Chatham County Rising is a series of virtual town hall events with 2020 candidates.  We cannot hold our Candi-dating events in the time of COVID-19 and offer this series to  help voters get to know our candidates. 

All events will be Zoom webinars.  If we exceed capacity, the event will live stream to Facebook.

Pre-registration is required.  Once you have registered you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the webinar.  

Joining webinars is 'first come, first served'. If the webinar is full you will receive notice about watching on Facebook.

Questions may be submitted in advance via email to Chair@ccdpnc.org. 

Town Hall with Sen. Valerie Foushee

July 7, 2020 6:30 pm

Register

https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_puG0tPFHQAKgS9nw5ZqiXw

Town Hall with Commissioner Candidates

Commissioner Mike Dasher,
Candidate Franklin Gomez Flores and
Commissioner Karen Howard.

July 2, 2020, 6:30 pm

Register

https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_z4DAyTyzRoWWkb6jzWOLEg   

June 2, 2020

Statement on the murder of George Floyd and Protests

The Chatham County Democratic Party is angered and deeply distressed by the brutal murder of George Floyd.  We stand with our black and brown brothers and sisters in their outrage and action to protest the continual violence perpetrated on people of color in the United States. These protests are about the murder of George Floyd but also about Sandra Bland, Philando Castillo, Eric Garner, Kalief Browder and so many others. The protests are about 400 years of racism and oppression.

We recognize and call for the transformation of the systemic racist structures that have oppressed and diminished people of color since inception of our nation.

We oppose the current national administration’s rhetoric, which only serves to inflame an already volatile situation in cities across our nation and causes an escalation in violence and abuse.

The upwelling of anger and protest signals that this is a time for us to come together to reform our government’s political and economic systems and policies so as to finally achieve a just and peaceful society for all.

We thank Governor Cooper for his forbearance and determination to put life above property.

While many of us in the Democratic Party, by virtue of our white privilege cannot know the pain, anger that communities of color continue to experience, we share your distress and sorrow and pledge to work to change our communities and governments.

We concur with President Obama that “if we want to bring about real change, then the choice isn’t between protest and politics. We have to do both. We have to mobilize to raise awareness and we have to organize and cast ballots to make sure that we elect candidates who will act on reform.”

Join us in this important work.

Jan Nichols, Chair
Chatham County Democratic Party
www.ChathamDemsNC.net

TAKE ACTION: Tell your lawmakers to put people above politics and support SB861's vital protections for North Carolina voters. 

Use Democracy NC's form to contact legislators.

Senate lawmakers have proposed emergency election legislation that seeks to expand voting access and secure voters' ability to cast a ballot at home or in-person in the upcoming 2020 elections. 

Senate Bill 861 would provide two important categories of funding and protection for voters and our democracy, which Democracy NC supports. 

First, SB861 would expand absentee voting access, by:

• allowing absentee by mail requests by email, phone, fax, and via a secure online portal,
• reducing vote-by-mail witness requirements from two signatures to one, and
• providing absentee voters with pre-paid postage and envelopes.

Second, SB861 would protect in-person voting, by:

• increasing flexibility to help counties recruit additional poll workers,
• providing sanitary supplies and protective equipment to maintain healthy polling places, and
• making Election Day a holiday.

This comprehensive plan is North Carolina's best chance to avoid the mistakes of other states that have unnecessarily exposed voters to the deadly coronavirus and keep our state's voters safe and voting secure during the fast-approaching 2020 elections.

Request Your Absentee Ballot NOW!

The only certainty we have about voting this fall is that things are very fluid.  We don’t really know what October and November will bring. 

That’s why requesting an absentee by-mail ballot now is a good idea.

• It allows the Board of Elections to plan and request additional resources to meet demand.
  
  
• It gives you, the voter, the choice of voting by mail or voting in person. That is because even if you request and receive a mail-in ballot, you can choose to not use it and vote early in person or on election day.
  
  
• You don’t need any special reason to request a ballot to vote by mail.

How to request your ballot

• Fill out this request form.  If you can’t print it out call the Chatham Board of Elections (919-545-8500) to request they mail you a form.
  
  
• You will need your drivers license number, a NC special ID card number or the last 4 digits of your social security number to fill out the form. 
  
  
• Only the registered voter or their near relative or legal guardian may complete and sign the request form. (A near relative is the voter’s spouse, brother, sister, parent, grandparent, child, grandchild, mother-in-law, father-in-law, daughter-in-law, son-in-law, stepparent or stepchild.) 

• The request form must be mailed or delivered in person and may not be faxed or emailed.
  
  
• Mail your request to the Chatham County Board of Elections, PO Box 111, Pittsboro, NC 27312.
  
  
• Deliver in person to Chatham County Board of Election, 984 Thompson St., Pittsboro, NC 27312.
  
  
• No person other than the voter or their near relative/legal guardian may possess or return a completed absentee request form.
  
  
• The last day to request an absentee ballot is 5:00 PM on October 27, 2020

Find out if your absentee ballot request has been processed 

• Go to https://vt.ncsbe.gov/RegLkup/ 
• Type in your name.
• On the next screen, click on your name to get to your voter record.
• At the bottom of your voter record click on the section header labeled "Absentee Ballot"
• The status of your request will be there
• Absentee ballots are currently scheduled to be mailed on September 4, 2020.

SB 861, Comprehensive Covid-19 Protections for Voters is being considered by the state legislature.  If passed it will expand absentee voting access and increase protections for in-person voting.  Learn more.

Voting an Absentee Ballot

Witnesses

• The voter should mark their ballot in the presence of two witnesses (or one witness if the witness is a Notary Public). If the voter is unable to mark the ballot, an assistant shall mark the ballot according to the voter’s instructions.
  • A witness should not observe so closely that they are able to see what votes the voter marked. What is required is that the witness sees the that the voter is voting the ballot

Prohibited Witnesses

• The following individuals are prohibited from serving as a witness on an absentee ballot:
  • A person who is under 18
  • An individual who is a candidate for nomination or election to such office, unless the voter is the candidate’s near relative
• Additionally, if the voter is a patient or resident of a hospital, clinic, nursing home, or rest home, the following people are also prohibited from serving as a witness on the absentee ballot:
  • An owner, manager, director, employee of the hospital, clinic, nursing home, or rest home in which the voter is a patient or resident
  • An individual who holds any elective office under the United States, this State, or any political subdivision of this State
  • An individual who holds any office in a State, congressional district, county, or precinct political party or organization, or who is a campaign manager or treasurer for any candidate or political party; provided that a delegate to a convention shall not be considered a party office.

Certification of Witnesses and Assistants

• The voter’s two witnesses must, after observing that the voter marking the ballot, complete and sign the envelope in the space designated as Witnesses’ Certification.
• If a voter used the services of a Notary Public as a sole witness, the notary will sign the Notary-Witness Certification.
  • A notary is not permitted to charge a fee for witnessing an absentee ballot. G.S. § 10B-30.
• Any person who assisted the voter must sign and date the certificate in the proper place on the envelope.

After Marking the Absentee Ballot

• Once the ballot is marked, the voter or a person assisting the voter must:
  • 1) seal the ballot and document in the container-return envelope and
  • 2) complete the Absentee Application and Certificate on the ballot container-return envelope.

Returning the Voted Ballot

• Once the Absentee Application and Certificate is fully executed with all relevant signatures, the voted ballot (placed inside the container-return envelope) must be returned to the county board of elections no later than 5:00 PM on Election Day.
• Absentee ballots received after 5:00 PM on Election Day will be timely only if they are received by mail no later than 5:00 PM on the third day following the date of the election, and bear a postmark that is dated on or before Election Day.
• The envelope may be mailed or delivered in person to either the county board of elections office or to an open one-stop absentee voting site during the early voting period.

Only the voter or the voter’s near relative may take possession of the absentee ballot for purpose

Other resources.

www.ncvoter.org

NCSBOE How to Vote Absentee Information

On April 25, 2020 Chatham County Democrats met in a virtual convention. We missed seeing each other in person and the opportunity to talk to elected officials and candidates.  Here are the documents from the convention and videos.

Videos

Candidate Scott Huffman - 13th Congressional District

Documents

Agenda-Rev
Rules of the day
2019 Convention Minutes
Representation at the 2020 District and State Democratic Conventions
Message from Chairman Goodwin

Resolutions:
Resolution Committee Report
Chatham County Resolutions from the committee report
2020 Resolutions
Submitted outside of the precinct meetings: 2020 Resolutions from individuals

State and District Convention Delegates

(NY Times) An effective strategy to beat the virus is the ultimate answer to how we get our economy back on track.

By Joe Biden

Mr. Biden is the presumptive Democratic nominee for president.

April 12, 2020

People across America are stepping up to the plate. Millions are performing essential services at great personal risk, and millions more are staying at home, away from friends and extended family. In return, they want the answer to a simple question: What is the plan to safely reopen America?

So far, the Trump administration hasn’t supplied an answer.

The plan has to start with responding effectively to the immediate medical crisis and ultimately lead to the widespread availability and administration of a vaccine. But we can’t stay home and just wait for the vaccine to arrive. As others have noted, we need to build a bridge from here to there. Here’s what our national strategy should look like.

First, we have to get the number of new cases of the disease down significantly. That means social distancing has to continue and the people on the front lines have to get the supplies and equipment they need. President Trump needs to use his full powers under the Defense Production Act to fight the disease with every tool at our disposal. He needs to get the federal response organized and stop making excuses. For more Americans to go back to their jobs, the president needs to do better at his job.

Second, there needs to be widespread, easily available and prompt testing — and a contact tracing strategy that protects privacy. A recent report from Mr. Trump’s Department of Health and Human Services made clear that we are far from achieving this goal.

We should be running multiple times the number of diagnostic tests we’re performing right now. And we should be ready to scale up a second form of testing: rapid serology tests to tell who has already been infected with the coronavirus and has antibodies. This isn’t rocket science; it’s about investment and execution. We are now several months into this crisis, and still this administration has not squarely faced up to the “original sin” in its failed response — the failure to test.

Third, we have to make sure that our hospitals and health care system are ready for flare-ups of the disease that may occur when economic activity expands again. Reopening the right way will still not be completely safe. Public health officials will need to conduct effective disease surveillance. Hospitals need to have the staff and equipment necessary to handle any local outbreaks, and we need an improved federal system to get help to these places as needed.

Make no mistake: An effective plan to beat the virus is the ultimate answer to how we get our economy back on track. So we should stop thinking of the health and economic responses as separate. They are not.

Once we have taken these steps, we can begin to reopen more businesses and put more people back to work. Things will not go back to “normal” right away. As public health experts have said, we should expect activity to return gradually, with sites like offices and stores reopening before arenas and theaters.

That’s why we need to be working right now on the conditions under which our economy will operate as America gets back to work, and ensuring that the financial support our families and small businesses will need is fully in place.

As long as there is a significant risk that the virus can start spreading again, we are going to have to do some things differently. And the federal government should be leading the effort to figure that out.

If I were president, I would convene top experts from the private sector, industry by industry, to come up with new ideas on how to operate more safely. Perhaps offices and factories will need to space out workers and pursue other solutions to lessen risk of spread of the virus on the job. Restaurants may need new layouts, with diners farther apart.

From my talks with some industry leaders, I know that many are already at work on these questions. Mr. Trump needs to accelerate this thinking and make sure it is available to all businesses — including small businesses, not just the largest companies.

Likewise, I would direct the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, working with organized labor and employee groups, to figure out what protections workers need on the job during this period.

Getting protective gear to our health care workers and emergency medical workers is the top priority — and one where we are still lagging. But once that need is met, I’d ask the experts to figure out what delivery workers, waiters, clerks and so many other professionals need to be safe. And I would focus like a laser on the racial disparities in Covid-19 cases.

Franklin Gomez Flores, a resident of Siler City, is seeking a seat on the Chatham County Board of Commissioners as the representative of District 5. To have his name listed on the ballot for the 2020 General Election in November, he needs the support of 2500 registered Chatham County voters willing to nominate him by signing his petition. Gomez is a registered Democrat but was unable to file for the primary due to legislation passed last year.  CCDP supports his petition and is assisting in the collection of signatures.

Born in Guatemala, Franklin fled the country’s violence, poverty, and lack of opportunity with his family and came to Siler City in 1999. He was five years old. He attended Chatham County schools and credits the English as a Second Language program with helping him learn English and thrive academically. Franklin excelled at soccer and track and field at Jordan Matthews High School and graduated with honors among the top 10 students in his class. With the support of the Scholars’ Latino Initiative, he entered UNC-Chapel Hill and graduated in 2016 with a bachelor’s degree and a major in biology. While a student at UNC, Franklin served as an intern for the Office of Undergraduate Retention Finish Line Project, an outreach program especially intended to engage and support minority male students. He also mentored Latinx high school students by conducting college prep workshops that included information about navigating the applications process, meeting admissions requirements, securing financial aid, and succeeding academically and socially. He also served as outreach chair for UNC’s Carolina Hispanic Association and interned for a summer with Gilded Realty Group in Mebane.

Currently employed as a heavy equipment operator at Sealing Agents Waterproofing, Franklin has a passion for service to others. He currently serves on the Chatham County Planning Board. As a member of the Board of Commissioners, Franklin will fight for Chatham County on these issues:

• Increasing affordable housing
• Promoting responsible growth by following Chatham’s Land Use Plan
• Advocating for equitable pay for equitable jobs
• Protecting immigrants’ rights
• Supporting quality education for all
• Seeking the diverse perspectives of Chatham’s citizens
• Providing responsible, collaborative leadership

Franklin Gomez has the support of all four Democratic County Commissioners. 

"Franklin will be a terrific addition to the Chatham County Board of Commissioners as the first Hispanic to be elected in Chatham.  His enthusiasm, background, and concerns for his Siler City neighbors will provide a new voice in our diverse county."
Diana Hales, Commissioner, District 3

"I am pleased to endorse Franklin Gomez for the District 5 seat on the Chatham County Board of Commissioners. As a first-generation Hispanic American who was educated here in Chatham and at UNC Chapel Hill, Franklin will bring a welcome perspective that will enhance the work of the board and contribute to the quality of life in his community and beyond." 
Karen Howard, Commissioner, District 1 

If you would like to sign the petition or assist in collecting signatures please contact Alirio Estevez (alirioestevez1969@gmail.com), Franklin Gomez (gfran0205@gmail.com) or call CCDP at 919-913-7215

Download a petition form here.

As Chatham County Democrats we have a lot to be proud of. Our county consistently leads North Carolina in turnout. Democrats win in Chatham. We are blessed with amazing volunteers. 

Results in the 2018 and 2019 elections are encouraging as we prepare for 2020. A few of the highlights: 

• We broke the Republican legislative supermajority … in both North Carolina chambers. 
• We elected not only a Democratic Supreme Court Justice but also three Democrats to the NC Court of Appeals. 
• Kentucky and Louisiana have elected Democratic Governors. 
• Virginia elected a Democratic majority in both legislative chambers. 

In 2020 we can complete the work of taking back control of our state legislature while retaining the Governor’s Mansion and a progressive majority on the NC Supreme Court. We can also secure North Carolina’s Electoral College votes for the Democratic candidate for President. 

We can do all this – if we make sure that every one of our voters gets to the polls and votes. 

Strong precincts are integral to achieving this goal for the 2020 election.   

You can be part of winning in 2020.  Attend your precinct meeting and learn about opportunities to work for victory.

You will also be able to submit resolutions for the Democratic party to vote on -- these can become part of the national party platform. Information on writing and submitting a resolution to your precinct is here.

All registered Democrats are urged to attend their precinct meetings.  In addition to voting on resolutions you will:

• Learn about the work we are doing for this election cycle and opportunities to help,
• Get to know fellow Democrats,
• Learn about coming activities, 
• Elect delegates to the County Convention,

  The road to winning elections up and down the ballot starts with your precinct.

Need to find out which precinct you live in?  Look it up on the NC Board of Elections website.

Resolution Guide (PDF).

Amendment “Income Tax Cap of 7%”

Ballot language: Constitutional amendment to reduce the income tax rate in North Carolina to a maximum allowable rate of seven percent (7%).

Key points:

- An income tax cap will tie the hands of future generations.

- Lawmakers will have to raise other taxes to make up the difference.

- North Carolina won’t be able to fund schools and other priorities adequately.

- The wealthiest will continue to get the biggest tax breaks.

- The current tax rates are already lower than 7%: 5.25% (personal income tax)
and 2% (corporate tax rate)

Voters will be asked to vote on six amendments to the North Carolina Constitution in November. They are all unnecessary, unprecedented, and politically motivated. We need to nix all six. It’s unclear who will write the final ballot language, but the current language is “Constitutional amendment to reduce the income tax rate in North Carolina to a maximum allowable rate of seven percent (7%).”

This amendment originated as Senate Bill 75 and proposes changing one word in the North Carolina Constitution: “The rate of tax on incomes shall not in any case exceed seven percent.” The current language is “ten percent.” Lowering the income tax rate would be possible without amending the Constitution, but supporters can claim that they are lowering the income tax rate, even though the personal income tax rate currently stands at 5.25%, and the corporate income tax rate is 2%.

The proposed amendment may appeal to some voters, but it will create problems for the people of North Carolina. Income taxes are the largest source of revenue for the state. They are necessary funds that we pay to support the common good, including public education, health and human services, economic development, public safety, transportation, agriculture, and the environment. While the economy is relatively healthy now, during a budget shortfall the only way to make up for lost revenues is to increase local taxes, property taxes, sales taxes, and user fees. These regressive taxes nickel and time North Carolinians, disproportionately impacting the poor and middle class.

Without the ability to align the income tax rate with where income is growing, other taxes such as sales and property taxes will increase to fund the needs of our state.  This asks more from low- and middle-income North Carolinians. Already taxpayers with incomes below $60,000 (as a share of their income) pay nearly two times what millionaires pay in total state and local taxes.  The cap would make this worse.

A cap on income tax rates also exposes North Carolina to financial risk in times of economic downturns. Following the recession of 2008, for example, North Carolina faced a $3.2 billion budget gap for fiscal year 2009. The budget gap for fiscal year 2010 grew by $1.5 billion to a total of $4.6 billion. At a time when North Carolina’s population is growing, more people and less money means a significant reduction in state services.

Recent tax cuts have also jeopardized the state’s fiscal future. Eric Figueroa, Senior Policy Analyst for the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, has cautioned, “North Carolina since 2013 has enacted tax cuts that will cost $3.5 billion a year, or 15 percent of the state’s general fund budget, once they take full effect in 2019.” Capping the primary source of revenue for the state also puts at risk North Carolina’s coveted bond rating because it limits the state’s ability to react to negative economic developments.  

According to the Budget and Tax Center of the NC Justice Center, “The final state budget, passed by the NC General Assembly after overturning Governor Cooper’s veto, continues to underinvest in areas of great public need and neglects to account for upcoming federal budget cuts. Instead, the new $23.9 billion budget that lawmakers enacted maintains the same rigid commitment to reducing public investments in the face of growing and changing needs.”

Richard Moore, NC State Treasurer from 2001-2009, has cautioned that lowering the income tax rate “would expose our state to financial risk, threatening the economic and physical wellbeing of North Carolinians across the state.”

We must protect the largest source of North Carolina’s revenue to ensure that the state can keep up with the needs of a growing population while retaining its fiscal flexibility in an uncertain economic world. Vote against the amendment to “Cap Income Taxes at 7%”!

Sources:

https://www.ncleg.net/Sessions/2017/Bills/Senate/PDF/S75v5.pdf

https://ballotpedia.org/North_Carolina_Income_Tax_Cap_Amendment_(2018)

https://www.cbpp.org/blog/thanks-to-tax-cuts-large-budget-shortfalls-loom-in-north-carolina

http://www.ncpolicywatch.com/2018/06/28/bad-for-north-carolinas-bottom-line/print

http://www.ncjustice.org/?q=budget-and-tax/2019-budget-fails-effectively-address-nc%E2%80%99s-existing-and-emerging-needs

Getting fiscal about policy proposals.

Paul Krugman

The New York Times Feb. 19, 2019

Whoever gets the Democratic nomination, she or he will run in part on proposals to increase government spending. And you know what that will mean: There will be demands that the candidate explain how all this will be paid for. Many of those demands will be made in bad faith, from people who never ask the same questions about tax cuts. But there are some real questions about the fiscal side of a progressive agenda.

Well, I have some thoughts about that, inspired in part by looking at Elizabeth Warren’s proposals on both the tax and spending side. By the way, I don’t know whether Warren will or even should get the nomination. But she’s a major intellectual figure, and is pushing her party toward serious policy discussion in a way that will have huge influence whatever her personal trajectory.

In particular, Warren’s latest proposal on child care – and the instant pushback from the usual suspects – has me thinking that we could use a rough typology of spending proposals, classified by how they might be paid for. Specifically, let me suggest that there are three broad categories of progressive expenditure: investment, benefits enhancement, and major system overhaul, which need to be thought about differently from a fiscal point of view.

So, first off, investment – typically spending on infrastructure or research, but there may be some room at the margin for including spending on things like childhood development in the same category. The defining characteristic here is that it’s spending that will enhance society’s future productivity. How should we pay for that kind of outlay?

The answer is, we shouldn’t. Think of all the people who say that the government should be run like a business. Actually it shouldn’t, but the two kinds of institution do have this in common: if you can raise funds cheaply and apply them to high-return projects, you should go ahead and borrow. And Federal borrowing costs are very low – less than 1 percent, adjusted for inflation – while we are desperately in need of public investment, i.e., it has a high social return. So we should just do it, without looking for pay-fors.

Much of what seems to be in the Green New Deal falls into that category. To the extent that it’s a public investment program, demands that its supporters show how they’ll pay for it show more about the critics’ bad economics than about the GND’s logic.

My second category is a bit harder to define, but what I’m thinking of are initiatives that either expand an existing public program or use subsidies to create incentives for expanding some kind of socially desirable private activity – in each case involving sums that are significant but not huge, say a fraction of a percent of GDP.

The Affordable Care Act falls into that category. It expanded Medicaid while using a combination of regulation and subsidies to make private insurance more available to families above the new Medicaid line. Warren’s childcare proposal, which reportedly will come in at around 1/3 of a percent of GDP, also fits. So would a “Medicare for All” proposal that involves allowing people to buy in to government insurance, rather than offering that insurance free of charge.

It’s harder to justify borrowing for this kind of initiative than borrowing for investment. True, with interest rates low and demand weak it makes some sense to run persistent deficits, but there are surely enough investment needs to use up that allowance. So you want some kind of pay-for. But the sums are small enough that the revenue involved could be raised by fairly narrow-gauge taxes – in particular, taxes that hit only high-income Americans.

That is, in fact, how Obamacare was financed: the revenue component came almost entirely from taxes on high incomes (there were some small items like the tax on tanning parlors.) And Warren has in fact proposed additional taxes on the wealthy – her proposed tax on fortunes over $50 million would yield something like four times the cost of her child care proposal.

So benefit enhancement can, I’d argue, be paid for with taxes on high incomes and large fortunes. It doesn’t have to impose on the middle class.

Finally, my third category is major system overhaul, of which the archetype would be replacing employer-based private health insurance with a tax-financed public program – the purist version of Medicare for all. A really major expansion of Social Security might fall into that category too, although smaller enhancements might not.

Proposals in this category are literally an order of magnitude more expensive than benefit enhancements: private health insurance currently amounts to 6 percent of GDP. To implement these proposals, then, we’d need a lot more revenue, which would have to come from things like payroll taxes and/or a value-added tax that hit the middle class.

You can argue that most middle-class families would be better off in the end, that the extra benefits would more than compensate for the higher taxes. And you’d probably be right. But this would be a much heavier political lift. You don’t have to be a neoliberal tool to wonder whether major system overhaul should be part of the Democratic platform right now, even if it’s something many progressives aspire to.

My main point now, however, is that when people ridicule progressive proposals as silly and unaffordable, they’re basically revealing their own biases and ignorance. Investment can and should be debt-financed; benefit enhancements can be largely paid for with high-end taxes. Howard Schultz won’t like it, but that’s his problem.

By Mickayla McCann

Judge John Arrowood is running for election to the NC Court of Appeals this November to ensure that all North Carolinians receive equal treatment under the law.

Arrowood was appointed to the Court by Governor Roy Cooper in April 2017 to fill the vacancy created by Judge Doug McCullough’s resignation. Arrowood previously served on the Court from 2007 to 2008 after being appointed by Governor Mike Easley. Seeking to serve his first full term, Arrowood believes that he has what it takes to administer justice for all.

“I think it is absolutely critical that we have judges on the Court of Appeals who have experience and independence,” Arrowood said. “I believe that my 26 years of private practice, my five years on the Court of Appeals prior to that, and my work in public service while I was in private practice are experiences the court needs at this time.”

Arrowood was the first member of his family to obtain a college degree, showing considerable determination to continue his education after his parents passed away when he was just 15. He obtained his law degree from UNC-Chapel Hill School of Law, and began his career as a research assistant and staff attorney on the Court of Appeals. He then devoted 26 years to employment and commercial litigation at the private practice of James, McElroy, and Diehl in Charlotte. Prior to his first appointment to the Court, he also served as a Special Superior Court Judge. Over the course of his career, Arrowood has authored over 180 opinions, concurrences, and dissents.

“I have a unique experience for the court and a proven record of independence, fairness, and treating everyone equally under the law,” Arrowood said.

While Arrowood’s stellar performance as a trial and appellate judge has earned him an AV rating in Martindale Hubble, Arrowood is also extensively involved in his community. He is a member of the North Carolina Banking Commission, the North Carolina Rules Review Commission, the North Carolina Art’s Council, and the board of directors of the North Carolina Railroad Company. He is also an active member of St. Peter’s Episcopal Church, where he serves as the Chancellor for the Parish, the Chair of Outreach Grants’ Commission, and the Delegate to the Diocesan Convention.

As a judge, Arrowood thinks the recent legislation that Republicans have pushed to reduce the Court from 15 judges to 12 would hinder the Court’s ability to handle cases in a timely manner. “I think it’s critical that we maintain a court of 15, rather than what the legislature is trying to reduce, so that the litigants are able to have efficient and fast resolutions of their cases,” Arrowood said.

Above all, Arrowood states that he is committed to rendering decisions fairly and without favoritism to any party.

“I do not have any agenda to pursue or any platform to advance other than to dispense equal justice under the law,” Arrowood told Indy Week. “I pledge to perform my responsibilities with integrity and to the best of my ability.”

For more visit Http://keepjudgarrowood.org

Sources

https://indyweek.com/news/elections/john-arrowood/

by Mickayla McCann

Allegra Collins is striving to promote justice for all by running for the NC Court of Appeals.

“I believe a good judge is articulate, thorough, thoughtful, and skilled at communicating in writing,” Collins said. “I have taught legal research and writing and practiced appellate law for many years now. I love appellate law and the North Carolina appellate process. My training, background, and experience have really led me to believe that I can serve effectively as a judge for everyone in North Carolina.”

Along with her passion for equity, the Raleigh-based attorney brings extensive judicial experience. After graduating from Campbell Law School, Collins served as a law clerk on the NC Court of Appeals for the Honorable Linda Stevens. She later founded Allegra Collins Law, which focuses exclusively on appellate litigation. Currently she practices regularly before the NC Court of Appeals and the NC Supreme Court. She is also a Clinical Assistant Professor at Campbell Law School, where she teaches Judicial Writing, Legal Research and Writing, and Remedies.

Though Collins is known for her role as the Vice Chairperson of the North Carolina Bar Association’s Appellate Practice Section, she also holds many leadership positions within her community. As a mother of two, she has served as a member of Wake County Public School System’s Parent Advisory Council as well as the PTA president at her son’s school.

By engaging in her community and dedicating her career to appellate law, Collins is poised to be a competitive candidate in this year’s election. She states that her mission is to maintain the independence of the judiciary while judging accurately, fairly, and impartially.

“I will work very hard as a judge to hear each case on its own facts, research thoroughly to apply the law accurately, and put forth reasoned decisions in a timely fashion,” Collins said.

Collins believes that preventing injustice is integral to the position of any Court of Appeals judge. “Injustice is a breakdown in the process or procedure of the justice system, which results in an inaccurate and unfair outcome,” she said. “To prevent it, I will scrupulously apply the appropriate process and procedure to ensure that there is no inaccurate or unfair outcome.”

Collins seeks to fill the seat of the Republican judge, Rick Elmore, who has chosen not to run for a third eight-year term.

“I think my training and in-depth expertise in appellate law and in legal research and writing will make me an effective judge,” Collins said. “I believe that voters can count on me to be fair and impartial.”

To stay up to date on Allegra Collins’ campaign, check out her website.

Amendment:  “Voter ID” 

Ballot language: Constitutional amendment to require voters to provide photo identification before voting in person.

Key points:

- The bill contains no implementation language so as to create as little controversy as possible until the amendment is voted on. The General Assembly is already scheduled to reconvene to pass a bill that includes all the details. You have to pass the amendment to find out what’s in it.

- This is a do-over of previous voter ID initiative that were ruled unconstitutional. The 2013 voter ID law, which included specific forms of acceptable ID, was struck down because the legislature excluded many of the alternative photo IDs used by African Americans. The courts held that the law had targeted African-American voters with “almost surgical precision.”

- Voter fraud in not a problem.  The audit of the 2016 election in North Carolina by the State Board of Elections found that out of 4,769,640 votes cast, it appears that one fraudulent vote would have been prevented with a voter ID.

- An estimated 218,000 registered voters in North Carolina lack photo ID, enough to swing a Presidential election.

Voters will be asked to vote on six amendments to the North Carolina Constitution in November. They are all unnecessary, unprecedented, and politically motivated. We need to nix all six. It’s unclear who will write the final ballot language, but the current language is “Constitutional amendment to require voters to provide photo identification before voting in person.”

This amendment originated as House Bill 1092, and it’s short: “Voters offering to vote in person shall present photographic identification before voting. The General Assembly shall enact general laws governing the requirements of such photographic identification, which may include exceptions.” People who support requiring a photo ID to vote argue that it prevents fraud. In fact, the amendment presents a solution to a problem that rarely exists, and it creates new restrictions on your right to vote. The amendment also leaves many questions unanswered about what kind of ID will be necessary, whether only “in person” voting requires such IDs, and what impact such a requirement will have on older people, young people, and people of color. This amendment is not about preventing voter fraud; it’s about giving the General Assembly a blank check to determine who gets to vote and who doesn’t.

The voter ID amendment is essentially a do-over of previous voter ID initiatives that have been shown to be unconstitutional. By leaving the details out of House Bill 1092—they will be worked out later—the hope is that the amendment will create less controversy than the 2013 voter ID law, which a federal court found targeted African American voters with “almost surgical precision.” The 2013 law required specific forms of photo  ID—a North Carolina driver’s license, a state-issued ID card, a military ID, or a U.S. passport—but these types of ID created difficulties for older people who no longer drive, those who rely on mass transportation, young people with only a student ID, and other groups.

The intention of Republicans is to create a voter ID that will withstand judicial scrutiny this time, which is likely if the amendment is passed. But as developments in technology make more common other forms of identification--facial recognition, biometrics--photo IDs will quickly become outdated. Gerry Cohen, former special counsel to the NC General Assembly, recently quipped that requiring photo IDs will be like “mandating buggy whips in all motor vehicles.”

According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, only seven states have strict voter ID requirements, and even fewer write such requirements into their state constitution. Once it’s written into the NC Constitution, it will be difficult to undo.

How common is voter fraud? It’s almost nonexistent. The most recent study of the 2016 election by the North Carolina State Board of Elections found that only two people, out of 4,769,640 voters, pretended to be someone they were not. One woman signed an absentee ballot for her deceased husband, and another cast a ballot for Trump because her deceased mother asked her to. Only one vote would probably have been avoided with a voter ID. The report also found no evidence of ballot stuffing or equipment tampering.

U.S. Rep. G.K. Butterfield said in a statement, “This latest proposal by Republicans in the North Carolina General Assembly isn’t about protecting our elections. It is about suppressing the vote. Their continued and thinly veiled efforts to make it harder and less likely that some North Carolinians will vote are shameful.”

We should be encouraging more people to vote, not making it harder. Vote against the “Voter ID” amendment!

Sources

https://www.ncleg.net/Sessions/2017/Bills/House/PDF/H1092v5.pdf

https://ballotpedia.org/North_Carolina_Voter_ID_Amendment_(2018)

https://medium.com/@Jeff_Jackson/a-close-look-at-the-six-constitutional-amendments-on-your-ballot-43a77714dbfc

https://s3.amazonaws.com/dl.ncsbe.gov/sboe/Post-Election%20Audit%20Report_2016%20General%20Election/Post-Election_Audit_Report.pdf

Amendment Marsy’s Law (Victim's Rights)

Ballot language: Constitutional amendment to strengthen protections for victims of crime; to establish certain absolute basic rights for victims; and to ensure the enforcement of these rights.

Key Points:

- We already have strong victim’s rights legislation.

- This would be an underfunded/unfunded mandate.

- The law is too broad and risks unintended consequences, possibly compromising a victim’s right to privacy and the accused’s right to a speedy trial.

- It makes fundamental changes to the criminal justice system by eliminating the current distinction between adult and juvenile offences.

- Victim’s advocates in states that have voted on Marsy’s Law opposed it, as does the NC ACLU.

Voters will be asked to vote on six amendments to the North Carolina Constitution in November. They are all unnecessary, unprecedented, and politically motivated. We need to nix all six. It’s unclear who will write the final ballot language but the current language is “Constitutional amendment to strengthen protections for victims of crime; to establish certain absolute basic rights for victims; and to ensure the enforcement of these rights.”  

The amendment originated as House Bill 551 and is part of a national effort, sponsored by Marsy’s Law for All, to enact similar amendments in other states. Marsy’s Law takes its name from Marcella “Marsy” Nicholas, a California college student who was murdered by her ex-boyfriend in 1983. Marsy’s Law for All is the national organization founded by Henry Nicholas, Marsy’s brother and the co-founder of Broadcom Corp., who has spent some $27 million to pass similar constitutional amendments to increase the rights of victims. His ultimate goal: a victims amendment to the U.S. Constitution. “The whole idea that someone who has a lot of money can come into a state and heavily influence what our laws are is concerning,” said Peg Dorer, director of the NC Conference of District Attorneys.

Regardless of its origins, this amendment is unnecessary and would lead to numerous unintended consequences. Victim’s rights are already protected in the North Carolina Constitution, Article 1, Section 37, which details the rights of crime victims “as prescribed by law.” House Bill 551 removes “as prescribed by law,” so it is unclear how these rights would be afforded to victims and how the amendment might impact the rights of defendants and the operations of the courts. Some have suggested that that the amendment removes the flexibility and discretion of the legislature and the courts in criminal proceedings, creating significant delays and interfering with the rights of defendants to a speedy trial and effective legal counsel.

House Bill 551 also revises the current North Carolina Constitution to include victims of both crime and “delinquent acts.” The effect is to erase the current distinction between adult and juvenile offenses. The North Carolina Branch of the ACLU opposes the amendment, in part, because “we fear this will result in more pressure on the judicial system to pursue punitive outcomes in juvenile cases and undermine the current system’s focus on rehabilitation.”  

Other critics, including Democratic Rep. Marcia Morey, a former prosecutor and District Court judge, believes the money being spent to pass Marsy’s Laws could be better spent helping victims get to court, make up for lost wages, and get needed counseling. Victim’s rights advocates in states that have also voted on Marsy’s Law oppose it because adequate funding for systems and services and better enforcement of existing victims’ rights laws can more effectively serve survivors.

Our legal system manages rights between individuals through statute, not by means of the North Carolina Constitution. Mark Rabil, a Wake Forest University law professor and director of the school’s Innocence and Justice Clinic, is concerned that “Nobody’s really thinking about the change that [the amendment] fundamentally makes to the criminal justice system in the United States.” That system is based on two parties: the government and the accused, the prosecution and the defense. By essentially making victims a third party, the state runs the risk of complicating the process even more and possibly tilting the system against defendants. “I believe we have the best system of justice in the world,” Rabil added. “If we make victims a party, it’s going to turn into a three-ring circus.”

Barry Pollack, president of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers agrees: “It really turns the presumption of innocence upside down by designating someone as a victim . . . before it’s been established that the defendant has committed any crime.” Most Marsy’s Laws, he said, “give rights to ‘victims’ before there has been any conclusion about whether the accused has committed a crime.”

A completely different worry recently emerged recently on the BlueNC blog, run by former Democratic gubernatorial candidate James Protzman. If the amendment passes, Protzman warns, “Victim’s rights will be extended to any class of people the legislature wants, including fetuses. This amendment will pave the way for making abortion illegal under North Carolina’s constitution.”

Former Supreme Court Chief Justice Burley Mitchell also opposes the amendment. “The constitution . . . is supposed to set broad general policies and aspirations,” Mitchell said. “It’s not to get down into the nitty gritty refinements of all public policy.” Mary’s Law makes sweeping promises the state can’t keep, claims to fix problems that constitutions can’t solve, and harms our justice system.

Sources:

https://www.ncleg.net/Sessions/2017/Bills/House/PDF/H551v5.pdf

https://www.newsobserver.com/news/local/crime/article142702004.html

http://www.ncdistrictattorney.org/victimrights.html

https://ballotpedia.org/North_Carolina_Marsy%27s_Law_Crime_Victims_Rights_Amendment_(2018)

Susanna Birdsong, Senior Policy Counsel, ACLU-North Carolina. Memo to NC Senators. June 20, 2018.

Each election is important but 2020 is the year we must win up and down the ballot! 

We have a real opportunity to change leadership in our state legislature, hold the courts and keep our Governor Roy Cooper.  Every vote we turn out for Democrats increases the likelihood that we will take back the White House and add a Democratic Senator to Congress. There is a full slate of candidates in 2020 and you can help us turn out more Chatham voters to support them.

2020 is also the first year that the new voter ID law is in effect.  CCDP will be reaching out to voters to ensure they have valid ID's.

Perhaps even more importantly, the winning party will be in charge of redistricting following the 2020 census.  This will have far reaching impact on elections and policy for the next decade.

Your help is vitally important!  We can't succeed without you.  Become part of our volunteer network. If you can give 2 hours or 20 - there is something you can help with. 

With volunteers like you we will succeed.

Each election is important but in 2018 we have a lot at stake.  Our courts, our state constitution and the health of our state.   In addition there are many initiatives addressing various campaigns and issues recruiting volunteers.  There are many options but when you volunteer for the county party you are working to get voters out to support every Democratic candidate on the ballot, elect all four of our judicial candidates and defeat all six amendments to the state constitution.

We have very specific periods and types of work to be done so it is possible you may volunteer for us and other efforts.  Just remember we need to get Chatham voters out and have people at the polls to greet them.

Show your support for CCDP's efforts to promote our values and ideals and turn out our voters this November!  Purchase an ad in the Unity Breakfast program.  All program ads are full color.  Please send your art (pdf, png, or jpg) to Lesley Landis by September 7th.

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Quarter page $25

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