Lemmond Missing Expo?

Update: There were no spottings of Jerry Lemmond at the Expo, one of the largest gatherings of the campaign season.

Jerry Lemmond Skipping Meet The Candidates Session

The En­richment Center’s Sixth Annual Boomer, Senior and Caregiver Expo opens Thursday at the Dennis Wicker Center. With more than 2,500 people expected to attend, Jerry Lemmond failed to sign up for a special session offered to candidates to meet with interested attendees and take their questions. Lemmond, who has the reputation of showing up anywhere 3 or more people gather in Lee County, may plan to be on the grounds, but he apparently did not want to take unmoderated questions in an informal session with voters. Commission candidates were offered 30 minute periods to sit down in a special section of the lobby to answer questions from attendees. According to event organizers, Lemmond did not respond. Since Robert Reives will be off drawing his public salary from the state somewhere in Raleigh, Lemmond would not be able to read the facial cues that Reives uses to tell Lemmond the position he is supposed to take on issues as was demonstrated at the last commissioners meeting. A number of people had especially planned questions for him. Here is the schedule for commission candidates: Harry Undy 10:00; Amy Dalrymple 10:30; Herb Hincks 11:00; Richard Hayes 11:30; Larry "Doc" Odom. 1:00. Candidates for other offices are scheduled at other times. Lemmond is not believed to be out of town drawing his $150 per diem at one of the many conferences at which he so dutifully represents our county. He may unavoidably be at a funeral for his wife's first cousin's next door neighbor's brother-in-law's husband. Of course he could be out driving around the county on his in-county travel allowance "checking rain damage." With the number of attendees expected he might try to get lost in the crowd--any thing but face the voters in a question answer session.

Just A Few Sea Shells

Editor Rambling After Beach Trip

Editors Note: Last week was spent at the beach. The posts were scheduled automatically to keep things active. No computer access for a week! Coming home and catching up I have found some items that need some verification. I have also picked up some odds and ends of interest--kind of like picking up shells on the beach.

What A Difference A Day Makes

The first day of school is a day that one can always expect traffic jams, but the one created with the dual opening of Southern Lee High School and SanLee Middle School was apparently Raleigh-style grid lock. After having a chance to observe traffic patterns, Lee County Schools staff made some changes in the traffic pattern and Tuesday traffic moved as well as anyone can expect until NC DOT realizes the need for a stop light at Hickory House Road.

Commissioner's Meeting

So Jerry Lemmond voted both ways again. He changed his vote after getting a nasty look from Robert Reives. That happened back in July, too (See Previous Post). It doesn't matter much because it was a procedural vote to decide not to decide whether or not to allow attorneys to smoke in a back room in the courthouse. Ray Martin, the "expert" the commissioner's hired because they don't know what to do with the political mess they created over Lee County High School, is now going out to the court house to look the smoking situation over. This seems to be the commissioners new way of doing nothing productive while looking like they care.

Welcome To The Crumpton's

County Manager John Crumpton has finally been able to get his family relocated here to Lee County. With the housing market in the toilet selling his home, it was necessary for the board to extend his relocation allowance to accommodate his needs. Word is that his daughter is on the tennis team at Lee Senior High School. Since he chose to live in that attendance district, does he know something we don't?

Letter Wrong About Board of Education Votes

A recent letter to the editor published in the Herald suggested that the Board of Education had split into two blocks with most votes 4-2. That, it turns out, is not true. The Board voted 4-2 to elect Bill Tatum chair and Frank Thompson at its first meeting. Since then, every other vote has been a unanimous vote of 7-0.

Note: If you missed the Uncommon Sense Column in the Herald last week, you can read it by clicking here.

LCHS Report : Part 3 Misrepresenting the Obvious

Hard Work By Team "Packaged" For Effect While the entire document is 49 pages, the report itself is only 5. There is a two page letter from the project czar, Raymond Martin, the $2000 a week consultant, a title page, the 5 pages of the report, and 48 pages of memorandum (mostly emails) from the members of the team to bulk it up so it looks like a big report. (to see a list of the team click here). No doubt the members of the team did a conscientious job of inspecting the campus and writing emails to Martin. These memorandums and emails reflect people who are conscientious and professional. It is Martin's failures that make the report of little use except as the political document it was intended to be. No where is there a single cost estimate. Back to the lack of scope. One failure was to compare the findings with those of the Hite Plan for Renovation to see what could be learned from the comparison. Those already identified could and should have been marked. But, without a well thought out scope document, these kind of ideas that could have greatly increased the value of the report aren't considered. You will recall that what was a" safety and health study" is now called a "safety and security study." As noted in the first of this series, there was no written scope and without one, the findings can get out of whack. The Hite study dealt with "security" from the standpoint of physical control of the campus--how to avoid a "Combine" here. It is not clear why the name of the study was changed, but its scope has nothing to do with that kind of security. The inspection team included no one with that expertise. So if you are looking for identification of those needs, you will not find them. As for Martin's report, he reviewed the material and classified the findings into five categories:

• Emergencies
• Updates to Current Codes
• Maintenance
• Housekeeping
• Miscellaneous

The biggest items in this entire report are buried at the back in the miscellaneous section. It is suggested that no less than a site engineer, an environmental consultant, an architectural consultant, mechanical engineer, and lighting consultant be retained to look at various issues. Duh, that is what taxpayers money has already paid for in the Hite Report. Why won't the commissioners use it? I thought Mr. Martin had the expertise to examine these matters. When you start reading a report on conditions at a school, and you find references to a supreme court definition of emergencies, it is kind of a clue of the b-s that is to follow throughout the report. I think we all intuitively know with what an emergency is but the author wanted as dramatic a report as possible. The report calls for an integrated fire alarm system and fire suppression systems. It notes that contracts have been let for the fire suppression system. Updates to Current Codes refers to items that met the building codes when built, but the old buildings do not meet the all the requirements they would have to meet if the were rebuilt today. Most of these would were identified and correction provided for in the Hite report for the renovations. Few if any will come as surprise to the Board of Education. However, since the commissioners never would agree to a thorough briefing on The Hite Report, they may come as a surprise to them. This is why the unwillingness and stone-walling by the commissioners on the Hite Report was a major mistake. This is the part of the report that undoubted most parents and other speakers had reference to when speaking of health and safety problems. Maintenance is a suggest that certain items inter alia be considered for regular check lists. inter alia? inter alia? What on earth is inter alia? It is one of those show-off words. It simply means "other things". Why use inter alia instead of "and other things." It is one of those b-s words designed to let us know how smart the writer it. In the case of suggesting that the schools have certain things like checking light bulbs behind exit signs on a regular check list, it also helps to make it sound like a big deal. There is no evidence that the schools don't have a check list. A simple email would have found out. But no, we have got inter alia? The Housekeeping section is much like the maintenance section--clear the gutters, change air filters, etc. Why this isn't" inter alia?", too, I am not sure. Read this recommendation regarding the water problem with my comments: reportedly-with all the rainstorms he never saw the problem.) floods ankle deep during and immediately after heavy rains. It should (should--does that mean yes it will or maybe it will. It sounds like a highly qualified statement) be possible to raise the surface of this walkway 6” or 7”+. Existing surface should be demolished and substrate built up with crushed stone and 4” reinforced concrete topping. Leaks in existing cover should be repaired. When asked where the water would go, Martin replied "into the grass?" Certainly not a very precise answer. Of course, he does recommend bringing in a civil engineer to look at the real problem.

Part 2. LCHS Report: Project Management Failure

From The Seat Of His Pants Despite his constantly citing 30 years as a construction manager, Ray Martin could not provide any evidence of the most basic of project management techniques. His attitude was "I am so smart" that I don't need them. First he said the project never had a written scope. Perhaps that why the name went from "Safety/Security" from the original "Safety/Health." He finally admitted "I was just supposed to look around and see what was wrong." Having a clearly defined, written scope is project management 101. For example, while the report makes some recommendations it provides no cost or time estimates for the problems that it found. He could not produce a planned task list from which work was done other than to refer to memos sent back to him by members of the inspection team. He kept no record of hours worked by team members--some of which were public employees. As a result there is no way to determine, other than his $2000 a week salary, what the true cost of the project was to the tax payers. There were no common checklists, no standard ratings of how serious a particular problem might be by the person who identified it, or minutes of team meetings. While the various members of the team no doubt did what they thought were their responsibilities, these responsibilities were never documented. Martin's style was to try to bully his way past the answers by questioning the knowledge of the interviewer. Martin saw no value in providing the Board of Education with a draft of his report so that he would at least have an up-to-date status of what was planned or if certain work had been done. Both state and federal audits of the programs I have managed in state government have always wanted to have management comments before making a report public. Martin kept failing back to all his experience in the past and his supposedly superior knowledge, but it took less than 10 minutes to see that this project was run by the seat of his pants. In the report, he ends up recommending bringing in a professional to test for fungus and a civil engineer to deal with the water problems. In other words, when it comes down to the bottom line, he was not qualified to perform these functions and the most critical issues were not resolved. Most of the recommendations were made by members of the team with little evidence of independent contribution by Martin. Worst of all, there were no proposed time schedule for or cost estimates on the recommendations made in the report. As he said "I was just supposed to look around and see what was wrong." In Part 3, tomorrow, a look at the recommendations.

Part 1. LCHS Report: The Political Agenda

Commissioners Try To Rebound From Lee County Senior High Debacle

Despite the pleas of parents, teachers, students, and supporters of the sales tax referendum, the commissioners turned a deaf ear to express an intent to use a portion of the proceeds of the sales tax revenue to fund the renovation plans for Lee County Senior High School. In fact, on orders from Commissioner Robert Reives, it was stripped out of a resolution on the use of the funds at the last minute. A review of entries of the e-Lee Dispatch provides documentation of weeks and weeks of the commissioners refusal to deal with the Lee County Senior High School issue. One post deals with Jerry Lemmond's complete silence on the issue. The commissioners, it seemed, thought the public would "trust them." As we shall see in a future posts, the commissioners had a plan to spend the money on a lot of other things besides education. After the defeat of the sales tax and chairman Bob Brown, Commissioners Lemmond and Paschal were panicking. The county manager made calls to several community leaders to test the waters for perhaps a second run at the tax in November. Lemmond and Paschal, however, were afraid the referendum would hurt more than help their chances. Commissioners hoped that the strong leadership of the Board of Education by Bill Tatum would come to an end in the election, but Tatum won and stayed in the chairman's seat despite efforts by their surrogates. Reportedly Reives and Kelly came up with a public relations approach to defuse the problem--a safety and health study to show that the commissioners did listen and did care about Lee County High School after all. Never mind that most of these issues were already addressed in the Hite report they had consistently ignored. And perhaps they could embarrass and discredit the school board because of the conditions found at the school. Then they rushed to implement their plan--that rush was there first mistake. They were interested in getting a document out as soon as possible that would be critical of the school, not an in-depth study. They picked a bully with a loud voice rather than a professional as project management--one not certified in project management, civil engineering, or health. No one apparently considered going to the Hite report for which the school board had already paid for had much of this information. No scope was written for the product. In the end it recommends hiring 4 kinds of experts to look at the site. The report had has no cost estimates. The shoddy manner in which the project was managed will the subject of Part 2 tomorrow. When voters find out what they have gotten for their money they will not be happy. Click here to download pdf file. You can get a copy of the report by emailing the Clerk to the Board "Gaynell Lee" . Her address is glee@leecountync.gov It is public information and should be sent in pdf form by email.

Report on Lee County High School Due Today

Will Report Prove To Be Embarrassing For Board? Editors Note: The commissioners now have the report on health and safety they paid Ray Martin $2000 a week and asked hundreds of hours from public employees will be released tomorrow. Hint: When asked for how he checked for mold, the project manager said he looked for it. Guess: How many more consultants did he recommend be hired? Wild Guess: What much will fixing repairs cost and how long will they take? The commissioners are going to be faced with to a dilemma --act pleased, treat the report as a the fulfillment of a great idea, and use it for making some momentous decision or realize that because they don't know what they have doing, they have placed more nails in coffin of those members facing reelection. To avoid the latter, they will have to act very disgruntled, ask a lot of hard questions, and Jerry Lemmond and Ed Paschal will have to make some quick overtures to end their stonewalling on the Hite Report. This is a big call for Robert Reives to make. For each of the next three days, there will be a series of posts that provide the analysis and insight about this report that will provide insight and information that you will not get any where else. Stay tuned. This is guaranteed to be worth it.

GOP LATE, DEMOCRATS ILLEGAL $

Democrats Have Their Turn Let's see. The Lee County Democrat Party filed its second quarter report on time. It was not a hard report to complete. It shows no contributions and $3.23 in expenditures. The Republicans turned their homework in late and the Democrats took an illegal contribution from an elected official. For their administrative errors, the Republicans will have spent a few days in political purgatory, most likely be fined, and gotten a wave of bad press. If anyone ought to know every nook and cranny of how to spend money politically, Jamie Kelly should. The "good ol' days" when his grandfather could just hand out the cash are supposedly gone. There are volumes of laws now. So Jamie's firm gets its money back and gets to keep the meals he thought he was buying. It doesn't sound quite equitable, but its the law. In the end, none of this will have much impact on the elections. In both parties most of the money is collected and spent by the campaigns of the individual candidates. By November voters will be deciding between candidates. It is reported that 1% of the voters provide 90% of the political contributions. Perhaps more of us should assume the financial responsibility of living in a democracy.

GOP Files Reports, Awaits Board of Election Action

GOP Officials Accept Responsibility

Editors Note: This is one of those blogs in which I am involved with the subject matter as well as reporting it. When the State Board of Elections opened this morning, the balance of reports that were past due were delivered. According to the a spokesman for the state board of elections, processing of the form requires 2-3 days before it appears within the system. Shortly, thereafter, Lee's GOP should be placed back in active status again. A penalty of $500 was waived for the Lee County GOP due to tardiness with a 2007 Mid-Year Status Report. The waiver letter stated that that the penalty for that failure to file in a timely manner would be $500 but would be waived one time during the 2006-2008 election cycle. The letter also states that the penalty waived would be added to next penalty assessed during the 2006-2008 election cycle. Each situation is individually assessed and the amount of any penalty has not been determined but is not likely to be less than the original $500 that was waived. As noted in an earlier post, the former treasurer Jim Pitts has now resigned. Charlie Parks, a retired flight controller supervisor, has been elected treasurer. Since he is also serving as the campaign treasurer for Linda Shook, he has completed all required training and has established a reputation for the meticulous manner in which he manages the campaign reporting process. In his new capacity he will also serve as a member of the executive committee. Keith Clark (yep, that's me) has also resigned as vice chair and spokesperson for the Lee County GOP. The resignation came following the executive committee meeting, and no replacement has been named. The resignation had been under consideration for some time. The designation as spokesman was a compromise attempt to allow Littiken to serve as chairman, but to reduce the sometimes ill considered remarks for which Littiken is noted. That was successful in regard to such things as letters to the editor, but difficult to accomplish when the media contacted him. The designation was also to permit me to speak on behalf of the party during the public comment section of commissioner's meeting. As the e-Lee Dispatch began to take on the format as as source of news and commentary, there was conflict in those two roles. Nevertheless, I was reluctant to break my commitment to the arrangements that had been made. Finally, I had agreed to monitor the administrative matters of the party to avoid its loss of recognition specifically by the state GOP and see that party affairs were conducted consistent with its plan of organization, and in general compensate for Littiken's lack of administrative skills. In this last respect, it is clear that I had relied on the treasurer to ensure that the reporting was done, and was not made aware that no reports had been filed, After learning that Littiken had been aware of the problem for some months and not communicated the problem to me, I determined that little was to be gained in offering my assistance. My time and efforts will be better directed at assisting candidates for office. I can assure Republicans, however, that there will be a properly called and conducted convention next spring in which those who wish to see Mr. Litiken replaced will have a properly conducted and orderly process to do so. However, only registered Republicans can participate in that process. Those interested in seeing a change of leadership in the party can best do so by maintaining their Republican registrations.

Highlights of Republican Situation

What Is Important to Know Editors Note: As vice-chair of the Republican Party I am the designated spokesman for the local GOP. A more detailed statement will appear here and at the e-Lee Dispatch Plus at approximately noon today. This will allow the local Executive Committee to be notified of personnel changes and may provide greater clarification of the status of the local GOP.

• This action has no direct effect on the campaigns of any local candidates. All local candidates have remained in complete compliance and can continue to accept contributions and to expend funds.
• The first of the two late financial reports was filed yesterday. The second is expected to be filed by 10:00 am this morning. Once it is filed, the Board of Elections will advise the Lee County GOP of what further steps will be required to regain its certification.
• Individuals who may have desired to give funds to the local GOP may make contributions to the Lee County Young Republicans which is in full compliance. All the contributions will go to support the Republican ticket.
• The Party Treasurer will resign as soon as the final report is made and his replacement will be announced. Jim Pitts was unaware of and did not complete the training provided by the State Board of elections.
• While a quorum was present for the Executive Committee meeting, not all members were present. They will be informed of the personnel changes in the committee prior to the noon announcement.
• When all matters pertaining to the status of the Lee County GOP with the State Board of Elections have been completed, a statement will be forthcoming to the media. The Lee County GOP remains in full standing with the North Carolina Republican Party

Littiken Says Problem To Be Resolved Today

Editor's note: I am Vice Chair of the Lee County GOP. I was unaware of the failure of Mr. Pitts to file the reports. Certainly, if I had been aware of the reporting problems they would have been resolved. Also, readers would have learned of the problem here before reading about them in the Herald. Members of the GOP executive committee are being polled to determine if a quorum can be available for a meeting this evening. Littiken has said the forms and fines will be taken to Raleigh today. Nevertheless, this is a sign of upheaval in the party. There will be additional posts updating with developments and reactions later today and following the meeting. To be sure you don't miss an important post, sign up to receive the e-Lee Dispatch by mail. When you sign up, you have the option to keep your email address private--this means that e-Lee Dispatch will not have your address. To learn more about email notification click here.

Herald: City Council and Commissioners Need PR Officers

Not Even "Spin Doctors" Would Help Give the Sanford Herald Editorial Board credit for disclosing its own interests when it proposed that the city and county should hire "public information officers." Being in and around government, I have noticed that sooner or later these employees hired to get information out to the public turn into "spin doctors' just as sure as a cocoon turns into a butterfly. And the idea of adding such employees has Lloyd Jennings lamenting at his word processor, but Steve Brewer is salivating. It would be a good thing if the public "really" knew what was going on, but they won't get it from a public information officer with the current attitude and culture of the city and county. Of course, if more readers of the e-Lee Dispatch would let their friends know about this blog, at least a larger part of the public would know more! Just click that little envelop and send them a copy of this post! Now being a little more serious, The Herald's opinion that the city and the county do a poor job of keeping the public informed is absolutely right. And the city is much worse than the county. In fact, the very last post discussed the vision and wisdom of the county's chief technology officer in creating a web presence designed to make it much easier to keep the public informed than the traditional web page. [Important Correction: There was a serious error in the last post that its proof reader would not have known to catch. It said "Draughn was allowed to resign with much less fanfare than the school superintendent." It should have said "than David Smitherman was allowed to resign with much less fanfare than the superintendent." Our apologies to Mr. Draughn] And posts have already been planned to provide some examples of departments that are using the system well to keep the public informed and those that are not. There will also be some interesting comparison's between the city and county, too. They will just reinforce the point that adding a pubic information officer will not help--only changing the boards will help. The ruling majorities have no true interest in involving the public as discussed in the recent post (click here to read) contrasting the city and county searches for managers with that being done now by the schools. Here are some items that a public information officer would never been allowed to release to the public: Lee Senior High Renovations Stripped From Resolution Official Capacity Used To Influence CCCC Search Commissioners Dilute Board of Education MeetingNo Jobs Guaranteed for $70,000 Incentive Many posts here are opinionated but many also disclose information that would otherwise go unnoticed or unknown. And does any one believe that a City Public Information Officer would have issued a press release giving the evidence that two Sanford police officers were called to the scene on the drug bust? The city's website is a static site that is three or four generations behind the times. The difference between the Chief of Police's web site and that of the Sheriff's Office make quite a contrast and will be analyzed in a future post. What the public needs to get more information out of the board of commissioners and the city council is to vote the incumbents out and elect individuals capable of leadership. After all, Commissioner Reives will not even allow the Finance Committee to be recorded and posted on the county site. Next time you see Jerry Lemmond ask him why he hasn't made a motion to open those meetings. Editor's Note: Coming later this week the one document the commissioners did not want you to see.

Current County Web Site Underutilized

Managers Fail To Use Potential Editor's note: The Lee County site is not working this morning. It may be down for maintenance. The intention had been to give an example of the subject of this column. It must be a bad day for systems--Blogger is still having problems. Lee County had difficulty in getting a web site online, but now has one that has the potential to be of real assistance to citizens but it is going largely unused by the county. Lee County had a troubled history with its ability to bring even a basic site online until the then county manager, under severe pressure from then commissioner Chad Adams, finally recognized that the Information Technology director serving at the time was unable to complete the job. Then we see one of those aspects of government that makes it so ineffective and taxpayers so skeptical. (See yesterday's Uncommon Sense column) A new high level position was created with tax dollars to move the former county Information Technology Director aside. This is government's classic way of dealing with high level employees who cannot do their job that causes tax payers to resent the stewardship of their tax dollars. Often it is just moving incompetence from one area to another. That "made up job" is now taking $76,000 of tax dollars. My observation is that the individual is even less accountable now for the outcome produced. Then Lee County promoted Ryan Draughn, who became Information Technology Director in May of 2005 and made great strides. Draughn took an entirely different approach. He would bring in a contractor and create a system that would put the website content in the hands of the line departments. This allowed each department to maintain its own portion of the website and better use it to serve the public. It was a brilliant strategy change. He engaged Kelly Marcom to assist in deploying what is called a content management platform--a more innovative approach than the traditional web site -- for $15,440. No information technology deployment is without challenges but the speed and ease quickly made the new site available. (Jamie Kelly was not a commissioner at the time, and when he was elected the contract with his firm was phased out to avoid any appearance of impropriety.) The challenge was to get the departments to use it. Shortly after the new system was brought online it appears that the county manager at the time was interested in other things until Draughn [important correction: should read David Smitherman] was allowed to resign with much less fanfare than the school superintendent. Draughn left to become the Chief Information Officer of the North Carolina League of Municipalities in July. The progress Lee County made so quickly with its web site and other initiatives led to his becoming one of the best of the field in the state. Editors Note and Commentary: A future posting will discuss the unprofessional manner in which Mr. Draughn was treated by Robert Rieves in a finance committee meeting. When private citizens have taped recent finance committee meetings, this kind of conduct has been subdued. The next time you see Jerry Lemmond ask him why the county does not record and play Finance Committee meetings on its web site like the City of Sanford does?

Problems With Blogger-But Posts Available

Issues Arise At Ironic Time---- Having just written a column and a post about problems with the county's IT system, Blogger is having some minor problems. I recently started a second blog, E-Lee Dispatch Plus to provide a place for posting my column, personal comments, and supplementary information. You will see it's name to the left. It is supposed to be a link and to list the latest posts. I worked on it most of the day yesterday. I finally learned that Blogger is having trouble with the module that supports that. Update: Right now the module is working properly, but it was in and out all day yesterday--double irony! That all to give some of my readers a hoot. It was an all day project to try to fix but turns out to be their problem not my lack of effort. I could have worked around it so you would not have seen it, but all is fair in love and politics, and I love irony. Some folks who aren't always happy with my posts will get a good laugh I am sure. Blast away with your comments. To read yesterday's column from the newspaper on the web, click here. To read a blog post with my comments about the column, click here. Just to see how the development of E-Lee Dispatch Plus is coming, click here. Please remember none of your tax dollars were wasted! And when I couldn't get the job done, as was the case with a former county IT director, no one created a $74,290 overpaid make-work job for me. Reminder: On Thursday, August 7, 2008, the Lee County Board of Education will hold two community forums to gather input on the personality traits the next Superintendent of Lee County Schools should possess in order to be an effective educational leader for the district. At 4 pm, educators and staff of Lee County Schools are invited to meet with the board and its search process consultant, followed by a public input session at 5 pm. Both forums will take place at SanLee Middle School, located at 2309 Tramway Road, adjacent to Southern Lee High School. (Read more here) This is an important opportunity for our community. Take advantage of it. My suggested comment for that meeting is "A proven community leader with the demonstrated ability to develop the commitment of the community, students the school personnel that results in a new level of excellence in preparing students to deal with the rapid changes of the coming century." I still plan to attend. It is a well designed process and worth every penny. Today I will be working on tomorrow's post while Blogger gets its technical problem solved. PS Thanks for the high readership yesterday.

County Tax Status Shut Down For Repairs

A Post Related to Today's Herald Column

Pretend it is February 18 and you see this screen (Click here) on the county tax department web site and ask yourself are taxes owed on this property on 2/18/2008.

The person preparing a closing statement on a sale of the property saw this statement, "Real Estate Bill Information As of 2/18/2008", and assumed the balance was $0.00. If that is what you thought you, too, would be wrong.

This page actually gives her tax status for 2007 taxes. The fact that taxes were owed for 2006 on 2/18/2008 does not show up. The page provides nothing, however, to explain this.

A closing was made in reliance on that page and guess what--someone was out $1858.15 because those taxes and penalties were not listed on the closing statement. The attorney appeared before the commissioners but received no relief. As a result of the appearance before the commissioners, the inquiries feature of the Online Tax Payments And Inquiries page has been disabled.

The Disclaimer
County Tax Administrator Dwane Brinson showed the commissioners screen shots that would have given the correct information had the user "understood the system." Since the system is not operating, the e-Lee Dispatch could not fully verify its operations as it was designed when the alleged problem occurred.

One screen shot on the tax department web page showed a disclaimer in large print that warned against relying on the data in the tax portion in the system. Actually almost every page on the county site has a small print Disclaimer Link that gives a similar statement. (Click here to read it.) As you can see, it says in effect, "this information is for internal use, we don't guarantee it to be correct, and you (the public) should not rely on it."

Here is a clue folks--that disclaimer isn't news to the public. Given experience with the majority that controls the county commissioners, most of us don't rely on what comes out of the county office buildings anyway. Few will ever forget Bob Brown's politically fatal statement "Trust Us" in regard to the proposed sales tax. Both the tax and Brown went on to defeat.

To his credit, once the problem was identified, the recently appointed Tax Administrator, Dwane Brinson, has moved swiftly to have changes made to the screens to help users understand the limitations of the screens and what they actually mean. In addition, he plans a major training session for users (lawyers, Realtors, and others) on August 21 to attempt to insure that users of the system understand how to use the system and to get a reliable answer. But the disclaimer will still be there.

Editor's Note: More follow-up on the original implementation of the web site and our local governments difficulty using web sites coming shortly. Also check my new post on the e-Lee Dispatch Plus in which I comment on Ty Stumpf's last column. The RSS feeds have not updated the content so what you see on the side about my post. They will take several hours to update.

GOP Collegue Publicly Commends Love

Letter Likely To Show Up in Love-Shook Contest

A 10-term Republican legislator has sent letters to the editors in House District 51 newspapers in which Republican Commissioner Linda Shook seeks to unseat veteran legislator Jimmy Love. What makes this news is that the letters are highly laudatory of the Democrat Love.

The letters, dated July 18, 2008 credit Love with critical passage of a bill she sponsored called Jessica's Law. "I can attest that passage of this legislation . . .would not have been possible without Representative Love's support." Love was chairman of the committee that handled the bill.

Jessica's Law increases penalties for sexual offenses against minors. North Carolina was the (click here to read more) 33rd state to pass the law Howard called, "the most important piece of legislation the North Carolina General Assembly has enacted in many years aimed toward the protection of our children from sexual predators."

The public nature of the commendation is highly unusual and Love's campaign is circulating the letter. No doubt Love is hoping to use this to blunt a list of bills that his opponent says Love co-sponsored and that would have been harmful to small companies if they had passed. Love, however, has been endorsed by The North Carolina Forum for Research & Economic Education (NCFREE). NCFREE is a non-profit, non-partisan political research business association and provides business leaders with the information they need to make informed decisions from a business perspective. (see previous post)

Meanwhile, Shook is also attempting to turn her bankruptcy into a positive by claiming that Love is focusing his campaign against her on the the legal proceedings, and this "negative campaigning" is causing a backlash from small business owners and others with financial difficulties.

Editors Note: Look for "Uncommon Sense" my column in the Sanford Herald on Wednesday and then check our blog for information related to the column.