Cabarrus leaders accuse NC treasurer of getting ‘political.’ It’s just math, he says
A pair of Cabarrus County officials allege political interference from a Republican commissioner candidate resulted in delayed approval of more than $235 million in school, social services and other projects.
North Carolina Treasurer Dale Folwell says “all this is about is math.”
County commissioners Steve Morris and Kenneth Wortman say Folwell, as leader of the Local Government Commission, overstepped his duty to evaluate the financial health of the county and its requests to borrow money. The commissioners allege Folwell instead intentionally slowed the process so newly elected Cabarrus County Commissioner Larry Pittman, a former legislator with a history of controversial statements about the Civil War, school shootings and abortion providers, could squash the projects once he takes office next year.
But the commission approved each of the county’s recent requests, albeit accompanied by a news release specifying one approval happened in opposition to the staff recommendation.
“I think that this was a political game, just quite honestly. And I probably shouldn’t say that, but that’s a fact,” Republican Cabarrus County Chair Morris told The Charlotte Observer. “What could have been accomplished in one month, took six months.”
The Local Government Commission is responsible for approving the issuance of debts for local governments, examining whether the debt is reasonable for a project and monitoring the financial health of counties, according to its website.
Morris said scrutiny directed toward Cabarrus County went “far beyond” whether it could afford to take on the debt.
At an October Cabarrus County meeting, Wortman specifically accused Folwell of stalling the projects on behalf of Pittman, a former Republican legislator who was elected to the Cabarrus County Commission this month. Wortman pointed to text messages obtained via public records that he claimed proved a friendly relationship between Folwell and Pittman. The messages don’t mention the Cabarrus projects.
However, Pittman made multiple posts on his Facebook page while campaigning that he would not support any more debt without a referendum. Pittman also said he was running “alongside” Laura Lindsey, who was elected in November. Wortman at the October commission meeting read off a message sent to the LGC by Lindsey who said she supported “tabling the two issuance requests until the new board is seated.”
“That’s not a good look to me,” Wortman told the Observer. “That’s playing local politics, which is not their job. Their job is solely to decide if we can pay for what we’re asking for.”
Pittman did not respond to an email, phone call or Facebook message requesting comment.
Folwell told the Observer he and the LGC only scrutinized information presented by Cabarrus County and asked about concerns related to the soundness of the request. Folwell said he won’t apologize for asking questions.
“They want to go emotional. They want to go political. When all this is about is math,” Folwell told the Observer. “In every (financial transaction) that Cabarrus County has been involved in, from my observation over the last couple of years, looking back over the last 10, this is like an onion. The more you peel it, the more you cry … It’s unimaginable what the new county commission is going to find when they get seated.”
ACN building
The LGC approved $85 million in limited obligation bonds in October for Cabarrus to purchase the ACN building in Concord for the county’s human services department. The department currently operates out of an old Kmart building, which Morris said is inadequate.
Cabarrus County first planned to purchase the ACN building and related projects through a program that provides funding as expenses happen rather than upfront or having to reapply for each new item. The LGC previously approved such a program for Cabarrus, with $42 million for the ACN building intended to be the last step, Morris said. From there, the county hoped to include $20 million for renovations and $22 million for a behavioral health facility in a subsequent, similar program.
The LGC and Cabarrus County decided in July to close out the former program without the ACN building. Instead, the groups decided Cabarrus County should submit a new debt request for the building, renovations and construction in September, Morris said.
When the September meeting came around, however, the Cabarrus County items were not included on the LGC’s agenda. Morris and other representatives from Cabarrus County attended the meeting anyway, which sparked discussion from LGC members, including John Burns and Revenue Secretary Ron Penny, who both questioned why the item hadn’t made it.
“They don’t have a right to be approved,” Penny said at the meeting. “But they have a right to be on the agenda and to be heard.”
The LGC ultimately approved the borrowing against staff recommendation with a split 6-3 vote in October, with Folwell in dissent.
Folwell’s issue with the project, he told the Observer, was that the county planned to pay much more for the ACN building than what an appraisal determined it was worth. He also said the county evaded questions and didn’t present information he asked for.
“They just kept wanting to meet, and we’d ask them for something, then they would present something different,” Folwell said. “They’re just not used to somebody, you know, actually asking tough questions that are not political, that are not emotional, but are mathematical.”
An appraisal on the building and the vacant land came back at nearly $24 million, according to documents included with the October agenda. That was much lower than the agreed purchasing price of $42 million.
Folwell told the Observer the $24 million appraisal was never shown to the LGC — something he said should be grounds for dismissal from office for anyone who withheld the information. Folwell provided emails to the Observer from County Manager Rodney Harris, who acknowledged the low appraisal values could be a “dealbreaker of a problem.”
But, Morris said, $42 million is cheaper than constructing an entirely new facility, which could cost over $85 million.
“So we’ve got $62 million invested in the building, versus a minimum of $85 million to build a new building, plus we had the added bonus of getting the property for that mental health facility as well,” Morris said. “So from a total expense standpoint, that was the most economical option that we were able to locate.”
Cabarrus County school projects
Cabarrus County had similar issues getting approval to borrow for various school-related projects.
On Nov. 12 the LGC voted unanimously to approve a $73 million borrowing request for school maintenance projects, but only narrowly approved a $78 million request to finance the construction on a new school with a 5-4 vote and Folwell again in dissent.
The approval was followed by a news release that emphasized the decision “went against a staff recommendation to delay the vote while awaiting important information.”
At the November meeting, LGC staff recommended the commission not approve the borrowing request for the construction of the new school since Cabarrus County only had a preliminary guaranteed price projection. Staff advised the LGC to wait until February before approving the project.
Morris and Wortman both said they believe the requests were intentionally slowed.
But Folwell, a former state legislator, directly addressed any speculation from local officials that political machinations by he and Pittman are behind the delays.
“I have served with Larry Pittman. I talked to Larry Pittman occasionally. But no, I don’t consider Larry Pittman to be a subject matter expert about draw programs and construction costs,” Folwell said. “When you have a county that has the economics of Cabarrus County, it did not have to be and it should not have been this difficult … They always opted for the more expensive option that created the least amount of certainty for taxpayers, and there’s nothing political about that.”
This story was originally published November 25, 2024 at 6:00 AM with the headline "Cabarrus leaders accuse NC treasurer of getting ‘political.’ It’s just math, he says."
