all Guilford County residents many more reasons in the future to respect and admire him as a commissioner.

Mr. Floyd - apparently you haven't been following county politics as long as you claim. If you had been observing the county commissioners, you would know that mr. winstead might just be on very thin ice. He won his current seat by implying that the commissioners were not acting in the best interest of the county by bickering along party lines. He was supported by the local republican machine in opposition to a 2 term republican commissioner who frequently voted in the best interest of the people of guilford county and greensboro. She did not vote strictly along party lines. That is why she was demonized by her own party, the guilford county republicans. Pay more attention. mr. winstead and his cronies spent several hundred thousand dollars buying a commission seat that pays around 12,000 a year. Time will tell, and not this one vote, what kind of person/commissioner he is.

ps

I agree that commissioner winstead did the right thing when he voted for the consent agenda at the last meeting.

I have only lived here for 18 months. I will tell you that I crack up laughing at every County Commissioner's meeting. I just can't believe what I am seeing. To say this board's way of doing business is a "joke" is so close to true for me, and maybe any other citizen that has moved here from out of town.

If you are from here, and haven't been anywhere else to have that reference point, maybe you just think this is "the way it is, it's politics".

Please give me a break! This is no way for ANY County Governmental body to do business. I agree with Trudy Wade, "This is embarrassing!"

Davis has no credibility or authority as Chairman. He has made a joke of himself. And as a result, made a joke out of the entire County. If I had seen a Commissioner meeting broadcast when my husband and I were here on our house hunting trip, we would have re-evaluated the job offer, for sure!

If this County continues to look the other way when the County Commissioners behave in this manner, this area will never attract serious big business or be able to recruit the talent to support it.

Come on Guilford County, it is 2005. Grow up and demand that your County Commissioners do the same.

Diane,

I should not have needed the reminder, but you reminded me of how hard it is to share a positive opinion about a commissioner.

Actually, reading back over what I wrote, I think I did stress more of a positive hope than a positive opinion.

I believe you were referring to Mary Rakestraw as the ousted commissioner. I was shocked by that outcome. The mere fact that she was an incumbent made it unlikely that she would be defeated. There have been incumbent commissioners defeated over the years, but not all of them have been the ones who needed to go the most. Overall, incumbency tends to help, but it's obviously not a guarantee.

Rakestraw does rank as one of the better commissioners, but even she had a couple of incidents that did not reflect positively on her. Still, she was by far not among the commissioners I would have preferred to lose.

It speaks volumes about the local Republican party that it fought so hard against her but did not against Billy Yow. (It speaks equal volumes against the local Democratic party that it won't go against Skip Alston.)

The Republican party has made an issue about Skip Alston's influence over other Democratic commissioners (suggesting even puppet strings), and part of me is beginning to accept that there probably is some accuracy to such charges, but good grief, is it not equally obvious that many Republicans operate at the will of their own puppeteer?

I guess I chose selective memory about Winstead's campaign. Still, as I recall, he did not go into attack mode with his ads. (Definitely correct me if I've slid into selective memory again here!) Yes, a lot of money was spent; as I recall, he spent a lot himself. He obviously did have the backing of some powerful Repubicans.

You are ultimately right, Diane. Winstead has the question mark of having received such strong party backing, and he will have to prove himself far above and beyond one mere vote. (The party backing may reflect worse on the party than on Winstead. It depends on what is expected of him. If he feels the need to vote and act as the party demands, even at the expense of common sense and decency, then yes, we have a major problem--the same general problem that affects the commissioners as a whole.)

I wish there was more energy within our community to clean up the pollution caused by the commissioners.

Our community has far better citizens than the representatives we settle for.

Unfortunately, the representatives (obviously) are the ones who represent us.

Sincerely,

Hardy

hello hardy,

keep on keeping up with the actions of our local officials. one vote or one unthinking outburst covered by the media is not everything that happens in meetings or behind the scenes. it is a shame that many people don't care (or don't act as if they care) what happens unless it is in their own back yards, and when it is already "cut-and-dried" they start to protest. people like you who are aware of many of these actions by boards, commissions, councils, etc. are not in the majority of citizens. keep up the observations and comments.

diane

Hardy,

Where's YOUR blog? I'd be a regular.

Luv2read,

I set up a Blog, maintained it briefly, and then stopped keeping up with it.

I essentially did what some politicians have done--set up a Blog, used it for a short period of time, and then basically abandoned it.

My plan is for the abandonment not to be permanent.

I have no children of my own, so my Blog was like my baby, and I don't consider it a positive thing to abandon one's children. Obviously, I've done so briefly, but hopefully I can make it up to my Blog, and it will hopefully forgive me.

Instead of maintaining my Blog, I've behaved like a rabbit.

When I was growing up, my brother and I briefly had a pet rabbit.

With our Dad, we constructed a long cage that we had set up in the back yard as the rabbit's home.

We would sometimes bring the rabbit inside and let it hop around.

Unfortunately, we would have to clean up these little round pellets that would pop out of the rabbit's rearend. They would be all over the house by the time we gave the rabbit some decent running-around time.

Fortunately, the pellets were not too difficult to clean up and didn't appear to leave a permanent mess.

My father came up with a brilliant idea: put a diaper on the rabbit!

And we did!

It worked like a charm. We attached the cloth diaper to the rabbit's rear, and not a single pellet popped out of the diaper and onto the floor.

We--particularly my Dad--were quite proud of the diaper. My Dad even commmented on trying to market it. Why hadn't someone else dreamed up such an invention?

Eventually, it was time to put the rabbit back in its cage.

We prepared to take the diaper off.

It was a royal mess!

The little round pellets that we had always cleaned up with ease didn't come out hard and easy to pick up. They initially came out soft and mushy. They quickly hardened, and when we had allowed the pellets to be dropped all over the floor, by the time we went around to pick them up, they had already conveniently hardened.

When we fixed the diaper to the rabbit's bottom, however, the pellets came out mushy and were pressed all into its fur and tail. We had a yucky mess to clean up, I believe scissors were required, part of the rabbit's cottontail had to be snipped, as well as surrounding fur, and we never tried the diaper again. We had learned our lesson!

I thought of those rabbit pellets because that's what I've basically done since I stopped posting on my own Blog--I've gone around and posted comments on other people's Blogs, particularly the News & Record's. So I've basically left my droppings everywhere, just as our rabbit once did.

I need to clean up my act and start using my own Blog to post comments.

No promises on when I will do that because I don't want to come across as a politician making promises and then not fulfilling them.

But I wanted to acknowledge publicly that I know what I should do in the near future.

Sincerely,

Hardy

Hardy, har,har (laugh,laugh)

Thanks for the reply. Now let me see if I have this right...

If someone put a diaper on you, you'd start your blogging again? Is that what you implied?

Okay, I'm sending over some Depends.