At the Capitol Monitor, we're not only tracking stimulus spending by project – we’re tracking it county-by-county, comparing the government's spending choices with North Carolina’s needs. But the counties with the highest unemployment don’t always get the most money for “job creation.” See how your county fares in this chart, which is updated monthly as new unemployment figures are released. HERE'S THE CHART, reflecting June's unemployment & spending.
While funds are desperately needed for education, health care and infrastructure repair, the state of North Carolina is considering funding for another major boondoggle that will cost state taxpayers millions, if not billions, of dollars in the years to come.The...... MORE
After discovering that five firms involved in managing North Carolina state employees' pension funds were being paid more than industry standards, in 2010, State Treasurer Janet Cowell negotiated management fee reductions with those firms - including Relational Investors, the current...... MORE
With all the glamour of Hollywood, sans Julia Roberts’ red hair, environmentalist Erin Brockovich arrived in Raleigh on June 29, 2010 to speak against Alcoa’s license renewal for the Yadkin River hydroelectric project, hoping to shore up support for the...... MORE
Some call it "the Global TransPork.” Estimated to create 50,000 jobs within its first decade, the North Carolina Global TransPark (GTP) Authority was created by the General Assembly in 1991, when it was hyped to become an “international prototype of an...... MORE
After more than 60 years of indecision, a settlement on the fate of the Road to Nowhere has finally been reached: Swain County will receive $52 million of your federal tax dollars to compensate for a road that was promised...... MORE
Here’s a new twist on an old gag. How many Nobel Prize winners does it take to caulk a window? Two. One to brag about it and one to write the rules in triplicate.According to the Government Accountability Office in...... MORE
The Winston-Salem Journal characterized it as apparent "political maneuvering."After losing federal funding in the first round of "Race to the Top" grants in April 2010, state leaders re-tooled their proposal to increase their chances in Round Two – but their...... MORE
Competition is the cornerstone around which public contracting is built. In its best form, it is a mirror of a free and open economy. North Carolina’s purchasing program is built on the principle of competitive bidding. When it is not...... MORE
Can't you just feel the economy booming? Thankfully, Washington’s $787 billion stimulus is creating jobs at warp speed.According to a new White House report, “The economic stimulus passed almost a year ago was responsible for between 1.5 million and 2 million...... MORE
It’s supposed to transform North Carolina.In 2005, billionaire David Murdock and a flock of state officials gathered in Kannapolis to announce the formation of the North Carolina Research Campus – a public/private partnership bringing together a cluster of biotech companies...... MORE
Remember the famous adage "Those who refuse to learn from the lessons of history are doomed to repeat them"?Since passage of the Obama administration’s $787 billion stimulus in February of 2009, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that our economy...... MORE
The Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board has just published a list of more than 4,000 prime recipients of ARRA contracts and grants that failed to comply with the first round of reporting requirements, including data on job creation and retention.If...... MORE
North Carolina local governments took advantage of the federal government's December 15, 2009 deadline to apply for $1.025 billion in federally subsidized bonding authority under the stimulus plan's Build America bonds program. Among the first to jump in – Charlotte...... MORE
Let’s say that despite all you’ve heard about erroneous stimulus jobs reporting in recent weeks, you still buy the argument that the stimulus is “creating & saving” jobs. How are private North Carolina businesses – and the unemployed – faring under...... MORE
According to a report in the Washington Times, the federal website Recovery.gov, the "official" tracking site for stimulus spending, came at an initial cost of more than $85 million to taxpayers, so one might expect, at the very least, accuracy. Last...... MORE
The first official reporting of job creation as a result of the $787 billion American Recovery & Reinvestment Act (ARRA) came due in October, and even if you believe the figures, the results are less than stellar.According to the official...... MORE
Imagine this. You rub the magic lantern and the Genie appears. The Genie gives you the power to become an irresistible force. Fantastic! But there’s a problem. It appears the Genie has given someone else the power to become an...... MORE
North Carolina’s stimulus czar (no, not his real title, but don’t we deserve a czar?) Dempsey Benton insists that the federal stimulus plan is going to save or create 105,000 jobs in our state by spending $6.3 billion over the...... MORE
In December 3, 2008, a 121-ton girder collapsed during the construction of a new bridge across the intracoastal waterway to Oak Island near Wilmington, crushing bridge builder Jose Mantalvo as it plunged forty feet to the ground.The contractor on the...... MORE
By now, you’ve likely heard all about Governor Perdue’s new $19 billion budget, her $990 million tax increase and the trauma the legislature endured closing the $4.7 billion budget shortfall. Well, forget all those numbers because they’re phony, political spin...... MORE
Commerce documents reveal how Apple officials guided state officials to pass changes to NC’s tax code that solely benefited their company State officials from Raleigh and local officials in Catawba County announced on July 6 that Apple Computer will build...... MORE
When will local leaders learn?Roanoke Rapids taxpayers are still paying for their elected officials’ foolish decision to invest an enormous amount of tax dollars in the Randy Parton Theater. In Kannapolis, taxpayers aren’t reaping the big dividends anticipated after billionaire David...... MORE
With the recent spread of the swine flu in North Carolina, affecting hundreds and claiming the life of at least one individual in the state, the media is again reminding citizens of the deadly Spanish influenza pandemic of 1918-1919 that...... MORE
At the very same time that the North Carolina legislature was debating nearly $1 billion in tax increases for the state’s citizens to cover an unprecedented shortfall in revenues, Governor Beverly Perdue was handing out $1 million in taxpayer cash...... MORE
Newly enacted in 2009, North Carolina's higher targeted tax credits for the film industry had barely taken effect in January 2010 before Gov. Beverly Perdue was calling for more. Despite dismal state revenues and predictions of major shortfalls every year...... MORE
President Barack Obama has repeatedly said the days of “pork … as a strategy” are over. However he is proposing to spend billions of dollars on an expanded infrastructure in the stimulus bill. He has assured the nation that state governors...... MORE
So where, oh where have our stimulus jobs gone? Oh where, oh where can they be? That’s the hot tune in Washington and Raleigh. In an April 29th prime time news conference, President Obama declared, "We began by passing a...... MORE
Are baby sitters going to start charging sales tax? According to Senate Finance Committee Co-chair David Hoyle, legislators may extend the sales tax to cover services as part of a tax increase package. Hoyle said the Senate may consider tax...... MORE
Washington-watchers already know that the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) has pumped 50 billion taxpayer dollars into Citigroup to keep the big New York bank afloat, making Citigroup number two on the TARP parade.Here's what you may not know: That’s...... MORE
Despite President Obama's assertion that heavy equipment maker Caterpillar would hire employees if his stimulus bill became law, the company recently announced another round of layoffs, bring job losses for the company to 2454. Caterpillar never agreed with the President's...... MORE
During her State of the State Address on March 9, 2009, Governor Beverly Perdue was adamant that her administration would be different. “This is the time to stand up to the sweet seductions of special interests, the temptations of politically popular...... MORE
Is it fair to send the bill of people who don’t pay their mortgages to people who do? Many homeowners who saved their money, made a down payment and didn’t buy more house than they could afford resent that they...... MORE
Income tax time causes one to calculate exactly how much they chose to contribute to non-profit organizations during the last taxable year. Indeed, charitable giving has become a way of life with most North Carolinians – but taxpayers are giving far...... MORE
A surprise projection of a $300 million budget shortfall for the State Health Plan for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2009 – and even worse news for the following two years of the plan – had Raleigh politicians pointing...... MORE
By enacting the largest tax increase in half a century, in 1989 the North Carolina General Assembly promised to use the money to make major road improvements across the state. The legislation established the Highway Trust Fund, and it was...... MORE
After repeated losses at the polls, local leaders are frustrated about the public’s adamant refusal to grant them authority to raise taxes on land transfers. Not to be deterred, they are now attempting an end-run through the North Carolina General Assembly...... MORE
In December of 2008, while Detroit carmakers were begging Congress (and taxpayers) for billions in bailouts, the Associated Press reported that “North Carolina's biotechnology firms pressed governor-elect Bev Perdue … to commit perhaps millions of taxpayer dollars to buoy cash-starved...... MORE
In April 2010, Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company announced lay offs of about 70 workers starting the first week of May. The news came as no surprise to critics of corporate welfare schemes. They predicted it back in 2008, when...... MORE
In May 2009, the Wall Street Journal reported that computer giant Dell Computer Corp. may sell off some of its manufacturing facilities, including the Winston-Salem plant that was awarded a record amount in local and state taxpayer incentives totaling more...... MORE
Recently, Internet blogs erupted with speculation about a grotesque looking creature that supposedly washed ashore at Montauk on Long Island, New York. A commentator from Animal Planet claimed it might be a decomposing raccoon. Since the original photo came from...... MORE
In North Carolina, state and local governments are prohibited from borrowing money without the approval of a majority of the people who choose to vote on the question. So why does the recently adopted budget for the fiscal year 2008-09...... MORE
The neverending saga of the failed Randy Parton Theater project took another turn when Roanoke Rapids city leaders voted to sever the relationship between the city and Lafayette Gatling, the theater's latest owner.By April 2010, Gatling owed $182,000 in back...... MORE
Despite a string of lawmaker convictions which exposed one of the worst kept secrets in Raleigh - the lack of transparency in state government - North Carolina still lags behind other states which are climbing aboard a national movement to...... MORE
As budget deficits continue to grow, the state sponsored Golden LEAF Foundation is under increased fire for funding projects that appear to be politically driven, and not in keeping with the mission of the organization, established in 1999 "to provide...... MORE