Building a New North Carolina

There have been a lot of goings-on this week at the Bev Perdue Campaign. Most of you have seen the TV ad by now, but we also released a couple of new ideas as part of Bev’s Building a New North Carolina series. Let me tell you about them…

Creating a DOT that works for North Carolina
Click here to read the four-step plan. The gist is that we must get the DOT’s house in order by decentralizing bureaucracy so that decisions are made in the field. Then we must hold contractors accountable so that we get projects on time and on budget. Combine that with ending the $170 million transfer away from the Highway Trust Fund and we can start to reign in the outrageous inflation of construction costs that is skyrocketing the projected costs of our transportation needs.

Cool Cities Assistance Initiative
Many of you may be aware of the Sierra Club’s Cool Cities program. The Sierra Club’s volunteers have done a fantastic job across the state getting their municipal governments to sign the US Mayors’ Climate Protection Agreement. 37 cities and towns in North Carolina have signed the Agreement, the 4th most in the nation. The Agreement calls on municipal governments to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions by 7% from the 1990 level by 2012.

Bev’s Cool Cities Assistance Initiative would give grants and funds to help the cities and towns who have signed the Agreement create their initial emissions reduction plans and then carry them out. The initiative is especially helpful to small towns that don’t have the resources or staff to carry on these projects.

Bev came out yesterday with the third installment of Building a New North Carolina: Main Street Solutions. This initiative will give a boost to the economic development of small towns and cities across North Carolina.

The state Department of Commerce has an existing Main Street program, but it only gets $450,000 annually from the state legislature. That’s a pittance considering the importance of our small towns and cities.

Bev’s immediate goal will be to increase funding to $2.25 million, so that we can help more towns around the state. That sum still represents only a fraction of what the state pays in annual incentives to relocating businesses. The projects funded through Main Street will themselves serve as tools to attract relocating and start-up businesses.

Taking from best practices in other states and success stories here in North Carolina and in consultation with local leaders; Main Street Solutions will develop a flexible menu of options from which our smaller town and cities can choose in activating their own economic development strategies.

Please read more about the program here.

If you haven’t already read the first two parts of Building a New North Carolina, Rural HOPE and BRAC Budget Reform.

Today I am launching a new webpage called Building a New North Carolina. I wanted y’all to be the first to hear about it. The page is going to be dedicated to highlighting new initiatives that I will pursue as Governor as well as some I have already been working on as Lt. Governor.

Check it often because I will continue to release installments throughout the campaign. You should also visit my new Flickr and YouTube pages.

First up is Rural HOPE. It’s an initiative I helped create as Chair of the Health and Wellness Trust Fund. It will help our state’s 56 rural hospitals be better equipped to provide quality health care to patients without forcing them to travel hundreds of miles.

I look forward to your thoughts and questions.

Take care,
Bev