Commissioners Patel and Tyson: What's at Stake for Cumberland County This Election

Peter Pappas: Welcome to the Carolina Cabinet. I'm your host, Peter Pappas. I'm in studio today with Commissioner Henry Tyson and Commissioner Pavin Patel. Welcome, gentlemen. Good afternoon. So good to have you here. I know you have busy schedules, but you made the time to come in and talk with little old me about early voting. we have about early voting ends what? Halloween? Saturday. Saturday, the thirty first. Yeah. Yeah. So a week from PM. Yeah, we got one more week. so if I'm not registered to vote, can I? If you go during early voting, you can re go ahead and register on stake your photo ID with you and So in one one motion, I can just walk up and here's my ID, here's who I be, give me a ballot. Yep. Awesome. It is easy. But you can't do that on voting on election day though. So if there's any changes you have to make, you you need to do that before election day happens. Okay. Okay. Well, every election we hear from our electeds that, this is the most important election of your life. you gotta and I know that running for office we gotta run it like we're losing it. So tell me about what separates this election and why it's important at the county level, especially. that we need to get some sound leadership on the Cumberland County Commission. Well, so when we look at what we've the challenges that we face in the in our county, between our school, obviously our infrastructure and water. those are challenges that are persisting. We've made amazing gains in the last two years working on those. but when we kind of look towards the future, we've got to see where our opportunities lie. We need to have strong leadership that's willing to, you know, do the homework, get out, make sure those realities and those opportunities come to fruition. economic development is, you know, a major goal for us, I would say we need to have high paying jobs. We need to make sure this is the community to be in. This is where you you know, our kids want to grow up and live and and you know raise a family. But if we're not going in the right direction, we can easily start to slip back. And you know, we've already seen what damage has been caused with our school system and how much of a lift that's becoming, you know, the the keymoors lawsuit we're fortunate we were able to finally settle that and start really investing more into our infrastructure on the water side. And those are projects that unless you keep pushing, y we we could lose sight of of of the golden golden well, and I've seen a lot of changes or work that the current commission has done since you gentlemen both were elected in twenty twenty four. I see the water districts, I see action towards keymoors. Mr. Tyson, what what can you add to that? what what do we what do we really have at stake in this coming election? So it's just a matter of which which way you perceive what government's role should be. Okay. And you know, I know for one, my my philosophy is that government should be limited and that, you know, it should take only what it absolutely has to take to provide for the common welfare of the residents and of the taxpayers, and then it should give the rest back. And so, you have to stay mission focused, you have to stay, you have to keep that in mind. you have to first and foremost, for me, it's public safety, it's education, it's having clean, safe drinking water for our residents, it's fire protection. So these are the things that government is was created to do, was created to provide for. And so if you look at if you look at that priority. coming into our our new budget cycle that we're gonna have, we know that if you don't have the s the correct priority and focus on those mission objectives, you're just not gonna have enough money to do do everything. That's just the bottom line. Yeah, it's it's all fun and game, so we run out of somebody else's money. That's right. And you're talking about government taking in the fa form of property taxes. Yes. And I believe you gentlemen did not have to raise the rate in this budget. Is that correct? Incorrect. Tell me if you're we were able to keep it steady from the significant drop that we were able to bring last year okay on that forty nine point nine cents on the hundred dollar advorum but we've got to be a little bit honest with ourselves too things are getting expensive. every day I feel like everything is just going up in price. And when you look at just our private lives and then you kind of compare it to government, well for every dollar something goes up in our private lives, it's three or four dollars in government. And so, you know, w we've gotta be very conscientious of the taxpayers, the because we, you know, as you know, I mean, we are in a tier one community. We don't have that much, you know, wealth sitting in our county. So while we try and build to that direction, we've gotta be cognizant of making sure we're not taking What we don't need a year. Sure. Well, and that reminds me, we have a tax holiday that the state legislature put in. I think we're saving 41 cents a gallon or something. It's temporary. It was definitely a political campaign season move. nobody can disagree 152 to one in the House and Senate at pass. but we were able to do that because we have a surplus at the state. We have an inflation adjustment in, you know, fund. Does the county have such a savings account? And are we at risk if we get the wrong people on this board? Are we at risk of blowing through it and being in debt? So that's always a risk. and we've got a good team that helps keep us, on the on the guardrails, but we also have a lot of priorities. One of the things, realizing coming into office is we were behind in a lot of areas. We were behind in our school infrastructure and we've seen that this board's made an investment six hundred and ten million into that infrastructure. So that has to be prioritized. You know, our water and sewer infrastructure. Throughout the county, we've been lagging way behind other pure counties in that. The closest estimate we've gotten to doing a countywide water and sewer initiative is over two billion dollars. So when you look at that, yes, we have we're very fiscally sound as a county. We do have but fund surplus and our general fund and our capital investment fund. But we have to be very strategic about how those dollars are spent. They're there now, it doesn't mean it's going to be there much later if we don't continue this responsibility. So I I need to have you each on separately later on, but let's talk about those water the water issue, because PFAS, PFAS, PFAS, big deal here in Cumberland County. what progress have you all made? I know we had the big win in Grays Creek. We got the schools finally on regulated water. but what's next with this? district tell me about the district idea and stuff like that for the county. So we we've got PwC that is main municipal water provider for and for our county, but that's really limited to mostly Fayeville, some of Hope Mills. And then you've got Spring Lake that has a water facility, which you know that there's some help that needs to be afforded over there. And then we've got capacity that we're trying to gain. So as Cumberland County continues to grow, once we've secured that capacity, whether it's from other counties around us or if it's through the Cape Fear River or ideally multiple sources, but that capacity is ours forever. so we'll have kind of our straw in the river to make sure we've got our drinking water. Okay. But when we look at c Commissioner Tyson's point that he made earlier We've lagged behind our pier counties, so we we don't qualify for a lot of the funding that existed forty, fifty years ago for these infrastructures like the USDA grants and things of that nature. So the way that we're going about it is these water districts they'll be separated throughout the county and it'll allow us to build out where the density is instead of trying to have one major center and then trying to pipelines everywhere. So y we can create these districts and then the point of doing that too is to make sure economically they're feasible because no one wants to get hit with a thousand dollar water bill when you've got an option for well water, for example. But when you can when it's an affordable water bill, maybe you don't have to worry about you know, digging a new well every ten, fifteen, twenty years, you know, maintaining your palms, et cetera. So and then ideally, those lines will also have gap filters. they'll be treated it'll be treated clean, drink drinking water for the community. I I wanna point something out. So you know, the P the s the seats that are up for election this cycle on County Commission are the at-large seats. I mean district one is too, but that's pretty much already settled. We you're gonna have Commissioner Adams and Commissioner Cuffy in the fall. There's nobody running in a post. But right now you have vice chairwoman and you have I guess Whose other chair came up? Commissioner Fairclaws. Fairclaws. Okay. my goodness, he's gonna hate me. I know Mar I know Marshall. But anyway. so those of those predate you, gentlemen going on the commission. So what did you have to initiate two years ago that you are in danger of losing if they return? We we need some fresh blood on the commission. So what would a change in those two seats mean for you guys going forward to maintain because I don't remember hearing about water districts two years ago. So I th I yeah, I think when you look at it, the biggest the biggest difference you're gonna see is what philosophy do you want your government to have? Do you want your government to have a philosophy where priorities that aren't necessarily the core priorities of the government are funded? Or do you want the government to have a philosophy where we're gonna fund those core ph philosophies first? And I think that's really what you've seen is in the past, you've seen government not really focused on the things it should be doing. It was focused on the things it could do and now the things that it should have been doing have lagged. So you could do them doesn't mean you should do them. That's right. Okay. And I and I think like a good way to look at it is, you know, we've always been trying to grow up But we you know, in the last two years we've really looked at the foundation and you know, you w you can't build a house on on quicksand if that makes sense. So we need we've been working extremely hard to make sure we've got a solid foundation where we can continue to build up from. and that takes away a lot of risk, but it's also a lot of hard work 'cause it's not it's not the funnest things to do if that makes sense, but it's the most important to the community in our future. And it's funny that Commissioner Patel brings up building because, you know, one of the things that I know he's been championing is a review and a reform of our subdivision ordinance in the county. Okay. And you go, you know, if you went and talked to any builder two years ago and I and I interface with a lot of them just because of what I do for a profession. Sure. A lot of them saying were saying, Hey, I'm not gonna build in Cumberland County. I'm gonna go somewhere else because the regulations and everything has made it so hard to build a house. And and it's not affordable. You know, there was a new study that just came out and it said California had the highest amount of regulatory burden to build a house, and it was two hundred thousand dollars per house in California goes towards regulation. Before they even get out to their mortgage. Wow. So making sure that regulation is reasonable, but that we're not adding a burden so that our next generation has the opportunity for America's greatest dream, which is home ownership. Okay. Okay. So we got the waters at risk. we have so there's a lot of seems to be a lot of good going on in our county for the last couple of years. what what else would be at risk? I I know that we have we've had a big blow up over DSS, we've had a big issue over PFAS consistently, we have the data centers, which is another the I I hate it for you guys. Holy crap. the the backlash on that has been unprecedented for a local issue, but What are we gonna lose? what's at stake in this election with those things? So let's talk about our public safety and our first responder community and some of the strategic initiatives we've done there. When you l when you when we came into office, you look there wasn't really as much of a focus on public safety. And if you look at the investments we made in our sheriff's office, for one thing is he was having vehicles that were wrecked that they weren't replacing and as a result They were making him go through the budget process to get that vehicle replaced. Okay. So it started this cycle to where we had these patrol cars that were twenty years old or p or more. And there was an incident where we had a a deputy that was actually in high speed pursuit in one of these relics and his steering column fell apart and he wrecked his cruiser because it had three hundred and thirty-eight thousand miles on it. So one of the things is we pushed that to the forefront. We got those vehicles replaced. Okay. And so now we've we've worked to modernize our fleet over there, which has been a huge priority. All of our sheriff's office has new firearms. Some of their firearms were twenty five years old. They were having issues with them. And so we were at a critical point. We funded that. we we gave a new s search tool that they could utilize and we funded that. So a lot of this has helped bolster some of the morale and the confidence in that department. And what we've seen is that our recruiting deficit that we've had with the tools that we've enabled has really bolstered the ranks and we're not we don't have the shortfall that we did. Okay. Okay. And I mean look, vehicles for the sheriff should be pretty much fundamental, I would think. We want them to have a patrol car. they were kicking the can down the road, it sounds like to me. Well, they they were using the budget process to to hold up if if a if a sheriff loses a vehicle and it's not his fault or his deputy's fault or it's not because it's worn out, it's because it wrecked. let's get them a new vehicle. Mm-hmm. that that shouldn't be something so we put that policy in place with our fire departments. You look at there was a lot of challenges with inflationary plu pressures. A new fire truck now is a million dollars plus. So a lot of our rural fire departments just that that was not sustainable. Right, right. So, we did a assistance program where they were able to apply. We did funding there. But also when reevaluation came, I know a lot of homeowners got hit. we did do revenue neutral and we we did the best we could to ease that, but some of that was the fire tax. And so, you know, bringing those fire departments up to a funding level that was sustainable and so that those departments could continue to show up, I think, you know, that was the right move. Even though it it it it was something that the community I know felt. It's it's pain I think it's unpopular stuff. You're you're definitely making us eat the vegetables right now, it seems like. and you have kids now, so you get that. but I think it's necessary. I mean it is. I mean you you if you've just kind of followed where our school system kind of lag from a physical facility standpoint, you know, one thing we we've asked and we've got it pass in the budget. this last year was to maybe take a complete step back and really do an assessment of all of the buildings that Conway County owns, all of our facilities to the parks and rec centers even and making sure that what what has not been kept up, where are the preventative maintenance plans, what needs to be replaced, what can be fixed. You know, we don't need another six hundred and ten million dollar ask and which Quite frankly, it's only a third of the money that the school system really needs to get according to their plan to where, where they'll be on par with, you know, with school building safety. But you know, with all this shortfall, and I'm sorry, this is becomes a partisan race at a certain point, and we are in a conservative show here, so we can discuss that. I mean, the commission's been largely Democrat controlled for years. And it sounds to me that they've been kicking stuff down the road and not attending and giving the schools the the just deserve that they deserve. Well and and and I'll tell you that that was one thing and I know and thank you for your service to the community on the Civic Center Commission. But coming into office, our biggest capital project in the history of Cumbean County was an event facility. Yeah. And an entertainment facility. While our school infrastructure was crumbling, while we didn't have water and sewer planned and we weren't really pushing that. So, you know, to me it was a lack of priority. And You you can argue funding sources and well, that's a different revenue stream. But at the end of the day, if if we continue down the road with that project, we were gonna have to use general fund tax dollars for those facilities. And so, you know, it was a hard pivot. but I'll tell you something, it was a necessary pivot because like Commissioner Patel said, we don't know what our liability is on our deferred maintenance on our county owned facilities yet. And that and I I have to believe that's gonna be a big price tag. You mean facilities outside of the school system? Yes. So every building just an office building. The courthouse, the law enforcement center. So we've not even looked at there has not been in since well, definitely since we've been in office in the last two years, but there's not even a previous facilities assessment that we could find to to see where we may have been ten years ago, let alone today. So it it it's a pretty big undertaking and that's gonna be something that we're gonna have to put on the forefront of of our budget discussions and where we need to allocate funds. it it's it would be it would would have been awesome to have the performing arts center downtown, but to Commissioner Tyson's point, we're we're leaving our schools behind. to me, if if a child can't drink a glass of water from the tap, are we living in America? I don't know. if they can't go to school and get a decent education. we've invested a lot with FTCC, FSU for workforce pipelines. You know, obviously the medical school is open now. So that's gonna bring a different, you know, level of education professionalism into our community. But those are things that we still need to go and try and, you know, bring those opportunities to light. Mm-hmm. I hear that. Well I I'm sorry to hear that we've let our office buildings go that far too. I mean I didn't even consider That we're not I just figure we had a maintenance guy that just went around and kept it up. you think about it, so the the courthouse was built in seventy seven, the new the new courthouse. The new courthouse, yeah. Yeah. Which, I knew. But you know, the other part of that facility assessment is we haven't done a facility utilization study. So like the top two floors of the historic courthouse empty. The top two floors of the law enforcement center, empty. Wasn't that the old jail? It was the old jail. Okay. So so nothing has been done. Now the sheriff uses it for evidence storage. Sure. But, at the same time, while we've got all these different offices spread out and all these different functions spread out, you know, the other thing that we don't really talk about was this proposed government services building that when they came into office, when we came into office, they wanted to fund it eighty million dollars. And how was that going to get paid for? So you had all these kind of unfunded mandates, you know. There's not a funding plan even today necessarily for the unhoused support center. So that has to come out of general fund dollars, not just for the capital, but for the operation. So when you look at all these projects that they had going on coming into office, there wasn't really detailed planning on what was the permanent funding sources for these. And that's what I mean by we were focused on all these other things, but we weren't focused on what the core function of government was to do. Yeah, it's like we were only focused on the whipped cream and the cherry on top and not thinking how we're gonna pay for the ice cream in the cup. Yeah. that's yeah, it just sounds like there's a lot of ex expected spending, but no expected how to get it there. Yeah. Just let's just make the mandate and we'll come we'll figure it out. I mean I'd love to buy a nice shiny car, for example, but I need to have a house that stands sturdy and be able to park it in. Or you gotta pay your electric bill and your tax bill before you can buy the new car. Right, right, right. Okay. All right. Well, sounds like we have a lot at stake at this upcoming election. ever since running for office, I will say that coming into the fall, I don't know if you guys are feeling this too, but it feels like like this is my Christmas coming up. Not not that I'm the taken away from Christmas, but it's like it's not fall unless there's an election and contested stuff. And sh shortly after Greek Greek spaghetti dinner and then Halloween hit or but then Thanksgiving and then we're on the on the way out. So is there anything that either one of you would like to add? this kinda turned into a show instead, but we're gonna we like that we were here to talk about get out the vote, but is there anything either one of you wanna add that's pressing? I wouldn't I'd I'll say this. I don't know if this is pressing, pressing, but I mean it it's a genuine honor to represent the people of Cumeland County do the work. you know it's going back to Your neighbors, your friends, your family, your coworkers, even maybe the neighbor down the street you don't like too much. But all jokes aside, you don't have to like everybody. You just gotta represent everybody. And and making sure that we're taking the genuinely strong, good steps that are thought out, well constructed. and I I truly believe our best days ahead of us, but If don't get out to vote on and make your voice heard, it's it's gonna be hard to have leadership that that's gonna follow through with those ideals. Agreed. Yeah, I'll just say thank you to the residents of Cumberland County for allowing me the opportunity and us the opportunity to be your voice. You know, we're your representative, not your leaders. Right. And at the bottom line, we're accountable to you. And what I'll say is this whenever you are looking at what somebody is promising you. Look at their actions. Don't look at their words. Because it's real easy, just like a used car salesman can tell you everything about this car and why it's great. And then you drive it off the lot and you realize, wait a second, the engine's about to blow up. That he didn't tell me this. So I would I would say this. If you like the actions that you've seen from this board in the last two years, if you think that we're moving in the right direction and you want to vote to continue that direction, get out and vote. If you don't like it and you think you need a change, then vote for that. But judge us and review us based on the decisions we made and the actions we've taken, not just the words of what people are campaigning to promise you. Excellent. Well, gentlemen, thank you for being here. I'm Peter Pappas for the cabinet. Y'all have a nice afternoon. Thank you.