Crystal Coast Tea Party

CRYSTAL COAST TEA PARTY PATRIOTS
MEETING MINUTES  OF
APRIL 24, 2012

Meeting held at Golden Corral, Morehead City, NC
Meeting called to order at 6:05 pm by Chairman BOB CAVANAUGH
Invocation was led by HOWARD GARNER
Invocation by STEVE BEST

BOB opened the meeting with “It has been an exciting week!”.   His phone has been ringing off the hook.  Several others said they had had the same problem.  EULA PARKIN said she had been driven off the sidewalk where she was working the polls in Beaufort.  When it had gotten too hot for Ms EULA, who had set up on the pavement of the parking lot, NORM SANDERSON had helped move her table into the shade (awning of a store, down pass the last business) .. still outside the 50 foot legal distance.  Doug Raymond told her she had to move, that the Board of Elections had called him and said they had had something like 20 calls about her blocking the entrance of several stores and they (the customers) were having to walk around the table.  Several different stories were told about this incident, so no one is totally sure exactly who insisted on EULA having to move, but several had their opinions.  BOB said last week an elderly gentleman had shown up at the Beaufort polling place, said he was a member of the TEA Party and told voters who came up not to pay any attention to the list the TEA Party had put out, it was wrong, they were asking people to vote for Elaine Crittenton and NOT Harry Taylor.  Well, it seems Harry stopped by and asked him who he was and why was there a problem with the TEA Party’s list.  Harry called HOWARD, who in turn called BOB and by the time BOB got there to check it out, the man had left.  We also had an incident in Newport where one of our new young Republican/TEA Partier (and BOB said he noticed they were missing tonight)…(Note:  they showed up right before the close of the meeting without making any comment.) was working under the Republican umbrella but passing out TEA Party ballots.  He was telling voters that he was with the TEA Party Group but don’t vote for the first 3 people.  He was against anyone voting for Mitt Romney (was pushing Ron Paul), talked against Frank Palombo and Pat McCrory and recommended they not vote for any of those three.  Most of the attendees at tonight’s meeting were upset and considered this a stab in the TEA Party’s back.  BOB said he planned to have a talk with the offenders.  This can not be allowed.  If they disagreed with the democratic vote we had taken, then they should not proclaim to be members of the TEA Party, but campaign under their own auspices.  This is a bad reflection on them and makes the TEA Party look bad also.  KEN LANG said he had gotten several messages on Face Book indicating their dissatisfaction on Ron Paul not being selected by the TEA Party to support.  They also went to the 3rd District Republican Convention with a group from other areas supporting Ron Paul, but because of the rules and the way things were, they made virtually no end rows at all. You could tell by the different counties represented that they had gotten together and they were very well organized.  But as it turned out they were unable to get a delegate elected to send to the National Convention in Tampa, Florida.  There were a couple of other positions that were voted on (at large positions) which they were unable to get delegates for either.  KEN said he thinks they got upset with that process also.  He thinks they were here, and there, for one purpose and that was to drive Ron Paul onto the recommended list, which is fine, because that is what we are all about, especially here.  Everyone in attendance Tuesday night week, voted, went with the majority vote and that was the way it was. You can’t just accommodate the minority, which is what they turned out to be.  Majority rules. BOB said he felt that giving voters our ballot and telling them to dis- regard anyone is disenfranchising the votes of all the people that were here that night to vote.

HOWARD said he wanted to apologize…BOB forgot the donation jar last week in his hurry to get to Cape Carteret meeting and we carried it home with us, planning to bring it back tonight.  We forgot it.  But he did want to report that during the week we had a $20.00 cash donation, and a check for $50.00 given to us.  (With what was in the jar, the new donations, and tonight’s donations, we have collected $100.00 for our treasury.)  BOB said, well with collecting that kind of money, maybe the Garners should just keep the jar.  HOWARD said he was blaming it all on BOB and then apologizing for his forgetfulness also.

BOB reported on the final total votes for each candidate (both Morehead and Cape Carteret) and how we ended up with our recommended ballot.  We had 27 people here that night and 17 at Cape Carteret for a total of 44 eligible votes.

He said he had gotten a lot of flack from disgruntled folks saying we had picked the wrong candidates, with all kinds of accusations about who is being hand picked by other leaders in the party, who is trying to stuff the county commissioners board and school board, etc.  People he has known for many years have called arguing for one candidate or another that did not appear on our list.  LYN BAKER asked if he told them they should have been to the meeting to vote.  BOB said he had been concerned about narrowing the list (especially in the county) to one candidate might disenfranchise a lot of people who would otherwise support the TEA Party and might now see us as being biased.  He worried about how it would impact the TEA Party going forward into future elections, but after discussing this with several other TEA Party members, he decided that we would cross that bridge when we come to it.  We made our decision, we cast our votes, everyone here was in agreement with the process, and we tried to be as fair and honest as we could be.  Everyone here had an opportunity to listen to the candidates who came to speak to us, offer their opinions and rationale, and then vote.  If there are some who are disappointed in our decisions, we are sorry, but we did what we felt was the right way to go.

BOB said a lot of discussions were going on in the Republican Face Book page and recommended anyone interested to check it out.  Also check out the Crystal Coast TEA Party Face Book page also and join in the discussions.

BOB reported that he had received an email from Harry Taylor and Harry had asked BOB to thank everybody for their support, and he promised he would not let us down.  He really did appreciate our show of confidence in him.

David McFayden had stopped by to thank us for our support tonight prior to the meeting.  He was on his way to another meeting and was unable to stay, but wanted us to know how much it meant to him to receive our endorsement.

BOB again recognized EULA PARKIN saying she was 85 years old and probably weighed about that same amount, but had been representing us at the poll in Beaufort and she could really use some assistance.  The poll in Beaufort runs from  8:00 in the morning until 5:00 in the evening.  Give her some slack, she gets down there about 9:00 or 10:00 and stays a reasonable amount of time.  One of the members said he went down by the girl scout building and he couldn’t find where the voting was going on.  (He was in Morehead City.)  BOB explained that there was no early voting in Morehead.  The early voting was taking place at the Fire Department in Davis, the County Board of Elections office in Beaufort, Fort Benjamin Park in Newport and the Western Park Community Center up by Cape Carteret.  The member said he guess that was why there was no one there when/where he went.  The Beaufort location is open from 8 am to 5 pm Monday through Friday, while the other sites are open from noon to 7 pm Monday through Friday.  The last day of early voting is May 5, (Saturday) when all locations will be open from 8 am to 1 pm.  BOB said STEVE BEST has been manning the location at Fort Benjamin Park.  It has been a little windy and cool the last couple of days.  The wind blew his tent over and while he was chasing that the wind blew his table over and all his papers.  STEVE has really stepped up to the plate, a real trouper.  KEN LANG  has been manning the table at Cape Carteret.  KEN said he has actually had some help this time.   Two years ago he had done it all by himself for the whole early voting.  Jim and Pat Nalitz and Karen and Bob Clark and a gentleman, whose name Ken could not remember, have been helping and Bill Sherry has volunteered to come tomorrow also.  He feels he has had decent volunteer help.  It would be nice if we could get a few people to come out and help Eula.  WAYNE WILLIS reported on the Davis Fire Department polling site.  He said there had been a grand total of 13 people voting and he was one of them.  Another was Weston Willis, who is relieving  him today, because WAYNE had physical therapy and another voter was CLAYTON WILLIS.

HOWARD said he has seen some dirty elections before but never like what he is seeing today.  He is talking about the campaigning being so dirty.

Discussion on the fact that Randy Ramsey had workers at every one of the polls.  Someone said they were employees of Ramsey’s business.  KEN said it was not like he had this vast army of volunteers working for him at the polls; it is his employees who are there.  BOB wanted to know if anyone knew how Ramsey was manning the polls in the other counties.  Someone in the audience said he was doing the same thing in the other counties, because there was no one working at the business the last few days, including Randy, who was out politicking.

HOWARD showed everyone his sign that someone (who was stupid enough to leave his address on the Ramsey flyer) had defaced.  They had taped one of Ramsey’s flyers to one side of a Sanderson sign and taped an X over Sanderson’s name on the back.  Everyone wanted HOWARD to take the sign to the sheriff’s office and complain.  HOWARD said he might later on but was getting a lot of mileage out of showing it to people right now.  He had it to the polling place in Newport last Friday and a lot of people saw and commented on it, including the man who was there representing Ramsey.  He apologized for the action by apparently one of Ramsey‘s supporters.  HOWARD said he had been having a lot of problems with someone stealing or tearing down the Sanderson signs he had put up.  This one he was showing had been a replacement for another sign in the same location that had been stolen.  When he was going by on the way to the dump (at the intersection of Masontown and Tom Mann Roads) he noticed the sign had been tampered with.  He stopped and started to tear off the electric tape that had been used to deface the sign and PEGGY told him to keep the sign, what had been done to that sign was illegal and could get whoever was responsible in real trouble.  So he brought the sign home and later put up another one.  A couple of days later he noticed on the way to church that that sign had been pulled up and thrown down in the mud.

KEN said Ramsey has sent out approximately 12 different flyers to Republicans and Independents in Carteret, Craven and Pamlico counties.  It is estimated that it is costing him about $10,000.00 per mailing.  That is $120 thousand that he has spent so far just on mailing these things out.  He has radio ads on 107.1 and probably 94.1.  The frequency of those have gone up in the last several days.  And he has television ads on Time Warner’s Channel 14 and several others.  It is estimated that Ramsey will probably end up spending about $250 thousand to win this race.   Norm Sanderson told KEN that he doubted that he would be able to spend over $20 thousand, because he just doesn’t have the money or the big spenders (“What’s in it for Me Crowd”).  You have heard very little from Norm defending himself from this attack on his supposedly voting for Obamacare, because he does not have enough money to put ads in the papers, radio and TV to defend his position.  The fight is being done via email, face book, Twitter, and stuff like that, that is free.  KEN has posted Pat McElraft’s letter to the editor on the  TEA Party Web and Face Book pages.  He also sent Pat’s letter to the over 900 TEA Party member email addresses he has.  This is the only way Norm has of getting the truth out to the voters right now and hopefully all those will pass the word on to their friends.

HOWARD said he had talked to Pat and during their discussion he mentioned that the lady working the Republican booth had gotten a copy from HOWARD of Pat’s letter.  She then had shown it to Ramsey’s man at the poles, after which he noticed the man on his cell phone for an extended period of time.  Upon figuring the time frame of Ramsey’s man getting the letter and making his phone call, Pat said it was somewhere around that time she had received a phone call from Ramsey.  He did not apologize but instead told her he was going to win and looked forward to working with her in Raleigh.

WAYNE said around Easter he went to the church he has been going to for about 7 years and the preacher pulled in ahead of him and had a Ramsey sticker on the back of his vehicle.  This was not problem, since that is his prerogative but when he went inside, there on the table along with the bulletins of the church activities and other religious pamphlets was a stack of Ramsey political propaganda.  So he got in touch with the pastor and he told him that it did not appear to him to be an appropriate place for him to display political activity of that nature.  The preacher responded by saying that he goes out to Jarrett’s Bay every Wednesday, conducts a prayer meeting, and apparently someone stuck the sticker on the back of his vehicle without him knowing it and brought the political flyers in and put them on the church table.  He doesn’t know whether the preacher is being totally honest with him or not, but WAYNE feels this is inappropriate action.

HOWARD and BOB, both, said if anyone could afford a little donation to help Norm out, please do so.  It will be greatly appreciated.  If you can’t help financially, then please get on the phone and call anyone you know in Carteret, Craven or Pamlico counties and ask them to please vote for Norm and help him out.  Explain the flyers that are being mailed out are false and there is no truth to them and that Norm has been endorsed by Pat McElraft.  Pat has informed the radio listeners recently that what Norm Sanderson did vote for was done by every Republican in the House and several Democrats, also.  The only people that voted against that bill were the liberal Democrats in the House, which is an indication that the bill is not what Randy has represented it to be, otherwise liberal Democrats would have voted for it because they are FOR Obamacare. Pat is very upset because basically when Ramsey tried to impugn Norm Sanderson, he ended up impugning every single Republican member of the House.  BOB said in case you are not familiar with the bill, it was not an endorsement of Obamacare, it was largely a procedural bill that protected North Carolina in the event the Supreme Court upheld Obamacare and would save the state countless dollars.  In fact, the full title of the legislation was “An Act to Preserve State-based Authority to Regulate the North Carolina Health Insurance Market and Prevent Federal Encroachment on State Authority by Establishing the North Carolina Benefit Exchange”.   As the name implies , it was designed to limit the power of Obamacare.  It was NOT an endorsement of Obamacare as Ramsey implies.

NANCY BOCK said she had seen about some meeting with Pat McElraft as guest speaker on the internet or via email (could not make out totally what Nancy was saying).  She said she would send it to KEN and PEGGY to put into the minutes.  (Not received in time to go in these minutes, so maybe KEN will get it out via email to the members in time.)

HOWARD reported that he understood Phil Knight (radio host) will have Randy Ramsey on his radio show Thursday and Norm Sanderson on Friday.  Might be interesting to listen to.

KEN said tomorrow night (Wednesday) the League of Women Voters is having a Senatorial candidate forum at 6:00 in the County Commissioners meeting room in the Beaufort Court House.  Need to get there early if you want a seat.  It will be a question and answer.  You can get a card and write down your question and the LofWV will choose which questions to ask.  Discussion followed on the fact that pointed questions were never selected to be asked.

BOB said Thursday they are going to have a second forum at the same time for the county commissioners and the board of education.

KEN said he understood we were running the recommended list of the TEA party in the paper on Wednesdays, Fridays, and Sundays.  It is going to cost us $1,113.00, which will just about deplete our treasury (approximately $400.00 left), so we need to be thinking about how to build our funds back up, because after the primary is over we need to start thinking about the general election and funds are going to be needed at that time.  Our list is worth putting out.  If you notice at the polls, many people come up with the copy from the paper or ask for one from us.

KEN brought up about the death of Cox’s Restaurant owners’ daughter and he thought it would be nice if the TEA Party sent a card or something to let them know how much we appreciated their help in getting us started.  HOWARD said the VFW in Newport had a fund raiser dinner last weekend to help with the expenses of her treatment.  She had three children he understands.
BOB asked RUTH PARKER to get a sympathy card and bring it next week for all of us to sign.  He said he would carry it down to Cape Carteret for those members to sign also..

CLAYTON wanted to know if anyone had any pocket Constitutions that we could hand out at the polls.  BELVA MANNING said she had a box full at her house.

The Men’s Republican Club is having a candidate forum on May 3rd, at the Sanitary Restaurant and it is for the County Commissioner races.  All candidates running have responded that they will be there.  He thinks it starts at 6:30 if you want to come and eat there and then the candidates begin to speak at 7:30pm.  The reason it is as late as it is is because they asked Lockwood Phillips to m-cee and he had a previous engagement so they had to kind of jockey the schedule so he would be able to do that.  Feel free to come.  It is open to anybody.

EULA discussed “UVisa”.  It is called violence against women authorization act or VAWA.  It was initially passed in 1994 to protect women suffering domestic violence and abuse.  It has become the latest vehicle for open borders lobby to increase visas and grant amnesty to illegal aliens.

EULA requested that everyone above the age of 65, please check to determine when they had their last pneumonia shot.  If it is over 5 years, we need to get it renewed.  She also asked how many had had their tetanus shot.  She told about her sister in law who died after getting cut by a rusty wire.  Everyone should have an up-to-date tetanus shot.  Also if you have ever had chicken pox, you need to check into getting a shingles shot.

BOB recognized Debbie Rucker who is now attending the Cape Carteret meetings but came out tonight to say hello.

HOWARD said he felt that the reason we had been getting so many phone calls is because apparently some people think we are more effective that he even thinks we are, or we would not be getting those phone calls.

JERE GUERIN said he too had been receiving phone calls about our selection, and he had told them that he didn’t think everyone of the TEA Party members agreed with the total selection but we had all been given the opportunity to voice our opinion and vote, and the majority ruled per our decision of how we would select our candidates.  He thinks that everybody in the TEA Party will support that slate as a group.

CLAYTON wanted to know how many had voted already and over half raised their hands.  CLAYTON said he voted early, in case he dropped dead, he wanted his vote counted.

RUTH said when she went to vote she was not asked for a voter ID, but did have to give her address which they matched up with her name and address they had listed, but she did show them a  picture ID even though they didn’t ask for it.

JERE said he would like to address the Voter ID issue.  Every time he goes on the base at Cherry Point, even though he has a sticker on his windshield, he still has to show his ID card.  If he goes to the base exchange to buy something, when he goes to the register to check out, he has to show his military ID card.  Every place he goes on the base he has to show a military ID.  In town, if he goes to cash a check at the bank, his own bank, they ask for a picture ID.  Why is it such a bad idea to show ID when you go to vote, which is one of two things that a citizen can do to support the government and the other one being jury duty.

KEN said WAYNE had told him that when he went in to vote in Davis, he had his TEA Party hat on and they made him take it off.  Much discussion followed.  Did not like this.

Discussed the pro-Ramsey letters to the editor.  Most felt the authors had some type of connection to the boat industry….employees, owners of other boat companies that deal with Ramsey, etc.  Information on where Ramsey’s donations have come from will now be published until probably sometime next week.  Not in time to write anymore letters to the editor.  KEN said if he could get hold of it earlier, he would send it out to the members.  Make sure KEN has your email address.

PEGGY asked if all had heard Walter B. Jones latest ad.  It is not about voting for him but is FOR the Marriage Act.  It is a great commercial.  Almost makes you want to vote for him!!!  BOB said that’s what it is for.  PEGGY said she thinks it is going to work.  HOWARD said when he and PEGGY went to vote they voted the TEA Party slate.  We felt we worked for and belonged to the TEA Party and we owed it our allegiance.  PEGGY said she felt if she couldn’t support the TEA Party’s decision, then she shouldn’t be a member.

Meeting adjourned at 7:18pm.
Minutes submitted by PEGGY GARNER, Secretary.

CRYSTAL COAST TEA PARTY PATRIOTS
MEETING MINUTES OF
17 APRIL 2012

Meeting held at Golden Corral Restaurant, Morehead City, NC
Meeting called to order at 6:08 pm by Chairman BOB CAVANAUGH
Pledge of Allegiance was led by WAYNE WILLIS
Invocation by JERE GEURIN
Attendance – 27

BOB displayed our new TEA Party signs that NANCY BOCK had ordered.  BOB would like for those who are working the polling places during the early voting, to please pick one up to display on table used to hold our voter handouts.

On schedule tonight is the finalization of the candidates we decide are the ones most likely to best support the TEA Party principles of Limited Government, Fiscal Responsibility, and Protection of  Free Markets.  It was decided we would vote by show of hands and not by secret ballot.  Most said they were not ashamed of showing everyone where they stand.  Upon closing this meeting BOB will go to the Cape Carteret meeting and collect the ballots cast there and collate them for a final recommendation.  Following is a list of those candidates chosen by our group tonight.

President – MITT ROMNEY
There was discussion on leaving all of the three remaining candidates (Newt                Gingrich, Ron Paul and Mitt Romney) but decided to narrow all offices to one.
U.S. House of Representatives, District 3 – FRANK PALOMBO
N.C. Governor – PAT McCRORY
NC Lt. Governor – DAN FORREST
NC Auditor – DEBRA GOLDMAN
NC Commissioner of Agriculture – STEVE TROXLER
NC Commissioner of Insurance – MIKE CAUSEY
NC Secretary of State – MICHAEL (MIKE) BEITLER
NC Superintendent of Public Instruction – JOHN TEDESCO
NC Treasurer – STEVE ROYAL
NC State Senate District 2 – NORMAN SANDERSON
Carteret County Commissioner District 3 – TERRY FRANK
Carteret County Commissioner District 5 – HARRY TAYLOR
NC District Court Judge, District 3 – DAVID McFADYEN III
County Board of Education, District 2 – (Leave blank)
County Board of Education, District 3 – MARK MANSFIELD
County Board of Education, District 4 – (Leave blank)
Constitutional Amendment to provide that marriage between one man and one woman is the only
Domestic legal union that shall be valid or recognized in the State -  FOR

Upon completion of the voting BOB closed the meeting and left to go to the meeting at Cape Carteret to incorporate their ballots with ours.

Meeting adjourned at 7:40pm
Minutes submitted by Secretary PEGGY GARNER

CRYSTAL COAST TEA PARTY PATRIOTS
MEETING MINUTES OF
10 APRIL 2012

Meeting held at Golden Corral Restaurant, Morehead City, NC
Meeting called to order at 6:02 pm by Chairman BOB CAVANAUGH
Pledge of Allegiance was led by STEVE MILLER
Invocation by STEVEN BEST
Number in Attendance – 30

BOB introduced tonight’s guest speaker Bernard Bush, who is running for District Court Judge.  Those running for the same office, Judge Waddell’s seat, David McFayden and Kirby Smith, have already spoken to us.

Mr. Bush (Bernie) told us that he was the attorney for the Craven County Department of Social Services.  He started practicing law in North Carolina in 1994 with Pamlico Sound legal services.  “I handle landlord/tenant matters, employment matters, and subsidized housing matters.  In 2000, I got the job at Craven County Department of Social Services.  So, whenever there is abused children or neglected children that have to come out of their home in Craven County, I am the attorney that represents the county’s interest in court.  Over the past eleven years, I have seen Judge Waddell work with kids and he worked with families and he did a wonderful job.  He was very compassionate but firm.  Either the  parents would get their acts together or they wouldn’t.  And if they didn’t, they knew it was because they didn’t do it, not because they were run over.  And at that point we would look for grandparents, aunts, or other family members.  If there were none, then we looked to find an adoptive home for those children.  Judge Waddell retired recently and his seat became open and I’m running for it.  There is really not that much else to say about me.  I could go on and on but I will open it up for questions.  Some general things is – I graduated from Vanderbilt Law School in Nashville Tennessee in 1994.  As an undergrad, I started off in a community college which was called Camden County Community College in Blackwood, New Jersey.  After two or three years I transferred over to Gladsboro Community College in Gladsboro, New Jersey, a small town between Philadelphia and Atlantic City and got a bachelors degree there.  During that time, I worked my way through college at a super market, in the South Jersey area and also the United States Marine Corps, where I went in as a private and came out as a corporeal.  I was stationed at Trenton and I was in the artillery unit.  I ran the phone wires from the artillery batteries so that when they would mess up, they would break the wires to buy themselves some time and I would have to run out and fix the wires.  In a way I have had a whole lot of doubt working my way through college and met a lot of wonderful people and I think that would give me experience as judge because I’ve been there.  I’ve worked in the casino; the gift shop; I’ve worked in spaghetti factories and bread factories.  You know those Subway rolls, they actually come from a factory where (they are heated at the different stores but) they are actually made in a factory.  I’ve actually worked in those factories; spaghetti sauce factories…I’ve done them all.  You know the Marines…yes we fired guns, but I swept and mopped more than I shot at anything.  And learned quite a bit.  That’s about it for me.  While I was in New Bern, not only did I practice law but I worked in Habitat houses when they would have those habitat bills that they would have college students come out and since I was in town, I would go out and help them.  What I found were, for whatever reason, men in their 70’s have a whole lot more energy than I did.  I came out there in the morning I was ready to put them to shame, I’d be hammering, I’d be working and carrying things and by afternoon, they were working like nothing went on, my hands were sore and I was hitting my thumb more than the nails, but I was out there doing my part.  There is a community theater in New Bern, the New Bern Civic Theater.  I’ve worked with a number of productions there as well.  And I got to work with some really wonderful people.  The advantage of the civic theater in New Bern and in Carteret is we have the military base, Cherry Point, so you have some incredible talented people, who are in this area for a very short period of time and it is very humbling to be on stage with them.  I couldn’t sing, still can’t sing, so I won’t sing for you this evening, but in other parts of the stage I was able to do just fine.  That is about me in a nut shell.  Does anyone have any questions for me or about social services that I can answer.  I mean I might be able to give more information that way.’

KEN LANG said we have asked the other candidates even though it is a district court position, judges can advance into other positions from there, so what is your stance on judicial legislation from the bench?

Mr. Bush said, “It is not their job.  Their job is to take the law as it is written and apply it to the facts.  Leave the legislature to legislate and judges to their judging.  As a DSS attorney, I have social workers, it’s not my job to do social working.  You know sometimes it is a temptation or when someone makes it look easy, to jump in and tell them how they should be doing it better. They have their job and I would have mine.

BOB asked his favorite question.  ’What was your ’aha moment’ when you decided by golly I want to be a judge?’

Mr. Bush said people kept coming to him, because he was happy as social services attorney, because he was going to different churches, he was able to play guitar since he couldn’t sing.  ‘Everything was good.  Waddell was retiring and people started coming up to me and saying why don’t you consider it.  Not saying anything bad about the opponents, but you know you have been doing it, we think you would make a good fit.  I poo pooed it for a while, but then a moment came where I said well, OK let’s give it a shot, because they were saying you have nothing to lose.  Give it a shot.  You have a great personality, present yourself, if you win that is great, if you lose, you lose nothing for doing it.  It has really been wonderful.  I was scared because I am familiar with New Bern and Craven County because I ride my little motorcycle and I know the people there.  But I will go into Carteret County and Pamlico County in the far reaches to meet people who hear stories and have fears, but people have been absolutely wonderful.  I’ll go into beauty shops, or just regular stores and see what is going on and everyone’s really been wonderful.  So, it wasn’t like I had some dying passion, just an opportunity that came up…and I saw what Waddell did in civil/juvenile court with kids.  I have seen what social workers do.  I’ve seen them at their best and I’ve seen them at their worst.  So what separates me from the others is I know the inner workings of social services.  So I can better determine what is real and what is not real.  And one other thing that separates me from the other two is they were private attorneys.  As a DSS attorney over the past 11 years I got to watch mental health be dismantled.  It is no longer a working entity.  What it is is Neuse Mental Health used to send people to Neuse Mental Health and they would assume responsibility.  They would provide the services, they would see that they got the adequate services.  If someone needed a guardian, they would act as guardians.  They had therapists and psychologists and psychiatrists on staff so they could be provided the help that was needed.  On a state level you had state hospitals for people who needed hospitalized care.   That is all being dismantled.  They want those people in the community… which is good in theory, but the problem is there is no place in the community; so recently there was a law suit where a disability rights advocate said ‘Counties and states you can no longer put people with mental health issues in nursing homes with elderly people.’  That was going on because there was no place else to put them, so they were looking for a bed.  And that is really a terrible mix.  If you have people in their 70’s and 80’s with Alzheimer’s or are frail, you don’t want some 30 year old with mental health issues who….people with mental health issues tend to be stronger than you or I because for whatever reason, their brains do not have a stopping device.  Where if you hit me hard enough, you win.  The fact that you ball up your fist, you won.  Someone with a mental health issue don’t have that so they would keep on going even where a normal person would stop.  The problem is that’s been taken away.  There’s this thing called ECBH where Neuse Mental Health used to serve just the area and a few outlying areas.  ECBH now serves a ten county area and the state is looking to expand that further.  They want these people to be regional providers.  And what they are to do, they are not to be responsible.  They are just to be the purse string holders so if you said that somebody had a mental health issue, they will say, OK, you say so, but we are going to valuate them.  We are going to determine what services they are going to need.  We are going to tell them what doctors to go to and we are going to tell the doctors how much we are going to pay them.  We will tell you when they have enough services.  Which in theory may look good, in a county like Mecklinberg county or Charlotte where you have a lot of therapists, that may work, but in eastern Carolina where you don’t have that many therapists to begin with it is going to work terribly.  ECBH covers there where you don’t have a lot of therapists.  When DSS has these conferences, DSS attorneys meet two times a year and we discuss matters that affect DSS attorneys, somebody from mental health came and they are basically apologizing and back pedaling the whole time because the questions were ’We hear what you are saying about trying improve but you are not even answering our calls, our telephone calls, and we are the attorneys.’  We have people who call us saying  they are not getting through.  We are trying to call and can’t get through.  And it is frustrating because, on a state level and on a federal level, they learn to talk the talk, so you can have them come in right after me and they’ll say we admit that we are learning some things.  We’ve got some bugs to work out.  But you are a stake holder and we are partners and together we can make this better, ignoring the fact that people on the local level can not get the services they need.  And it affects us in a very intimate way, because if somebody has a mental health issue, that person has a family member, a mother, or wife, or other families that have to deal with it, if there is no one else to help them deal with it.  If somebody has a mental health issue, and it is not treated, many of them can drive a car.  If you have epilepsy, you lose your driver’s license.  If you have a bad vision, your license can be taken away.  If you are an elderly person, your family can tell the DMV this person needs to be tested again and have their license taken away.  With mental health, if someone is on their meds and are doing well, they can be smarter than me and articulate and then come off their meds it is a totally different story.  There is no mechanism to stop them from driving a vehicle.  And that is a best case scenario where you have somebody who is on their meds and doing well.  You have others who need to be in a Dorthea Dix where they are saying send them to a community…we are shutting them down…we are taking them out and there is no place for them.  Many of these people are high functioning.  The stereotype is people who are low function, but there are a lot of people who are very intelligent, very savy, and they can work a car.  They should not be behind the wheels of a car and they should not be asking a county to take care of them only because the people at the federal level and state level…they want to act like they are cutting costs but they are not cutting…they are transferring.  If you are going to cut…cut.  But if you are going to transfer be honest and say it and instead of giving ECBH all the money, give it to the county if you are going to do it so that we can fend for ourselves the best way we can; because when you have a ten county area calling somebody…where before it was on Neuse Blvd in New Bern, it may be in Edenton someplace and they might not be in such a rush to help us when we are saying something is going on real bad here.

ERIC BROYLES said ’On a scale of 1 to 10, with 1 being the most conservative and 10 being the most liberal, how would you classify yourself?’

Mr. Bush said ’It depends on the issue.’  ERIC said ’overall’.  Mr. Bush said he would say 5 for this reason…‘I am not a fan of wasting money.  I did not get, you have heard my background, I basically had to work my way through school, so I am not into wasting money.  I am not into getting a free ride.  The problem we have as a nation though is we are bailing out other countries,  which is just fine, I understand that, but our American citizens have to borrow money to go to college and they are now coming out every year with at least a $60,000.00 debt load when they are in their early twentys.  This is when they should be having a family and it impairs their ability to get credit.  There is no jobs, so now the student loan people are on them.  They can’t get a good mortgage and they are behind the 8 ball and they will stay there for the rest of their lives.  That is what we are facing so when you say are you liberal or conservative, I don’t know how to answer that except to say we have to fix that.  If somebody is willing to work hard.  I’m not saying to give it to them for free, but don’t make them a slave because other people are going to look at them and what is happening now you have a lot of people saying to young people ’do not go to law school.  There is too many lawyers.  You can’t find the work and if you are going to come out with a $100,000.00 in debt you are better off doing anything else.  I’m not saying everybody should be a lawyer but it is happening in other fields…doctors…don’t be a doctor…you are going to be eaten up in medicine insurance and the first time somebody dies they are going to find fault and sue you.  Be an insurance person.  This way you can be in on the good side.  That part is broken, so I don’t know how you would classify it…I’m not saying give it away for free, but don’t do it so…….ERIC said ‘the TEA Party principles are fiscal responsibility, limited government and free markets.  Where do you stand on those issues?’  Mr. Bush said ‘Who in their right mind would be against that?  Here is the problem, the media has done a terrible job of telling the truth to the American people.  The politicians have done an even worse job.  I have been going door to door, business to business, barbershop to barbershop, meeting people saying Hey, I am running for judge, think of me.  And what I am hearing is ‘not only have I not seen the other two, you are the first person who has ever done this.  So you have black leaders, you have white leaders, you have Republicans, you have Democrats, you have Independents on TV speaking about what the American people want and they have never spoken to you.  It is a problem.  You have the media that is portraying the TEA party as a bunch of right wing Republican wackos.  But when you look at what you are saying ‘who is against it’ really? And why are they portraying you in that way?  How am I able to run into this guy (BOB) and not know who he is and we get along fine and then he says by the way I’m a TEA Party Republican.  Come on down and speak, we would love to have you.  If I had listened and believed everything I had heard on TV I would have run the other way.  Nobody has bit me yet.

HOWARD GARNER said Mr. Bush had mentioned a couple of things he would like to address.  He said speaking about running from the TEA Party….he was in Sam’s in Greenville, had on his Tea Party cap and there was a black clerk and he (HOWARD) said something to him and he (the clerk) was big enough to pick Howard up and toss him, and the clerk just backed away and said
I don’t want a thing to do with you.  HOWARD told him he had been listening to the main stream media too much.  HOWARD said he didn’t think he had harmed anyone in his life.  Going back to this mental health, he tried to keep up with it as best he could and he was able to determine when they went from Neuse Mental Health to the Onslow/Carteret thing.…things got worse instead of better.  A month or two ago there was at least four of us here that attended the County Commissioners meeting and this new group that is taking over had two people explaining to the county commissioners what was going to go on.  I don’t think I’m that dumb, but I left more confused on that issue than what I was when I went it.  Mr. Bush said if he knew the truth, he would be angry, not confused.  HOWARD said nothing tears him up any more than what he considers useless government paper pushing and it is running this country…that and lobbyists.  Mr. Bush said Yep, it’s terrible and that is why in my ad you see in the newspaper, one of the things is ‘go to church, any church.’  I go to church.  I play in churches.  I grew up in a church.  I’m not here to force my religion on you even though I think it would be good on a personal basis.  But watching mental health be dismantled I am seeing the same philosophy being applied elsewhere.  They are trying to get the county in other things.  Instead of seeing it as a failure, they are seeing it as a model.  They are trying to do it with other things.  They are trying to cut corners everywhere they can.  So, what I am telling people and what I will tell them when I become a judge is…in New Bern where Neuse Mental Health is disappearing there is this Baptist Church called Temple Baptist.  It is a large Baptist Church.  It has this group called Celebrate Recovery where the church is taking in people with substance abuse issues, working with them, turning their lives around, and putting them on the street in a safe way.   That should be supported.  What I am saying to all the other churches, we don’t need 15 Celebrate Recoveries.  If they got this, find some other need….foster parents, single parents, school teachers.   You pick it.  Find something to help.  If everybody does a little bit, the situation gets a little bit better and then when we meet again we can go from there.  That is what I will be saying.  I will be going to different churches, white churches, black churches, TEA parties, liberals, whoever will listen.  That is what we have to do and the reason I say go to a church and go early, a lot of times in court, people go to church after they get into trouble.   With Neuse Mental Health broken down, it’s just a matter of time before all of us are going to need some help one way or the other.  If you don’t have a mental health issue you are one guy swerving off the yellow line being in trouble, so instead of everyone waiting until after they got into trouble, if everybody went to a church , any church, any denomination, and help them out a little bit.  I’m not saying accept everything they do, work to improve the building, work to improve the fellowship so that you know someone, make the church a little bit better, a little bit stronger, a little bit more useful, so if you need it or somebody else needs it, it’s there.  The reason why I am picking the church is in looking what they did with mental help and looking at what they did with other things, the people, they don’t get it; they’ll say what you say and say that what they meant was just shut everything down. That’s not what he said.  But that is how they will interpret it.  They screw it up every time.  I don’t know what happened between the top and the bottom.  It goes through so many hands that by the time it reaches local, its unrecognizable.  The church was here before the mess.  The church will be here after.  I’m saying find a good one, work with them, and let’s get through this together.

A member asked ’Getting back to college loans.  I understand that we up to a trillion dollars in college loans.  That is more than home mortgages, that’s more than bank loans, that’s more than all this together.  You don’t feel like students have anything to do with it?’  Mr. Bush said ’They do, but the people who allowed that, just like you don’t give drivers license to 12 year olds.  If we have a system where the college knows going in that only 10% are going to find a job, the lenders know that all are not going to get a job, and everybody knows that all those entering class, 1/3rd is going to drop out before the second year.  Don’t put it all on the students.  Give them their share of the responsibility but when you have other things going on, just like the mental health system, as judge if somebody comes before me and they didn’t take their medicine then it wasn’t their fault that they did the crime they did.  But it wouldn’t be fair if I said, he is in jail, my job is done.  I have to speak to somebody and say you know this EBCH thing it’s really getting on my nerves because people who otherwise would not be in jail are in jail.  And one more problem with putting them in jail…say a 17 year old is acting a fool and they need to be taught a lesson, let’s put them in jail, see if they learn their lesson, come out and do well.  If that becomes the warehouse for people with mental health issues, instead of learning their lessons, they are fighting for survival and they are honing skills that you don’t want them coming out with….and all these people are coming out.  The gentleman said his point was they make the loans so available everybody uses it as a party and they go to school to party for four or five years.  Mr. Bush said, ’The schools allow it because the schools monitor grades and they can kick you out or put you on academic probation.  The only time they clamp down is when somebody gets killed.  Why?  Whenever there’s a frat party and somebody dies because they were intoxicated they will shut that frat party down.  Why stop there?  How much if you are not maintaining a B average we don’t care what you do in your free time, we won’t get into it, but if you drop below a certain level, because you are not going to be beneficial to the field you are studying and we have foreigners who are competitors and you are not going to buckle down, you got to go.  Why is that not in place?  Why does somebody have to die first?  That is the fault of the system.  DAVID COX said ‘when our president gives credit to…disavows these loans…excuses these loans by the thousands.  Mr. Bush said we are going to come to a tipping point as a nation.  I don’t favor that.  But it is getting to a crisis because these young people are making choices based on the fact that they have a certain amount of debt and they are not getting jobs.  As a society we are not going to be productive if they can’t get jobs, they can’t buy houses and cars because they are struggling under a debt load and foreigners don’t have that problem.  DAVID said ’How do you discourage it when you excuse the loan and they are getting ready to excuse some more?’  Mr. Bush said, ’Because they don’t excuse everybody’s loan.  It is not every ones.  I’m not sure how it is given out, but the bottom line as I understand….I’m writing some big checks every month and a lot of people I know are writing them too.  It is a broken system and it is not going to be improved by playing favorites with a few or grandstanding in front of a TV.  Again it goes back to the media.  I’ve heard nothing from them about forgiving.  So they are going to forgive a couple of million and they are going to have the TV cameras and show some lucky person, slap him on the back and talk about what a wonderful job they did.  Turn off the cameras and the other 99% have to deal with their loans because somebody’s making interest off those loans (interest and penalties).  So you can be paying on a loan and after 10 years you owe more than you did at the beginning.  That is going to stifle the American creativity that made us great.  You are right, but not enough people are being forgiven and I think it is just for show.

ERIC said, ‘We see court rooms filled because of continuances.  Cases are continued time after time, after time.  There are some people that have had continuances for up to over a year.  I’m not talking about murder cases.  I’m talking about driving without a license because you got DWIs.  A third of the people are driving on revoked licenses and most of those are DWI’s.  This is tying up the court system.  It is costing the taxpayers.  It is because the judges allow it.  What will you do as a judge to tighten that process.  I understand that you have to be careful what you say.  Mr. Bush said, ‘No, he would be totally honest.  The law will only allow how much punishment you can prescribe for someone, just like I told that gentleman…if you put somebody in jail with mental health issues, eventually they are both coming out.  The legislature has to deal with that.  People coming out and doing it repeatedly, the legislature has to deal with that and as a judge, he will apply those laws as they come down.  The problem with continuances in this area is that you have a small number of attorneys and they are trying to be in several courts at once.  So, like you have attorneys in Havelock, today they could be in Carteret, tomorrow they may be in Pamlico.  Add to that witnesses.  You have therapists, doctors, witnesses who were at the scene of the crime, forensics experts, DNA testing has to be done, psychological exams and various others.  The problem is that it is real easy to say I’m going to crack the whip and I am not going to allow it to happen but the truth is…and I deal with this with my social workers, they get upset because cases are continued until they need a continuance….their car is broken, or they are sick, or it’s their vacation, and then all of a sudden they want a continuance.  And it happens.  We are limited in this area because of the number of attorneys we have and the fact when you have a lot of moving parts…yeah, they can work it and give a colorful excuse, what are you going to do from the bench?  Go by their home to see if they are sick or go to the golf course to see if they are there.  Again you have a lot of moving parts…the attorney may be there but the witness isn’t there.  If they are in the hospital….a lot of what you have is DOC problems.  If somebody is in the Department of Correction you do what is called a rig(?).  So it is up to the Department of Corrections to bring them, so sometimes they bring them, sometimes they don’t.  Again there is a lot of moving parts.  I’m not saying I am going to excuse it, but it is really hard to get up.  If anybody promises you that they are going to eliminate it…. (Several people offered their comments.)  Mr. Bush said you can do the best you can but when you are one person and you have all these different people and you have a docket of 400 cases with 400 different excuses, I can do the best I can to move things along.  ERIC said he just wanted to make the work easier.  Mr. Bush said he did not want it easier, but if you can’t do it, you can’t do it, because what every judge is looking at is if you say OK, I don’t care what is going to happen, I don’t care, we are going to try the case regardless.  And they do it.  It gets appealed.  Now it goes to the Court of Appeals and that takes about a year and a half to two years, so you saved no one anything.  So that is another thing they are looking at because the District Court Judge doesn’t have the final say.  The Court of Appeals is a more final say and it takes longer.

STEVE MILLER said, Basically the Crystal Coast TEA Party and the TEA Party in general is based on fiscal responsibility (Taxed Enough Already – TEA).  What is your opinion as a citizen, not as a judge, but as a citizen, with Obamacare (the affordable health care act)?  Mr. Bush said, ‘I didn’t study it closely enough to say (you know this chapter and that chapter).  Here is the problem…he did not get everybody on board.  They sort of ran it through and they got it because they could at the moment.  Now the Republicans, if or when they get in power because we know the power shifts, they are going to undo it.  The problem with doing anything that way if that you get people dependent on a system that is going to go away and you create another set of problems.  Our welfare system, our subsidized system, housing system, all these systems have become corrupt because they have been in place too long.  They hadn’t been well thought out so when somebody just says we are going to cut out or cut them off, they do not understand the ripple effects.  For example, with food stamps.  Fiscal year 2011Craven County alone, was I think, 24 millions dollars worth of food stamps issued.  It ranges from like senior citizens getting $10.00 (why they bother) to a family getting $600 worth of food stamps.  There is a myth that it pays off, but it doesn’t.  But what the individual gets is an EBT card which gives them the right to purchase food stuffs.  If they sell that for money, they can be arrested and jailed for fraud and I would do that if they did.  The problem with saying all these people should be cut off but when you take 24 million dollars and take it out of the economy, two lobbies are going to come right at you.  And it is not the poor people’s lobbies.  The farmers, because it is distributed by the USDA.  The farmers depend on that 24 million dollars for their crops.  Also the end user, the super markets in Craven County, there are 69 super markets that accepted these EBT cards and I guarantee you one of them got the lion’s share…WalMart.  So if you just say we are going to cut it out and the system will correct itself in five years, your WalMart lobbyist will shut you down.  And I guarantee you they are Republican and that is why when we start talking Republicans and Democrats, instead we need to look at rich and poor…the have and the have nots.  Everybody here and the folks who are doing well because it crosses lines.  The media portrays the folks as right wing whacks, but you describe what you are about and I say ‘who is against it?’.  Who is against fiscal responsibility?  Who is for fiscal irresponsibility?  No one, but you all got tarred.  And I think it was for a purpose.  It keeps the little people separated.  As long as people are jumping back instead of saying ‘brother’ the people above can do whatever they want.  They have been and they will continue.  That is a problem.  As a judge I will go from community to community, group to group, and just be honest with you.

ERIC said, ‘The good thing is you will be able to cut back on the fraud in that area as a judge.  You will know how that game is played.  Mr. Bush, said ‘we do, we have fraud investigators, and what has helped us more that anything is technology.  Where 10 years ago, food stamps was like in a little book, you ripped out the ticket and you gave it.  It was hard to track that.  With an EBT card, I don’t know if I should be telling everybody, is computerized and you can tell fraud, based on the pattern.  If somebody buys like say they got $600 worth of benefits.  They buy $400.00 worth of benefits here and they go across the street and buy another $200.  You know, if it doesn’t make sense, that is a red flag.  But it is computerized so now you know who is buying what and where.  You can not buy dog food or beer.  Now that it is computerized.  Before you shouldn’t have been able to either.  Back when I was working in a supermarket we had to (forgive me, I’m telling my age) we had these things called cash registers and you had to type the dollar amount in and there was a button you had to hit to let you know whether it was a food stuff or non-food stuff.  And then the total based on that would tell you how you could use the food stamps.  Now because it is all computerized when they ring it up and the person says it is $90.00 and you have a EBT card, the lady will hit a key and it will say like $80.00 is eligible.  So they will swipe the card and it will take $80.00 off and the customer will have to pay the $10.00 for the dog food.  The dog food will not come up on the EBT stuff.  Question was asked was the EBT card limited to a geographical region.  Answer, No.  Anywhere in the country.  HOWARD asked will this stop them from using two carts?  You see that.  They have one cart with food stamp stuff and one cart sometimes with stuff that I can’t afford and they are going to pay for and then they go out and get into a fancy car that I can’t afford.  Mr. Bush said he was not defending them but as far as cars go, you never know who the owner of the car is.  You may have someone’s parents who say I have carried you long enough, you’ve got to do it on your own, so they are living across town and now they have to go shopping and Dad says here take the car.  You get your food and you bring the car back and if you scratch it you and I are going to tangle.  I’m not saying there is not fraud, but you can’t say looking at the car and also about two years ago Hatteras laid off 200 people.  So people went from making $60,000 to nothing so I don’t want to hold it against them if they qualify for food stamps and they show up with that year’s Silverado.  Up until that point they were working and they had actually earned it, so I don’t want to be one to say well for you to get food stamps, you have to drive what I drive, a 1998 Camry.

What he takes issue with, is you take Obamacare.  I am going to agree with you there is probably doing things wrong, but what I want to point out to you is that it happens under every administration, whether it is Democrat or Republican.  Because you have a lot of lobbyists that are writing legislation for both sides.  You have a lot of career bureaucrats  that are doing everything.  So avoid heaping everything on the figurehead.  For the job of President of the United States that pays $300,000 a year, I believe, (several said over $400,000 or close to a half of a million) what does that tell you? (Several discussed the issue further)  Mr. Bush said what he was asking everyone to do was point fingers at everybody.  Call a spade a spade, so when you say Obamacare, Romney is doing the same thing.  Call a spade a spade because as long as we on the ground (several interrupted).  The thing is don’t get comfortable when he leaves office.  Even if he wins the election, he is not going to be in office forever.  Democrats will not be in office forever.  Republicans will come in.  Like the Who song, Here’s the new boss, same as the old boss.  Do not allow yourself to be lulled into a false sense of security because you happen to like the person who is up there because you don’t know them …. more discussion by the audience.  Mr. Bush said the part that is frustrating is the way we seem to fall for it like sheep.  Not just college or high school dropouts, but people with doctorate degrees, just as foolish, just as easily led, just as thoughtless, it is scary.  When he went to Vanderbilt, he thought Vanderbilt was this ivy league school, I am going to be with the best of the best, the smartest of the smartest.  I started off in a community college by gosh I am going to be with some real smart ones now.  Not so.  There were some smart ones,  There were some brilliant ones.  But there were others, the rest of them, but what are you going to do, so you just turn to your books and do what you did to get you where you are.  As people get higher, there is an expectation to do more.  The frustrating thing is as an agency attorney in the Craven County Department of Social Services, we go through a hiring process.  You post the job and get all these applications.  People interview very well.  They present very well.  They put on their shirt and tie.  They give you this paperwork to show they are as bright as can be.  You give them a job and they can’t write a simple paragraph.  And they have the degree….with honors.  And you are looking at this…what school.  Just like when I was in the Marines and going through boot camp and I saw them throw some out and then when I see some Marines do something absolutely asinine and it is obvious that it was not a bad day, that this person is just a pure idiot, I’ve going ’how did they get through, how did they not screen them out at the first base, how was this person able to wear the uniform.  It is not enough for the media to say ’Ex-marine shot wife and buried her in the back yard’.  No, no, no, how, who’s letting it go on.  Same thing with government.

A member of the audience said he gathered Mr. Bush was from up north.  How did he end up in Craven County.  Mr. Bush said the police didn’t look for him here.  (Laughter)  He said his car broke down, the police helped him opposed to arresting him, so he decided to stay here.  Seriously, the Legal Services Cooperation of North Carolina gave him an internship when he was in law school and they put him in New Bern.

HOWARD said you are talking about people with a degree but no education.  Mr. Bush said no sense, just stop there. Howard said he saw in the paper recently where the UNC School of Journalism is going to quit teaching spelling.  No more education that I have, I see all these misspelled words in print and the grammar is wrong, punctuation is wrong; it has gotten to be pathetic.  Mr. Bush said ’it is. And we have computers that are supposed to correct and they can’t even do that right.  When I was coming up through school the big debate was like during the 70’s, and NASA and calculators were new, so there was this big debate about whether calculators should be allowed in school where kids could use them or not.  Now my kids are younger than what I was then and they are getting like the scientific ones.  So even in math, not just reading and writing.  Social skills, everybody is tweeting each other, they are not going to be able…their table manners are horrible, their social skills are horrible, manners, forget it, you know you just want to spank all of them when you hear them in a group in WalMart in a public setting you have older people there and if you are going to curse, have the decency to do it outside in the back, not in the supermarket where you are showing off how manly you are.  I have a problem with that.

ERIC asked Mr. Bush if he was a Democrat and he replied yes he was a registered Democrat.  To the extent we are taking sides, like we are taking sides in a super bowl, you know, like I don’t like Obamacare, which sort of implies you are in favor of what the other guy is doing and it is just as problematic.  Watch both of them.  Demand the best from both of them.  Make your Republican representatives at least hear you.  Make them come and speak to you.  The Democrats should do the same.  And they should do like you do, OK this guy is a Democrat, we don’t know who he is.  He is elected to represent all of us, let’s have him come in and say a few words.  If I become Judge, invite me back and I’ll come and speak, maybe less, but invite me back.  And if I don’t win, if I lose, you still want the Craven County attorney come in, I’m just a drive away.  It is a nice drive.  He said ‘Thank you all for your time.

EULA PARKIN told about seeing a van in the Lowe’s parking lot with a big sign that read “The TEA Party and Republicans are a greater threat to America than the Taliban”.  She said she was very insulted.  Several others told of seeing it here the night of the precinct meeting and another time here also.  It is shameful.

BOB read an announcement of “Meet the Candidate Norm Sanderson, who is running for NC Senate 2” which is going to be April 14 from 12:30 to 3:00 at the vacant field at the corner of Hwy 24 and Broad Creek loop Road across from the fire department which is by Mike Lawrence Electric.  Free hotdogs and lemonade.  Hosted by Jennifer Hudson and Tim Buck.

HOWARD said we were all aware of the beautiful colorful brochures that Randy Ramsey is putting out.  Norman Sanderson would like to be able to get out one if he can raise the money for it.  He does not have the money right now.  So any amount you can afford to help him out, will be greatly appreciated.

BOB said he understood they had a fund raiser last week in New Bern at Mark Chestnut’s house for Randy and raised he thought he heard about $20,000.  He had all the car dealers and attorneys there.  RUTH PARKER said but he won’t come and talk to us.  BOB said we have sent an invite.  ERIC said Randy had responded that he would have lunch with BOB and ERIC but did not have time to meet with the group.  BOB told him we vote as a group and the group deserves to hear him.  Randy told them he was not able to make arrangements to meet with the group.

BOB asked NANCY BOCK, Treasurer, for a Treasury Report.  She said we have $1600 in the bank.  BOB wanted to know if she ordered those TEA party signs.  She said yes.

BOB introduced Butler Bennett and wife Ann who had met with us a couple of years ago.  He came tonight to thank the TEA Party for what they do.

Mark Mansfield, who is running for school board and spoke to us at a previous meeting, was with us again tonight, as a participant in the group, not campaigning.

BOB said there were four voting places for Early Voting:  Fort Benjamin Park in Newport, Davis Volunteer Fire Department, Davis, Western Park Community Center, Cape Carteret, and Beaufort Square Shopping Center, Beaufort.  Early voting starts April 19.  We need people to man each polling place.  Newport appears to be well covered, but concerned about Davis and so far only EULA has volunteered for Beaufort.  If you can work it in, please help out.  Where ever you plan to work you need to contact the judge at the polling place and ask where you can set up so you will be legal.  It has to be 50 feet from the entry way.  We have signup sheets for every day of the week.  BOB said he would be the roving patrol.

HOWARD said he had gotten a tip that they were going to have a fund raiser for Randy at the end of Front Street in Beaufort.  That new boat place, sponsored by the ‘What’s in it for Me Party’.  BOB said he can’t repeat some of the things he has been told about Randy, but he feels we are fortunate that we did not jump on his band wagon.  There is going to be some real ugly stuff coming out later on, he is afraid.  HOWARD said he has had a couple of phone calls on some of the stuff on Randy also.  BOB said we do not want this guy in the Senate, that is for sure.  HOWARD said ‘if he won’t meet with us now, if he gets elected, do you think he is going to  meet with us then’.  BOB said he thinks Randy believes he can raise enough money and with advertising, he doesn’t have to meet with anybody.

BOB said we do not have time tonight, but next week we are going to go through the TEA Party ballot and the folks that we are going to put on our ballot.  He has worked the wording on it to say the ‘Crystal Coast TEA Party Patriots believe the following candidates best support the TEA Party principles of Limited Government, Fiscal Responsibility and Protection of the Free Market’.  We have been trying to get as many candidates in here as possible to talk to us. It was decided that we would only list one candidate per office and the vote would be secret.

There will be a Republican meeting Thursday night (5:30 to eat), at Ribeye’s Steak House in Cape Carteret.  Guest speaker will be Mike Bietter, North Carolina Secretary of State candidate.  Many of the candidates will be in attendance.

Saturday morning (7:30) there will be a ‘Meet and Greet” at the Emerald Golf Club in New Bern.

Meeting adjourned at 8:00
Minutes submitted by PEGGY GARNER, Secretary.

CRYSTAL COAST TEA PARTY PATRIOTS
MINUTES OF
2 APRIL 2012

Meeting held at Golden Corral, Morehead City, NC
Meeting called to order at 6:03 pm by Chairman BOB CAVANAUGH
Pledge of Allegiance led by CLAYTON GILLIKIN
Invocation by NANCY BOCK

BOB asked NANCY to tell about how she broke her arm.  CLAYTON said he heard she got caught stealing Randy Ramsey’s signs.  NANCY said ‘No, her dog pulled her down.  She wasn’t paying attention (while walking two dogs).  She has 5 more weeks to go in a cast.

BOB introduced Mark Mansfield, who is running for a seat on the Board of Education, District 3.
Mr. Mansfield thanked SCOTT CARPENTER for inviting him to come tonight.  He said ’I strongly believe in fiscal responsibility.  I am an independent business operator.  I appreciate the opportunity to be able to talk to you tonight.  I believe in education.  I believe we need to maintain the quality of education in our schools in Carteret County while simplifying fiscal discipline.  I believe education is an investment in our future, however; I think everyone should scrutinize their investments and privatize their goals.  For those of you who do not know anything about me, I married my high school sweetheart, Jane Lewis Mansfield and we have three children.  I played basketball here at West Carteret High School when we won the State Championship.  I went on to University of North Carolina at Greensboro where I played basket ball and got a Batchelor of Science Degree in Nutrition and Concentration of Restaurant Management.  I am a realtor, a real estate investor, and a business owner.  I have been affiliated with the Dairy Queens here in Carteret County and we have locations outside of Carteret County (up to ten at one time).  I like to think I am capable of running a business.  I understand budgets.  I understand the value of a dollar and at the end of the day, if I don’t meet my budgets I am going out of business.  I have been doing this for over twenty years.  My opponent is a good person.  He was actually a PE teacher when I was here at West Carteret High School.  I think he is a great guy and that makes it hard sometimes when you run against somebody and you don’t really believe that they believe in or you don’t really like them, then it is easy to say bad things.  I don’t have anything bad to say about my opponent.  He is a really great person.  However, there are currently four people on the Board of seven from the education field.  At this point in time I strongly believe that five would be too many.  (Applause)  You hear catch phrases and terms all the time today, you hear a lot in the media, we need more transparency in our county government for the citizens and for the County Commissioners to understand what the needs are at hand.  I think that with somebody who can communicate and share their knowledge and help shape the future, education is where it all starts.  Without a good education we would not have the proper guidance we have here today.  Nobody wants to live where there aren’t good schools.  We wouldn’t have the doctors we have in our community, the lawyers we have in our community.  It is an important integral part as we all age to have people come back and take care of us.  We need to learn to meet doctors, lawyers, nurses, engineers, maintenance, being able to fix the roads, and take care; but the main thing is I am a business operator, I do believe in a strong fiscal background.  I don’t believe in spending more money, but by the same token, I sell real estate and I am not going to drive around in a 1972 Oldsmobile station wagon.  There are certain things I have to invest in to do my business, whether it be a new ice cream machine at the Dairy Queen or whether it be a new computer at the office.  I recognize the fact that we do have to spend money, but I do think we should scrutinize how we do it.  That is pretty much my thoughts.  Any questions?  I will do my best to answer them.’
ERIC BROYLES said ‘Over the last several years the school board has submitted budgets that exceed the cost of living.  For example this year the budget was 10% more than what they had before even though the cost of living has been established overall as around 3%.  What is your opinion of the fact that the schools are requesting more than the people here got raises.  Mr. Mansfield said ‘The answer to your question is a tough one.  Not being an elected official, not being privy to some of these closed meeting sessions, I don’t know that I have the correct information to answer your question.  Sometimes, and I don’t know what their situation is now, and obviously we have come through hard economic times in the past five years.  We have all deferred some expenses or eliminated things we have had to.  Sometimes you defer maintenance areas.  If you under fund things sometimes and don’t do maintenance, it’s pay me now or pay me later.  I don’t know if that is gamesmanship and they are asking for 10% and they are only wanting to get 2 or 3.  But they feel that if they only ask for 2 or 3, they are going to get cut 5.  I don’t know the answer at this time but I promise you that once I do have those numbers.  That is the transparency I am talking about.

ERIC said the reason he was asking the question was right now 42% of the students are getting some type of nutritional aid in reduced lunches.  That to him is a clear indicator that we live in a community who is of lower income than general.  If you discount Atlantic Beach, Pine Knoll Shores, that strip out there, you will find out that 55% of this county is classified as lower income.  Anytime you raise taxes that has a deep impact on most folks, especially the 42% that can’t even afford their own lunch.  That is why, if we support you, we would like to think we have a fiscally conservative in there that will try to control this out of control budget, the school has every year.  Mr. Mansfield said he would only be one of seven, so he didn’t know how much control he would have, but you would certainly have a voice.  On the flip side of what you are saying on the 55%, we are very fortunate that we do have people that are second home owners who do pay taxes here, especially that island.  They probably pay about half, I’m not sure it might be more, and they don’t use any of the services so we do have one of the lowest tax rates in the state.  However, you are correct the people who are receiving some sort of assistance, we are a low income.  We get penalized at the state level and we need to fight for more money, because we don’t get some of the state funding we are deemed a rich county; because we are fiscally responsible with our money, which I don’t think is right.  I don’t think you are going to find many business people that aren’t, you know (some of my friends call me thrifty, my wife calls me tight).  I am the President of the Carteret County Association of Realtors.  They sent me to a leadership summit up in Chicago.  They reimbursed me for all my expenses for the trip.  When I flew into Chicago O’Hare you have to take a cab downtown.  It is about a $50.00 cab ride.  I could have gotten a cab and ridden down town, paid the driver $50.00 and $50.00 to come back to the airport and turned in my expenses and got paid for them.  Instead I rode the train down to the main station and then took a cab to the motel and it cost me $10.00 each way.  It wasn’t my money, but I treated their money just like it was my money.  If I am elected, I will do the same thing with you.

HAILEY HULT discussed how it is the school’s personal responsibility on how the money from the county is handed out. When she was in school their teachers met as a group and decided that instead of taking bonuses or raises, they would apply it to the school.   And that is how they got new computers, and a lot more technology than what the school could afford.  She wanted to know if Mr. Mansfield had any experience in the school system itself.  Mr. Mansfield said he had received checks from the Carteret County School system for about 10 or 12 years now.  He has coached high school basketball.  As he had said he went to college on a basketball scholarship and who knows where he would have ended up without it.  Basketball paid for his education.    He has come back to Carteret County to try to give back to the schools the same opportunity they gave to him.  Right now he does not think it is the county’s responsibility, however he thinks we do fund part of the school system.  He thinks the state is not operating correctly and wastes too much money.   Now, unfortunately teachers are suffering, haven’t had raises in 5 or 6 years.  He doesn’t think that is right.  Hailey said she had heard some things about him, but not actually his being with the schools.

HOWARD GARNER said he didn’t know how aware of the system Mr. Mansfield was, but the school superintendent submits a budget to the county commissioners and how he is going to spend it.  But once he gets his hand on that money, he doesn’t have to spend it according to that budget he had submitted.  We have been going to several commissioners’ meetings and some board of education meetings recently.  A certain person does a whole lot of rug dancing.  Mr. Mansfield said it was hard to talk about hypotheticals and not knowing, and with the rug dancing you are talking about, I’m not sure I have the correct information or the citizens, and that is the need for transparency.  HOWARD said he did not know that he would be able to get that information.  The commissioners can’t.  Mr. Mansfield said that is why he was not running for county commissioner.  He was running for school board.  That is why he is here, and why he is running.   He does have kids, one who is in college, the business school here, one is in the first grade and one in the ninth.

CLAYTON said you were talking about maintenance a while ago.  East Carteret High School’s first class was in 1965, he thinks.  The school people submitted a budget each year for a certain  amount of money for maintenance at East Carteret.  This amount was included every year in the budget.  He graduated from East in 1975 and as far as he knows, or anybody can find out, there was never or very much money spent on East Carteret maintenance.  After being involved in politics for several years, he went to them and asked them where all that maintenance money that had been allotted been used.  He was told it had been spent on other schools.  He asked why it was spent other schools, when it had been delegated to East Carteret.  He was told that other schools in the western part of the county needed it worse than East Carteret did.  Mr. Mansfield said again he didn’t have any information but at least if he sits in that closed meeting he might learn some things.  Funding for the schools come from three different sources, the federal, the state and the county.  The state actually has access to that checking account.  They can actually take funds out and can put funds back in without permission from the board of education.  He said he could add real well, and you can play shell games and move things all around but it is still income and expenses.  Right now, not having information, just like you don’t have any information, I can’t sit here and promise you anything.  I can promise you that I will go in with an open mind and try to see what needs to be done, but by the same token, I don’t want to tell you and misrepresent.  I am not for gutting the schools of Carteret County, but I am for spending your money very wisely.  CLAYTON said, getting back to what that young lady was asking a while ago about his experience with the schools, he personally did not want anyone on that school board connected with the school system, whatsoever; because they are going to ask for everything they can think of to get for the school system.  Mr. Mansfield said that is what he was saying about everybody has an agenda at some point.  His agenda is being able to make an educated decision to protect the citizens of this county; but not sell ourselves short or shoot ourselves in the foot.  You can be penny wise and pound foolish.

JERE GEURIN asked if Mr. Mansfield could ever think of any reason why the school board (or public servants) to ever meet in closed meetings or close that meeting to the public.  Mr. Mansfield said he didn’t know whether he could know until he got in there and found out what they were talking about.  He could think personnel issues, contracts, something of that nature that shouldn’t be or where it could hurt the county itself and expenditures, but he did think there should be more transparency for the citizens and for the county commissioners, because if they actually knew what was going on, maybe they would feel more comfortable about the money.  Maybe they feel slighted or cheated, and he doesn’t know if that is how they feel, but that is how it appears by what he reads in the paper.  He thinks somebody should be able to sit down and talk, communicate and be reasonable.  He thinks he is a pretty reasonable guy.

Hailey said the reason she asked about his experience with the school system, she feels that people her age will feel more comfortable voting for him, with him having experience with the school rather than someone who doesn’t.  Mr. Mansfield said the position on the school board you will be looking at contracts, budgets, maintenance, personnel.  However, he probably could teach but they are not going to ask him to go into a classroom and teach a class.  Hailey said she was just concerned about if he had any idea about what goes on in the schools.  Mr. Mansfield said he had been volunteering since he had returned to the county from Greensboro.  He coached  before he even had kids.  He coached Tball teams and sponsored Tball teams for the Dairy Queen, coached soccer teams, before he had children and coached his own kids teams.  He coached in high school before his kids were even near high school age.  He can make more money flipping hamburgers at Dairy Queen than what he makes from the school for those four months that he goes and teaches basketball.  He has a license so that he can drive the activity bus.  He has been in the school system.  He sees the things that go on but he is not a part of what goes on out there.

BOB said part of the problem that we, here at the TEA Party, is with the school board; there are too many teachers on the school board.  We don’t feel that the school board knows enough about the budget, how to read a budget, and how to sort though all the numbers and stuff like that.  Basically, right now, they are just rubber stamping whatever the school superintendent says they are going to do.  He just steam rolls right over the top of them with piles of numbers, figures, facts, and carries it right off.  We need someone with a business background that can read a budget and not be so entrenched in the school system that they only look at the problem from that perspective.  That is why we would like to see more business oriented people on the school board.  ERIC said he thought it was a conflict of interest to have more than one teacher on the school board.  That has been part of the issue.  They are just rubber stamping stuff.

ERIC asked ’What is your position on ‘for five years the quality of education that our students get, based on the ABC scores and AYP scores, reading has declined in most schools.’  For example, last year, only 5 schools out of 16 made adequate yearly progress.  The year before, 16 out of 16 made it, and in 2007, 10 out of 16 made it.  What can you do, if you are elected, that will improve this situation.  Not adding teachers, because he feels they already have enough teachers, it is 11 to 1 ratio right now.  What can you do from your perspective to improved the quality of education.  Mr. Mansfield said, ‘one out of many, I’m not sure exactly how much one person can do totally to improve the school system.  You can take numbers and just as you have seen in the past, you can get them and make them look what you want (a lot of things).  On reference to your test results, he is not familiar with those test scores, but he is familiar with those the state has mandated over the past five or six years, and has put such an emphasis on EOC’s (end of class or end of grade) testing, where they placed a ton of our money and the teachers are pushed to teach those tests.  So where they may excel on those tests now, and not do as well on the tests you are talking about may have something to do with it.  He doesn’t think we should waste money on a test if it is not needed.  The state mandates certain things you are required to do at the county level and obviously the federal government mandates some things that you have to do at the state and county level.  A lot of them are unfunded mandates and we all get stuck.  ERIC said the reason he raised the question was this county has made a big commitment dollar wise; we are number 12 in the state in the amount of money the county gives to the education of a student and while we are paying a premium price for education, and we are standing there with our hand out like this, there is a problem.  Mr. Mansfield said he was not so sure about this, but he would look into the problem.  He can tell us right now, the amount of kids, and he has served on the scholarship committee of the Board of Realtors last year when they gave ($16 or $60, not exactly sure of amount he quoted) worth of scholarships, there was a child from East Carteret High School that got accepted by Duke University and that is an extremely prestigious university to get into.  We have had numerous students from this county go on and go to outstanding schools.  We have some smart, very qualified people in this area.  BOB said he read an article in the Carolina Journal this morning and out of the 50 states North Carolina is ranked 42nd as far as spending per pupil and we are 45th as far as scholastic achievement in the states.  So that doesn’t necessarily mean that money equals education because I think that Washington, DC has the highest per capita per student, and one of the worst scholastic achievement rates.  But do we need to spend more?  I don’t know.  We are 42nd out of 50 states as far as spending per student.  Our state house of representative Pat McElraft was here last week and the last budget or the current budget we are operating under now, in the state of NC, in the money they set aside for the schools, was included enough money to hire and fund 2000 more teachers.  And yet, when the money came down to Carteret County we wound up losing teachers and teachers aids.  So what happened to that money that was supposed to come down from the state so we would not lose teachers.  This goes back to Dr. Novey, he can just take that pile…..Mr. Mansfield interrupted with he would have to investigate that.  ‘When you start talking about… because of our finances in our county we are deemed a rich county.  So we get less state funding than Havelock or less federal funding because a military base is hard in Craven County and Onslow County so there is some dollars we are not getting here.  We probably could get more of those dollars but I can’t sit here and honestly  tell you what I am for…you know the money is going to come from somewhere. I’d rather it not come from, I’d rather we get it from the federal or state government.  But I am for spending less, but that doesn’t mean that I am for axing education.  Right now I’ll tell you you can go to the board of education and get all the numbers in the world you want and go spend a day with a teacher in the class room.  Like you say, the money is being shifted around.  I don’t know where it is going.  That is why I want you to elect me so I can find out.  When you were in school I guarantee you took a book home with you.  Today they don’t have enough books, they can’t all take books home.  They share books, they check out books.  Teachers spend their own money, who haven’t had a raise in 5 or 6 years, and go buy paper to run off stuff to give students stuff to do.  We raised I don’t know how much money by the real estate association to buy back packs, pencils, and all these things to help fund that, to help make out a difference.  The community does have some responsibility and we all do have individual responsibility but I can’t tell you what I can do until I get there.  That is the unfortunate part.  I have never been involved in politics before, never really had any desire, but for the same questions you are raising, the only way to get the answers is to step up and do something.  I am willing to volunteer my time.  $300 a month isn’t going to pay me…..I’m just here to let you know that I agree and understand your concerns and I would like to try to make a difference.  Whether I can; I am going to be one of 7.  I am a very honest person, and I believe in what I do and I don’t want to stand here and lie to you and tell you that I am going to go do something and then not live up to my promise.  I’d rather under promise and over deliver.  (More discussion along the same lines followed.)  Several in attendance thanked Mr. Mansfield for coming tonight and especially to the ’new’ young people who came out tonight and joined in the discussion.  We appreciate your concerns and involvement.  Invited them to come back to future meetings.

Mr. Mansfield was asked if he had any questions for us and he said he hoped we liked what we heard and understand that he is not promising anything…a golden parachute or anything like that… He promised to work hard and will try to get the most for our money.

BOB told him that we have another group of TEA party members that meet in the western part of the county the first and third Tuesday of the month.  They are meeting now…their meetings don’t start until 7:00.  He has already called KEN LANG ahead of time that you might be down there tonight.  So if you would like to head on down there…It is 10 minutes to 7:00.  He then gave Mr. Mansfield instructions on how to get to the community building where they are meeting tonight.

Discussion on who our group is going to sponsor.  It was decided and we were in agreement that we would support Sam Sanford’s “We Care” project with the same distribution for us as we had done with the Wounded Warrior’s project…$4.00 for each T-shirt we sold.  The reason for the change was we found out that the head man of Wounded Warrior’s was receiving a 6 figure salary, so we decided to change our support.  JERE GEURIN spoke on the We Care Project for those who are not aware of what the project is.  ’Sam Sanford is a retired Lt.Col.  He was a special forces guy, green beret, served in Viet Nam, Panama, and many other places.  Many of our members here tonight have helped out with this project.  We assemble and pack care boxes that go to our troops in Afghanistan.  Each box is addressed to a First Sgt over there because when you send something through customs that box has to be addressed to an individual.  We cannot send it to a First Marine Air Division or any organization.  We have to send it to an individual.  We get those boxes, we pack them with stuff that is donated and a lot of stuff that Sam buys out of his own pocket.  We put in there tooth paste, shaving cream, deodorant, magazines, books, trail mix, candy, coffee, and all kinds of goodies for these guys to eat.  This goes to guys in remote areas.  These are people that cannot get to a base exchange or post exchange to buy things that they need.  It makes their lives just a little bit more comfortable.  For example, a couple of weeks ago, we packed up something like 125 boxes.  We carried them to the Morehead City Post Office and asked people who came to the post office to please take one or more boxes into the PO (they are all addressed and the customs forms all made out) and mail them.  It costs $13.45 postage to mail each box.  100 boxes would be $134.50.  That is a bit much for Sam to have to undertake.  He already spends, JERE said he would estimate about $500.00 per month out of pocket getting stuff to send in his little warehouse to mail at the next mailing.  The day they took about 100 boxes to the Morehead City Post Office and they did not do very well that morning.  They only got about 20 of those boxes in the mail.  Yesterday they went to Newport and got about 50 in the mail.  This morning they went to the Swansboro Post Office where they were received by the clerks and post master there just like we were old friends.  They put the rest of the boxes in the mail today.  Sam plans to pack again a week from tomorrow, Wednesday morning.  If you are interested in helping out let JERE know and he will explain where to go and when.  Normally he sets up in the warehouse, forming tables in a “U” shape and puts all the stuff that is going in the boxes on these tables.  We assemble the box at one end.  People pick up a box.  They fill it and take it to the other end where someone seals it and it is done.  You can also support Sam by sending him money, because most of the boxes that we mailed today were financed by people who came by and gave us money.  If you have any kind of organization that meets, Sam would like to attend your meeting and explain to you all about “We Care”.  It is a great mission.

BOB gave NANCY BOCK the address to where she could mail the check.  He asked her for an accounting on where we stand financially.  NANCY said we have $1637.00 and we are obligated on the T-Shirts for $308.00.  She wanted to know if that is what we want her to make the check for to ‘We Care’.  BOB wanted to know how we were doing on shirts.  She had bought some recently so we are in pretty good shape right now.  SCOTT wanted to know if we were going to have a Tax Day Rally on the 15th or 16th of April.  BOB said we had put if off for too long a period and now did not have the time to get one organized.  HOWARD said he thought now that our time would be better spent to go to that meeting in New Bern on the 14th.  (Discussion on which meeting he was talking about.  There is one on Monday the 16th as well as one on the 14th).  It is the one at the Taberna (correction – Emerald Green) County Club from 9:00 to 12:00.  GLADYS said that was a different one than she was talking about on the 16th.  HOWARD said supposedly they were going to have all three of the State Senator candidates there.  Whether Randy Ramsey is going to show or not, we don’t know.

ERIC said since we are not going to support the Wounded Warriors anymore, should we not come up with another design on the back of our new shirts we order promoting “We Care”.  BOB said we will need to find out how much that is going to cost us to change the logo.  Find out is there is a set up fee and how much.  The logo for We Care is shown on the card BOB gave NANCY for mailing the check.  BOB asked about our printer of shirts and what NANCY’s contact with them on the situation had been.  She said she had been talking to them about the other Warrior (Hope for the Warriors) project and he said the logos were almost the same, that they would not need to change it.  We might want to get something generic so we can support whoever we want to.  Many at the meeting felt that since we are going with “We Care”, we should change the logo and Sam’s logo is absolutely beautiful and eye catching.  JERE said he would recommend that if we are going to support We Care that we contact Sam and ask him what he would like for it to say.  BOB asked “Do we want to change the logo?”  Discussion followed.  BOB decided to get NANCY to get a price to have the “We Care” logo produced and put on the shirts and what it would add to our bottom line as opposed to what we already have set up to run the current ones.

DAVID COX reported that he had ridden up to Washington on the bus with the group that is putting up the billboards and he was very impressed with what all they have going on up there.  He wanted to know if there was any way we could help them, he would like to.  BOB reported that we had already given them $400 to sponsor a month on one billboard.  We sent the money in January.  DAVID said they are doing some great work there.

BOB asked if anyone had heard about the Super Pac that was going to come out and run ads against Walter B. Jones.  There was a good article in the Beaufort Observer about it and a long letter about the Super Pac(but he couldn’t remember the name of them).  They were expressing that the incumbents have about an 86% election rate.  In the 2012 election the incumbents have all the benefits when running for election because they have all the pac money, the party, envelop franking privileges, etc.  This creates an arrogance of incumbency where they do not feel they are responsible to the voters anymore.  They can just vote however they feel and that becomes more and more evident the longer they are in office.  They get where they feel invincible so this Pac (is not running a campaign for Palombo) but are running their own thing on the side However, it is going to end up benefiting Frank Palombo because he is the only one that is challenging Jones in the Republican primary.  He was talking to Frank Palombo about this whole thing and he feels there is a whole other issue.  He said to watch for the news on Thursday.  There will be a big story coming out, a big media event, but he couldn’t tell what it was about.  He was bound by whatever and couldn’t share the news.  Latter part of next week, around Thursday, maybe Friday morning look for something pretty significant in the news.  Frank shared with BOB a poll that his organization paid for (to do a campaign poll costs a lot of money).  They polled voters within the third congressional district (approximately 500 likely voters) and they asked them about whether they would vote to reelect Walter Jones or not.  He scored a 46% which according to the pollsters is very good.  Then there was a series of eight questions that followed and each question dealt with different pieces of legislation that Walter Jones either voted for or against.  They would ask the question like ‘would you vote for Walter Jones knowing that he voted for the financial reform act (the Dodd-Frank bill).  It would go down the whole list of 8 questions like that and then at the very end they would re-ask the first question again.  Rephrasing “knowing what you know now about Congressman Jones’ voting record how likely would you be to vote for his re-election.  On the second go-round he scored a 29% which anything under 30% means you are going down.  Frank said the whole gist of that poll showed a real softness out there for Walter Jones and it is really all about voter education.  Getting the word out to the voters so they understand that Walter Jones is not the conservative they think he is.

STEVE talked about the prayer rally in support of the Marriage Act, that will be held the same day as our April 17th meeting, in Swinson Park.  He has yard signs and bumper stickers for anyone who would like one.  They think it will last about an hour and half.  They have speakers they are trying to get lined up to come out.  BOB asked if the churches were pushing this from the pulpit.  STEVE said some are but not very many.  Most are afraid to do anything political.
Some are opposed to the amendment because they say it is a hate the gays.  The pastor of Open Door preached about it two weeks ago to vote FOR the amendment.  He has a yard sign in his front yard and plans to put a sign on the church sign also.  A church in Pellitier is way on board.  Their church is doing a lot of stuff.

BOB  introduced Kirby Smith, who is running for judge.  Mr. Smith spoke to us a couple of weeks ago.  He said he appreciated us letting him speak to us again for a moment.  Two weeks ago he was appointed to fill the remaining term of Judge Jerry Waddell on the District Court bench.  That is through December.  He still has to run in the election on May 8, and if he survives that, run again in the election in November.  He told us when he was here last time that he wanted to keep coming back and he wants to keep that promise.  He really wants to keep it when he is a judge.  He is going to be sworn in next week in New Bern on April 12 at 3:00 and you all are invited.  He spoke at length here last time and during his talk to us tonight repeated much of the same information.  He said he loved coming here.  He had spoken at another TEA party meeting and someone came up afterward and apologized for all the hard questions they had asked.  He said he loved the hard questions, it was the easy questions he did not like.  Everyone hits the easy questions out the park.  It is the hard questions that show your mettle, what you are made of and how you think.  He asked everyone to go to his web site to find out what he has done and keep up with what is going on in his campaign.  He makes changes almost every day.  He wants to be approachable as judge.  While he can’t discuss cases, he still wants the contact with the people.

BOB said since the last time he was here, and now that he was elevated to the position of judge, and since we have already heard from the solicitor general arguing before the supreme court, where would you fall on Obamacare and why?  Judge Smith said ‘Oh, my goodness, he would have to quote Justice Scalia when he said 2700 pages – you expect me to read that?  He does not know how they got 6 hours of oral argument in three days.  Normally, you get one hour of argument per case.  He has never heard of this before.  There were several different issues, and he has to be honest with you BOB, he has not been tracking it.  He has been busy with his campaign.  He was not trying to duck his question.  RUTH PARKER said ‘let her ask it to him this way – does the government have the right, through the constitution, to tell us what we need to buy…what we can drive…what we can eat…what we can think.  It is out of control.  Judge Kirby said he agreed with Ruth.  He went on to discuss the bill of rights…what they put in them and what they left out.  The 10th amendment of the US Constitution ‘all powers not relegated to the federal government are reserved for the states.’  It has now been relegated to relatively nothing.  He went on to discuss the Civil War.  He feels it basically was not fought on the issue of slavery but what the Civil War did is (in his opinion) it brought in the era of big government.  The Civil War basically established that we will have a dominate federal government and subservient states.  Because when the states tried to leave the federal government came in and said no.  There were other things that flowed from the Civil War.  BOB said are you trying to blame big government on Republicans?  Judge Kirby laughed and said he hadn’t thought about that.  The Bill of Rights are the first ten amendments.  If we say these are the rights … are we saying that is all of them?  Are there more?  Are there less?  Some people did not want to put any bill of rights in there because they were afraid of limiting the rights.  In answer to your question, Ruth, no, it is expressly not in there.  And what Justice Scalia’s argument is, he is the true strict constructionist on the Supreme Court, who, in Judge Kirby’s opinion, writes articulate decisions.  He says if it is not in the Constitution, the solution is simple, then you amend the constitution with what you want in there.  Someone in the audience said he thought Ruth’s question was, ’did he think Obamacare was Constitutional or not…the mandate….is that constitutional?’  Judge Kirby said ‘No, he would be shocked if the US Supreme Court said it is.’

Discussion on DUI’s, levels of offenses and levels of sentencing.

ERNIE GUTHRIE asked Judge Kirby what did he have to offer compared to Mr. McFayden?  Judge Kirby said he did not want to talk negative about his opponent; but he will quote Ronald Reagan when he was debating Walter Mondale….”I don’t want to use my opponents youth and inexperience against him’.  He said he had 20 years of practicing law and that is what he brings to the table.  He has tried and prosecuted every type of case that he can think of.  (He said he hates to say that because someone could raise their hand and ask if he had ever prosecuted such and such a case, and he might have to say no, but he thinks he has covered most of the bases).

Judge Kirby thanked us for our attention and said he always liked to come and talk with us.  Several in the audience thanked him for coming back and said he was always welcome.

BOB talked about the Young Professionals Group (formerly Young Republicans) starting to die out.  He has mentioned it to the Republican Men’s Club and they are discussing incorporating them into the Men’s Club.  He said he would like to see someone like JAMES LAWVER be assigned as Chair of the Young Professionals, but they would have to see what is going on with the current leader.  We had a good group of young voters with us tonight and he would like to see them get involved.

EULA PARKIN wanted to know if you had to be a Republican to belong to the TEA Party.  Didn’t we want any Democrats to join with us?  BOB and several others said we would love to have good conservative Democrats to come out and join us.  If you can find some conservative Democrats, bring them on down.

HAILEY HALT said her mother had been trying to get her to come to the TEA Party meetings; that she (her mother) had been trying to get a group organized in Stella, but so far had had no luck.  Her mother went to the Republican conventions.  BOB asked who her mother was and HAILEY said Jessica Halt and BOB said he knew her.  HAILEY said her mom had also worked with the Young Republicans for a while.  HOWARD said we have a couple from Stella who are very active but are at the TEA Party meeting in Cape Carteret tonight.

BOB asked WES KRAMER where he was from and WES said he was originally from Onslow County.  He went to White Oak School.  He has been living in Las Vegas for the last five years.  He just moved back.  BOB asked if he was working or still in school.  WES said he had just picked up a job at Piccato’s and was hoping to get into Coastal Community College in Jacksonville.

BOB asked ERIC WILSON where he was from.  He said he had lived in Morehead since 2005.  He lived in Newport before that.  He was a West Carteret High School graduate.  He got involved with the Fire and EMS about four years ago and that was also his entrance into the medical world.

BOB asked STEVE BEST how old he was and STEVE said 4l.  BOB said he did not look it, he looked a lot younger; but BOB believed the Young Republicans ages were 18 to 40.  At least that is what it was back when he was one of the five original members that started it, back in 1980.  He was all enthused with Ronald Reagan and he left the area in 1983 to go down to Florida on Marine Corps orders and when he came back in 1986 those young Republicans were all too old.  The group just fizzled out.  You young folks, you are the future of the country.  He had been to a bunch of TEA Parties and rallies and when he looks around, most there are about the same age as he is.  He is now 64.  Some here are a little bit older.  EULA said she was the oldest.  BOB said, ‘are you older than HOWARD?’  EULA said she was 85 and HOWARD said he was 77.  She said when she was in school the desks were screwed to the floor.  The first mistake was when they unscrewed the desks from the floor.  Until then there was respect, discipline, and you didn’t have the kids saying, ‘well, my momma’s going to sue you.’  Talking about the education system going down, it is television, computers, cell phones, and all these little games they play on hand held instruments, and the parents who don’t have time.

Several stories were told about school situations and how they were handled.

BOB adjourned the meeting at 7:55 pm.
Minutes submitted by Secretary PEGGY GARNER

Meeting held at Golden Corral, Morehead City, NC

Meeting called to order at 6:05pm by President BOB CAVANAUGH

Pledge of Allegiance led by HOWARD GARNER

Invocation by PACE WINSTEAD

Number of attendees – 24

MARLIN PARK ERIC BROYLES reported on his findings to date on the park as discussed at the last meeting. He had met with Mayor Jerry Jones. Still Morehead only receiving $500 per game. All income, fence signs, concession stands, etc. will go to Riverfront Sports. Beer is back on the agenda. It will be sold at the park during the games. The Morehead group for the park is considering purchasing the land next to the park for extension. $275 thousand more than originally planned was spent on sewage due to changes in sewage rulings. The $900 thousand originally planned for the park has now exceeded $2.5 million. The concensus is that the park will be used only for a special (sports) clientele. KEN LANG said he understood that New Bern had done a ‘Cost Analysis’ and had found having a park in New Bern would be too costly and had turned down the Riverfront Sports group for building in New Bern. He thought this analysis would/should be available for Morehead’s review. It was ERIC’s understanding that no State or County money was involved, but he would check it out. The original park idea was for local boys Babe Ruth teams but had been expanded. Did not feel that this was an appropriate use of tax payer monies. Was the public going to be allowed to speak out on this project? Have they been informed or are being informed? We need to get this matter before the Morehead City tax payers and get them involved. ERIC said he had talked to several who were involved in getting the Marlin team here to Morehead and they kept talking about the intangible benefits. PACE WINSTEAD wanted to know what the intangible benefits being touted were. This is not a professional team, more like a college team. Someone is getting a big rake off, it appears. DEBBIE RUCKER asked what “Dawn” wanted us to do. Very few of our members are under the Morehead City jurisdiction and really do not have voice in the matter. TOM AUSTIN, BOB CAVANAUGH, and ERIC BROYLES all disagreed. The TEA Party is like a big umbrella, overseeing the total county. Therefore they, and most of the other attendees agreed, that we should look into the situation and determine if this is a good idea, not only for Morehead but the county.. Others said the ball field is already built, with the original cost to be around $900,000 and the park to be used as a Babe Ruth ball field for Morehead/Carteret children.($2.7 million has now already been spent). PACE wanted to know if anyone has negotiated about sharing a percentage of returns to Morehead. Who pays for the maintenance, lighting, security, etc.? Where did the two million dollars for the park come from? Mostly donations. WAYNE WILLIS said he understood that some of the money came from the O’Neal Estate, since Mr. O’Neal recently passed away, and the field had been named after him. BOB asked ERIC to continue investigating this matter and report his findings at our next meeting.

RAFFLE FRED DECKER is selling tickets for $200.00 in gas for a Scholarship Fund for the Retired Enlisted Association. Criteria for the scholarship is based on academic achievement.

W.B.JONES Congressman Jones is coming to Carteret County May 16, 2011. Tickets are $40.00. All proceeds will go to the Republican Men’s Club – none to Jones or his campaign. If you have a question you wish Jones to answer, please contact the Republican Men’s Club as they are making a list of questions to be asked, since there will be no questions from the floor. WAYNE WILLIS said Jones was on Channel 10 recently and when the credits rolled at the end “Shackleford Banks Horse Assoc.” was listed. He explained the relationship between Jones and Shackleford Banks.

HISTORY OF WILLISTON WAYNE told us he was a student of history and he had a couple of DVD discs he would like to share with us. They would never be a big hit or win an academy award, since there was no sex and no violence. He passed out the Williston tapes to those in attendance.

ATLAS SHRUG THE MOVIE TOM AUSTIN attended the movie in Wilmington and was very impressed. He said it would be playing in Wilson and Wilmington again tomorrow night. KEN LANG said we could go on line to ‘atlasshrugthemovie.com’ for the scedule of viewings.

TEA PARTY PATRIOTS WEB-A-NAR BOB said there will be a “web-a-nar” this coming Monday Night and anyone interested can listen in. Also this Thursday go to Congressional Offices and demand (1)”No Debt Ceiling Increase”, (2) “Support Full Faith and Credit Act – Pay debt first”, and (3) “No Tax Increase”.

KEN said he had seen a spot on Fox last night detailing what will happen if the Debt Ceiling is NOT Increased. We need to stop Government froms spending money we do not have. He would like for us to look into having more seminars put on by the John Locke Society, Civitas, etc. about cutting spending. They should be separate from our meetings, like the one we had a few months ago at the College that HARRY THOMPSON arranged. HARRY said he had a friend, “Chuck Beasley”, who volunteered as a teacher at Gramercy Christian School. His subject is “How GOD has played into the history of our country. He would like to get him to come and speak to us at one of our meetings. Those in attendance voice that they were interested in hearing him speak. BOB said maybe we could get him to come next month.

MISC DISCUSSIONS (a) Debt Ceiling – If we don’t start making changes soon, it may become too late. It is just getting worse. (b) Rush Limbaugh said he is afraid that the Republicans will probably cave on Paul Ryan’s budget and push the TEA Party aside. (c) Government has been stepping on Tax Payers toes for a long long time. (d) Social Security – The first woman to ever receive a Social Security check recently died. She had only paid in $1,500.00 and had ended up collecting thousands. (e) If Bernacke keeps printing money, gas will continue to climb to at least $10.00 a gal. Bernacke will be speaking on TV tomorror on why we must keep printing more money The banking system is also to blame. A $1,000.00 loan eventually becomes a $1,000,000.00 pyramid scheme. The 1933 dollar is now worth only .33 cents. (f) Federal Reserve – When we came off the gold standard it let the government print money to their heart’s content. Nixon took us off the gold standard when he was president; but Roosevelt made it illegal to own gold and required anyone having gold be required to turn it in to the government. It happened then, it can happen again, so owning gold may not be the answer we think it is. You could even be charged or taxed for owning gold. Barry Goldwater, while being considered incompetent, predicted exactly what is happening today. SB 490 – Modernizing Insurance – Safe drivers are currently subsidizing unsafe drivers. HOWARD says the current system is not working. Is the new system being proposed any better or not? BOB said when he moved from Jacksonville, Florida to Carteret County (NC) his insurance doubled. He was told he was now in a “high population density area”!!!! KEN and several others had had the same thing happen to them. Cherry Point makes us a high population density area. BOB said, since the meeting had lasted longer than anticipated due to our many discussions, he would ask PEGGY GARNER if she would hold her collected information on the the July 4th parades until next meeting night. PEGGY agreed, since she was the only one of the committee in attendance tonight and she had not had time to discuss her findings with them. Meeting adjourned.

Minutes submitted by Secretary PEGGY GARNER

CRYSTAL COAST TEA PARTY PATRIOTS
APRIL 19, 2011

Meeting held at Golden Corral, Morehead City, NC
Meeting called to order at 6:05 PM by President BOB CAVANAUGH
Pledge of Allegiance led by BOB CAVANAUGH
Invocation by Catherine McCabe
No. of Attendees – 26

RALLY DISCUSSION
HOWARD GARNER congratulated everyone on the outstanding teamwork at rally.  He said the cooperation and pulling together could not have been more memorable if it had been practiced in advance.
BOB said he thought the speakers we had this year were the best yet.
SCOTT CARPENTER said the only thing he could find fault with was not enough advertising.
We needed more signs out.  There was nothing on Hwy 24 and only 2 on Hwy 70 and they only went up the weekend before the rally.
FRED DECKER said he knew of about 20 good available property sites for our use and could have used them if we had more signs.  NANCY BOCK said the signs we had cost $95.00 each and that was really all we could afford right now.  SCOTT said he thought we could use smaller signs, sort of like candidates use during the election period, maybe a 2 or 3 foot size.  NANCY said that size would bring the cost more in line.  We could really use a big sign, sort of like at the flea mall (those owned by Jim Ferrell.  However, understand they run about $160.00 and we didn’t have that kind of money.)  TOM HARMON said we need to have a good fund raiser.
NANCY said she went to the New Bern Rally and the attendance was off there also.  HOWARD said the public needs to get riled up about something that gets their attention before they will get involved.   SCOTT asked if the yellow sign was the TEA party sign; the one that says ‘Don’t Tread on Me’.  Explained that the TEA Party did not have a sign especially for us, that this sign was just used because it fit our cause and all the TEA Parties used it.  SCOTT said it would be nice if we could line the side of the road with flags.  BOB said we did that last year.  He had put up small flags by the side of the road to attract attention.  This year we had put them around the fence.
BOB was curious as to what we all thought had kept the crowd away this year other than what we had already discussed.  Was Saturday a good day?  Was it the time of day?  Maybe we should have it later in the day after work?  Maybe all the above had influence over the attendance.
PEGGY GARNER said she had been thinking about the rally and the upcoming 4th of July, and did not think we should hold a 4th rally this year.  There is nothing special to get the people excited about; maybe next year.  She understood that Morehead had a 4th of July parade and thought we should expend our energy with the TEA Party developing a float and entering the parade.  Maybe Beaufort and Havelock may also have parades and we might try to hit all of them.  This would give us more exposure and attention; especially if we had a really neat and eye catching idea for a float.  She said she had mentioned it to Catie, Ruth, and Tom, and a couple of others and had suggested making the float look like a ship with Indians throwing tea overboard as in the Boston Tea Party.  Wayne Willis said that would not work.  The only reason they had dressed as Indians for the Boston Tea Party was to have the Indians blamed for destroying the tea.  It would not be politically correct now.  Peggy said it was just a suggestion  and subject to change for better idea.  Catie had suggested we buy some candy, attach a paper containing information on the CCTPP to the candy with string so it looks like a tea bag and throw it out to the children.  Peggy said we could get a big group of TEA Party members to wear their shirts and walk alongside the float and pass out Constitutions to the adults along the way.  ROMA WADE said he had set up a table at the Beaufort parade last year and passed out information.  They had set up donation jars and collected a goodly amount.  We might want to look into something like that.  BOB appointed PEGGY GARNER, NANCY BOCK, CATIE MCCABE, TOM HARMON AND BELVA MANNING as a committee to come up with ideas and information and report back our findings.  Like what days of the parade, can we have tables set up to pass out information, sell our shirts, etc.

NANCY said graduation was coming up and it would be nice if we could give each graduate a copy of the Constitution along with a voter registration.  We need to find out if this would be approved.

BOB asked what we thought about Frank Palombo’s speech.  TOM HARMON said he didn’t like his comment on the Air Force and had told him so.  He felt that he was pandering to the Marine Corps.  BOB said if we are planning to support Frank we need to start cranking up our group to push him not only in Carteret but surrounding counties as well.  TOM H. thinks we should wait until the candidates announce.  He would hate to promise our support to one candidate and have someone that we think might have a better chance of beating Walter B. Jones pop up later.  FRED said if we decide to hold a fundraiser, he thought he could talk to Holt Faircloth about holding it at his home like he did last election year.  BOB said the DNC will be pumping a lot of money into the next campaign trying to make sure democrats get elected.  Even if Frank can beat Jones, it is questionable if he will be able to raise enough money to win against all that democratic money and candidate.  Also many counties are waiting to determine who to support until they find out how the redistricting will go.  Some, now in Jones’ district, may not be afterward.  Redistricting will not be announced until after the June State Convention.  FRED had heard around the first of July, however it is probably going to be challenged and go before the court, which will mean probably the late fall.  TOM H.  said he thought Palombo should contact all the surrounding county TEA Parties and ask them for their help.  KEN LANG said he didn’t think Frank could do this at the current time since he had not formally announced and couldn’t until later.  Right now he is working with his friends on raising money.

HOWARD said he had heard that Gary  Dean was now working at WalMart and that Dean had told a friend of his that Jones had told him that he was really a democrat.  He had only run as a republican so he could get elected.  We might consider having Dean come and speak with us.

Rumor is that Obama plans to have a headquarters in each and every county in North Carolina this election.  (Someone said they hoped Ken Humphrey would be in charge of the one in Carteret.)

WAYNE said he would check with a couple of friends he knows in Raleigh to find out what he can on redistricting.

MARLIN BALL PARK DISCUSSION
BOB said he understood the Marlins want a 10 year contract.  A group in Morehead is working to make sure they come here, since the Kinston Indians will be leaving Kinston.  This is their last year and Kinston will be looking for a replacement team.  A lady is contacting as many organizations as she possibly can to inform them of the raw deal she thinks the tax payers of Morehead will be getting.  The town will only collect $500.00 per game while the Marlins will have the opportunity to sell the fencing banners (55 approximately), concession stand profits, etc.  The town will also have to pick up park maintenance, police protection, safety, etc.  She is upset because the people of Morehead will not have the opportunity to vote on this project.  She is hoping to get enough local people informed and create enough interest to put a halt to this effort.  TOM said maybe we should collect enough information and contact Carolina Journal and see if we can get them involved.  Maybe they will send a reporter here to look into the matter.   We might even try writing letters to the editor to get Morehead residents attention.

ROY MUSSER came in late but said he wanted to thank everyone for the great help provided not just him with parking but from all he saw, the group really had it all together.

TOM AUSTIN said he attended the County Commissioners meeting last night.  One of the subjects discussed was windmills.  Since the windmills were over 500 feet high, we had no one in the county trained to inspect and we would need a consultant.  Much discussion on paying a consultant.  Everyone in the TEA Party meeting said they thought wind mills were a dead issue in Carteret County.  From what went on at the Commissioners meeting, apparently not.
Also discussed was a Scenic By Way through Dare, Hyde and Carteret County.  Discussed paying $2,600.00 to a professional to develop signs along the route; size, color, wording, etc.  Thinking of something to rival the Blue Ridge Parkway.  Both issues passed.
Does no one realize that grants are not free money, it is still our money out of our pockets.
Other items discussed were: a website to determine if you might have any monies due you, enabling their finding you…. and the collection of latex paint.  This paint will be dumped all together, regardless of color, mixed up, and given to the handicapped and poor to use to paint their homes.  Both of these also passed.

TREASURER REPORT
NANCY reported that we currently have $524.72.  We had a beginning balance prior to the rally of $1997.82.  We received an income of $2,912.50 from donations, hats/tees, Insurance, and rally.  Expenses were $4,385.60 for ads, banners/flags, business cards, hats/tees, bumper stickers, pocket Constitutions, and rally expenses.  We still owe $294.00 for our Wounded Warrior obligation and for the 6 Underdogma books we sold.

NANCY asked if anyone had watched the O’Reilly show about the ‘anti-TEA party Rally’.  It was a disgrace with the ugly comments and profanity.  She also told us about a paper she receives called the Tea Party Review.  She said an article on the Wisconsin and Ohio union disruption, told about the Tea Party getting to the capitol early and were met by what the TEA Party thought were security police.  They were told that they were not allowed in, the building was already full.  Did not find out until after everything was over that the guards were not legal police, they were union members using intimidation.
BOB said he understood that is some places, the ANTI-Tea Party groups were selling ‘Don’t Tread on Me’ signs and other official Tea Party paraphernalia, and using the income to support their effort.
TOM H wanted to know if the TEA Party of North Carolina couldn’t get together and hold a state wide convention.  BOB said they can’t get everyone on the same page.  He went to one in Charlotte and almost everyone there was from Charlotte and the surrounding area.  TOM said maybe if we got a more central location like Asheboro or Raleigh.  BOB said once again we are going to need a rallying cry to get participation.  Last fall Goldsboro tried to put together a meeting of eastern TEA parties and were expecting 15 groups.  Only those who tried to put the meeting together and BOB and his group were there.  In fact, many of the TEA Party groups are losing ground.  The kitchen table groups have just about all failed.  He thinks the fact that we meet every week; it has become a habit; is the reason we are still active.

LOU KUKULINSKI was thanked for providing the tent for registration.

Meeting adjourned.
Minutes submitted by PEGGY GARNER, Secretary

MINUTES OF CRYSTAL COAST TEA PARTY PATRIOTS
APRIL 12, 2011

Meeting held at Golden Corral, Morehead City, NC
Meeting called to order at 5:58 PM by President BOB CAVANAUGH
Pledge of Allegiance led by BOB CAVANAUGH
Invocation by JERE GEURIN
No. of Attendees – 34

TEA PARTY RALLY, APRIL 16
BOB CAVANAUGH reported that he would be able to pick up the sound system Friday afternoon in lieu of Saturday morning as previously reported.
WAYNE WILLIS said he has the music.
We may have two singers for the Star Spangled Banner.
Howard said he needed help Friday afternoon at 4:30 at the Moose Lodge to load tables and chairs.  Had several volunteer to be there.
Stage will be brought in Friday night.
Everyone please get to the grounds before nine to get everything ready.  We need volunteers to decorate.
CATIE MCCABE reported that she got the opportunity to get a plug in for the rally on the radio Monday night on Teen Talk.
Bob asked folks to get letters in to the editor this week advertising the rally.
NANCY BOCK reported that the bumper stickers, etc were here.
ERIC BROYLES asked that everyone please sign the petition for a Balanced Budget with Debt Ceiling Reduction.
BOB asked KEN if he would make announcements at the rally about the petitions signing table, voter registration, etc.
Someone asked if anyone had heard from Pastor Willie Montague and Nancy said the money we sent has changed hands (cleared the bank).
WAYNE wanted to know who the “sign” man was so he could get them to return the music CD’s.  This created a little confusion until we all realized he was talking “down east” and it was finally interpreted that was “sound” man.   He said he could speak other languages also.
WAYNE asked that all those who had not mailed in their ballot from the Carolina County Carteret Craven Electric Cooperative magazine to please do so and vote for him.  He promised to pass on anything we wanted brought up at the meeting Thursday.
BOB reminded us that we would discuss our sponsorship of a worthwhile charity after the rally.  If anyone knows of any other worthy organizations, please get information on and report at our next meeting.  Right now those being considered are Hope for Warriors, Carolina Canines for Veterans, and Sam’s Project We Care.

Discussed the Morehead City Marlin Ball Field and the misuse of Morehead City tax dollars.  Cost is estimated at $2.4 million dollars.   Marlins will pay $15,000 per year “rent” and keep all the proceeds received .  This equates to about their reimbursing Morehead about $500.00 per game.  They are trying to lock in a ten year contract.  The tax paying citizens are footing the entire bill.  Riverfront Sports (originally in New Bern) wanted New Bern to build them an arena but New Bern refused, so they approached Morehead.  Why in the world would the city board be in favor of this?  Lockwood had said he estimated this would equate to approximated $2,700 per Morehead City resident.  Bob would like the Tea Party to get involved in this situation.  He would also like to get someone from Riverfront Sports to come talk to us at one of our meetings.  Maybe someone from Morehead could look more into this and write a letter to the editor bringing this before the other tax paying citizens.

At 6:30 BOB and KEN left to attend a Republican Party meeting.  ERIC, Vice President continued with the meeting.  Talked about the on-line conference meeting.  He said Bob had gotten him hooked up so he could listen in but not comment.  They had discussed the Republicans not doing as they promised.  The TEA Parties are pushing for a balanced budget.  Took a poll on Paul Ryan’s budget “40 yes, 8 no, and 50 will get back after discussing it with their Tea Party groups.   They felt they needed more information, and chance to study Rand’s budget.  If we have any comments, please email Eric.  Disappointment was major on Republicans backing off on Planned Parenthood, Obamacare, etc.  The ones taking part in the conversation, feel the Republicans folded and the majority of the Tea Party Groups feel betrayed.  They are considering picking a day and having everyone slam Behner with everything we’ve got.  If we can’t get anything in return then hold firm.  Military Conflict.  They can exceed budget in time of war, regardless of what the Dems are threatening.  Obama would not stop military pay, just using it to get the resolution passed.  He doesn’t care about the military and Michelle’s coming to Camp Lejeune this week is just a photo op.  We have to hold Behner accountable and defund Obamacare and Planned Parenthood.  Planned Parenthood, when checked, was found to not be doing the cancer screening, mammograms, etc, as the Dems are insisting they are.  Mainly they are doing abortions.

Discussed the economy, gas, food, clothing, etc. are all going up.  We have to get the public’s attention as to what is happening with our country.  Please note when the politicians talk about inflation they do not include these items, and we all know these are definitely a big part of our economy.  As the gas prices continue to rise, the public will begin to realize the TEA Party is right.
One third of our food currently is being imported.  It is time to get to work and find out how to start growing our own here in the US once again.

The TEA Party is the most powerful party today; but we need to find out how the maximize our power.

WAYNE said he had been told that Iraqi money was becoming the item to buy (sort of like buying stocks).  He said he understood we could purchase it from First Citizens Bank, but if you buy less than $100.00, the bank will charge you $10.00.  Something to look into.

On that note, meeting adjourned.

Minutes submitted by Peggy Garner, Secretary

MINUTES OF CRYSTAL COAST TEA PARTY PATRIOTS
APRIL 5, 2011

Meeting held at Golden Corral, Morehead City, NC
Meeting called to order at 6:05pm by President BOB CAVANAUGH
Pledge of Allegiance led by WAYNE WILLIS
Invocation by JERE GEURIN
No. of attendees – 31

New attendee – Norman F. Boothe
Guest speaker – Rick Hairston (Carolina Canines for Veterans, a national program that provides service
dogs to our wounded veterans)

RALLY APRIL 16 – The ability to play music is still in limbo.
NANCY BOCK brought the two new banners.  FRED DECKER volunteered to mount them on 2×4 boards.  He said he would set them up on Hwy 70 by Hibbs Road.  HOWARD GARNER recommended we contact Clayton Garner about putting the other one up on his land (Garner’s Farm).  Howard will get up with Clayton and find out.
NANCY recommended that one of our members volunteer to prepare a flyer (maybe ½  page to hand out to the attendees along with a pocket Constitution as they arrive.  One side would be a Schedule of Events  (list of speakers and time) and the other side a ‘thank you’ to those who have provided special items:  ie The Flea Mall, Barry Page for the stage, financial donors, Americans for Prosperity, John Locke Foundation, etc.   HOWARD volunteered PEGGY GARNER, (since she wasn’t doing anything anyway) to make up the handout.
ROY MUSSER needs additional help with parking.  Right now, he only has one volunteer other than himself.
BOB said we need someone to help put out flags.  KEN LANG will put out an email asking for volunteers to help set up at 9:30.  HOWARD said he planned to pick up the tables and chairs Friday night, put them in a covered trailer, and have them at the grounds by 9:00.  NANCY is in charge of aligning the tables.   TOM AUSTIN wanted to know about a table for petitions.  He thinks BOB or KEN should announce from the stage about stopping by the petition table to sign and/or vote.  FRED said he had been unable to get up with the Guthrie girl about singing the Star Spangled Banner.  Her father has been sick.  He will try again.  BELVA MANNING said she knew of someone whom she thinks would do it and they have a beautiful voice.    If FRED is unable to get someone, then she will contact her potential singer.

GUEST SPEAKER –
ANDREW GOODRICH introduced our speaker for the evening, Rick Hairston from Charleston, SC.
He is head of a Dog Training Outfit, Carolina Canines for Veterans, with corporate office in Wilmington.  The program was founded in 1996.  They have three full time employees and one part time with over 250 volunteers.   They provide over four million dollars worth of services.  This program was started in January 2008 at Camp Lejeune.  They utilize military prisoners to raise and train dogs to give to wounded warriors with a mobility disability and/or post traumatic stress disorder, at no cost to the veteran.  As of March 2010 there have been 36,906 soldiers wounded and they need over 9,000 qualified service dogs.
The program provides a threefold benefit or as they say ‘a triple win’:
Benefit (1)  Rescue of the Shelter Dog.
The dogs are usually pound dogs, either abandoned and/or scheduled to be euthanized.  They must pass strict health evaluations and are given a twenty-nine minute temperament evaluation.   They are then given a new life and purpose as a service dog.  They do not select special breeds, however; they do not use Pitt Bulls or Rottweilers; not because they are not suitable for use, but because of people’s opinion of them.  A service dog is supposed to draw attention from his wounded veteran, who only wants to live his life as normal as possible.   The friendly loveable dog that everyone takes to, makes people look more at the veteran without noticing his infirmity.

Benefit (2 ) Rehabilitation of the Military Prisoner.   Program gives prisoners a second chance to help their comrades, begin atonement, and increases their self-esteem.   Valuable training for their future release from prison is learned.  Many prisoners, upon attaining their freedom, continue with the program or find jobs like dog grooming.  They have learned a trade.  When in the brig, prisoners are not allowed to touch, not even place their hand on someone else’s shoulder.  This can create more time added to their sentence.  However, when training a dog, they are permitted, not only to touch the dog, but they receive love in return for their time and effort in training.  Dogs, one to two years old are preferred, since it takes up to two years to train and prepare the dog for a life of devotion to a wounded veteran. It takes about 2,000 hours of training and tests can cost up to $1,000.00 per dog.   Dogs are taught (learn) 70 commands resulting in 350 tasks.  They are valued at $40,000.00 each and cost the program approximately $30,000.00.  The program retains ownership of the dogs for five years, assuring what is best for the dog.  They are insured with a million dollar policy, not because they are afraid the dog might bite or hurt someone, but that someone might trip over the dog and break a bone and sue.  They do not want the veteran worrying about such things.  Less than 500 dogs are placed each year and there probably could be several thousand that could use a dog.    Rick said he would like to be able to use veterans with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).  He thought it probably would cut down on the  current suicide statistics with this group.

Benefit (3) Revitalization of the Wounded Veteran.  Assistance of these quality-trained service dogs at no cost to the veteran helps them regain independence and ability to enjoy an enhanced quality of life.

The question was asked if they had any female prisoners working with the dogs.  He said that there was only one prison taking females and that was in California.  However, wounded female veterans are receiving the trained dogs for their enhanced quality of life, also.

Due to this program brig policies, procedures, and practices have had to be rewritten, ie.  Security, use of designated outside areas, exercise, feeding, and sanitation of facilities, and many others.

As Rich had explained, this program had started at Camp Lejeune, but amount of time spent in the brigs here has been reduced, so the prisoners here are not afforded the required amount of time to train.  They are now being trained at the Navy Brig in Charleston, South Carolina.

ANDREW passed out a flyer on the program and BOB thanked Rick for coming to talk with us about this most worthy cause.

KEN asked if anyone there had heard of the Carteret County Concerned Citizens for Education (C4).  They are holding an Education Budget Symposium with Dr. Novey, speaker, Monday, April 11, 2011, at 6:00pm at East Carteret High School auditorium, in Beaufort.   It would be nice if one/some of our members would attend.  If interested in their school budget position, check out https://sites.google.com/site/c4educationnc/home. CORRECTION: C4 will be holding a Legislative Budget Update Luncheon Friday, April 15, 2011 at the Sanitary Restaurant at 12 noon (dutch treat).  You do not have to have reservations, but would appreciate your calling Leigh Johnson at 241-2255 or the Chamber of Commerce at 726-6350.  Speakers will be Senator Jean Preston and Representative Pat Elraft.  Once again we would like to have representative(s) from the TEA Party attend.  We need to keep our fingers on the pulse of our county in order for us to be effective in our goals also.

Discussion on EPA wanting to ban bacterial hand soaps and other type sanitary aids (TRICLOSAN).  Do we want another right taken away?  It was requested that someone in the group follow up on this bill.  Would like to have a petition made up to get people to sign at the rally.

Understand there is a bill being worked on making English language North Carolina’s primary language.  Need someone to download any information can find and bring it (and possibly a petition) to the rally.

Project we care – Packed 100 boxes last weekend and spent $1,295.00 postage to mail overseas to our troops.  JERE said he had sat at the Post Office in Morehead requesting volunteers for postage and had mailed 43 boxes there.

BOB told about a Teen Party Camp being planned for ages 14-18.  The cost will be $225.00 per weekend.
For more information go to teapartyteencamps.com (Jeff Bernard).    Also he will try to get more info on the seminar ‘Training to run for office or helping with campaign’.

BOB said he understood there were only about 700 to 1,000 attendees at the Continuing Resolution Rally this past week in Washington.  There is still no resolution on the budget as yet.  He felt that holding a rally during the week was absurd.  People work or need to be home during the week.  If they want a crowd to show they need to hold them on weekends.  He feels that snail mail and phone calls are more effective.

TOM HARMON said HR 37 (Net Neutrality) was coming up for a vote.  They want to regulate the internet.  Call Walter B. Jones and tell him to vote not to regulate.

Treasury Report – NANCY reported we have $1,300.00 in the treasury.

Postponed discussion on adopting a new charitable cause to sponsor.  Will decide after the April Rally.

Meeting adjourned at 7:30pm.

Minutes submitted by PEGGY GARNER, Secretary