It’s our tax dollars, not the prize patrol. Legislators should show respect

By WRAL TV

It’s Christmas time in North Carolina and some state legislators have decided they can play Santa Claus – with the taxpayers’ money.

Across the state members of the General Assembly – mostly Republicans – are appearing in photo opportunities with giant checks they’re presenting to local government agencies, area universities, community colleges, health providers, other non-profits and entities fortunate enough to be objects of legislators’ largesse.

Republicans, who once decried these localized goodies as “pork barrel” spending in the days when Democrats controlled the legislature now give them a more genteel moniker – “earmarks.”

No matter the label, it is taxpayer dollars given out at the whim and will of local legislators. There’s no open legislative process to examine the need, worthiness or appropriateness of the agency receiving the taxpayer funds. Nor is there an opportunity for other worthy causes and needs – those that may not have the obvious requisite partisan or political connections or simply missing from a legislator’s radar – to merit funding.

There is an estimated $3.1 billion in funding for pork barrel projects in the latest budget. Much of it is distributed based on politics more than need. Cleveland County, home to Republican House Speaker Tim Moore, and Rockingham County, base for GOP Senate Leader Phil Berger, will be receiving a combined total of about $200 million for local projects. The two counties together have a population of about 190,000. Wake and Durham counties – represented mostly by Democrats and with a combined population of about 1.5 million — is getting $124 million.

One of the largest allocations in the state budget for treating those with substance abuse disorders appears to have received little scrutiny or notice – but happens to be in a powerful Republican legislator’s district. (Read more)