Branson, Trapp, Phillips, Henning

Guilford County government has been under Democratic rule for all but two of the last 20 years, and it's in shambles. The tax rate keeps going up, the county is over $1 billion in debt, the city manager has been investigated by both the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Internal Revenue Service, and long time agreements with other jurisdictions have been trampled by a Board of Commissioners that appears to have no regard for anyone.

One example is an agreement between Guilford County and the City of Greensboro on library funding. Guilford County simply refused to pay the amount that was agreed to, and the excuse was that there was no written contract. The message to Greensboro was that Greensboro could no longer trust anything the Board of Commissioners said unless it was detailed in a lengthy, legally binding contract. Some people believe that keeping their word is important, but not the Guilford County Board of Commissioners led by Chairman Skip Alston.

Fortunately the voters of Guilford County have a chance to do something about the mess that the Democrats have made, and that is by electing three Republicans and one Democrate who are newcomers to county politics and cannot be blamed for the current state of Guilford County government.

That is why we are endorsing Republican Jerry Alan Branson in District 4, Republican Jeff Phillips in District 5, Republican Hank Henning in District 6 and Democrat Ray Trapp for District 8.

District 4

Jerry Alan Branson is running against Democratic District 4 County Commissioner Kirk Perkins, who has been in office since 2004. Perkins tries to sound like a conservative when he runs for reelection because he knows how conservative the district is, but if you check his voting record, when Chairman Alston has needed a vote during the past eight years Perkins has provided it.

Perkins made an extremely political motion to fire County Manager Brenda Jones Fox, but it appears it was all for show. If Perkins had been serious he would have made sure he had a second for his motion. As it was the motion came out of the blue and, before anyone could second the motion, Alston gaveled the matter closed and the motion failed for lack of a second. So there was absolutely no discussion of it.

Perkins should have known that all he had to do was mention that he was going to make that motion to one of several fellow commissioners who had been railing against Fox for months and he would have had a second. After the motion failed for lack of a second, Perkins has never made the motion again. Why is that, if he was serious?

The damage that Fox has done to Guilford County will take years to repair, yet, other than that one motion, Perkins has sat up there and gone along with her ploys year after year. Before Fox, Greensboro and Guilford County had a good working relationship and cooperated in ways that saved the taxpayers money.

Perkins lists as an accomplishment buying Hagan-Stone Park from Greensboro. The only thing gained by Guilford County in buying the park is that now Guilford County pays Greensboro to run the park, and when Greensboro owned the park, Greensboro paid to run it. It didn't get a lot of attention but even the Greensboro city councilmembers couldn't believe that the county commissioners would be dumb enough to buy the park. But they did and now the county rather than the city pays the bill. Perkins lists it as an accomplishment.

Branson has run a good campaign and has made huge progress as a public speaker during the campaign. He has also managed to let voters know where he and Perkins differ on the issues. It's not easy because Perkins talks conservative but votes with Alston.

But Branson talks about saving money by standardizing school construction, a method that is used in many other areas of the country. Perkins claims he doesn't know what that means.

Branson says we are going to have trouble creating jobs with one of the highest tax rates in the piedmont triad and will work to lower tax rates. Perkins is one of the causes of that tax rate being so high.

Branson runs a family-owned trucking business that he said has 42 employees, so he knows what small businesses are going through in this economy. He also knows that the people of Guilford County don't need higher taxes.

Both Branson and Perkins agree that the county has not funded school building maintenance as well as it should be, but Perkins is the one responsible for funding. If the schools aren't getting enough it is the fault of the Democratically controlled Board of Guilford Commissioners, and Perkins is the vice chair.

Perkins out on the campaign trial is evidently trying to style himself as the Vice President Joe Biden of Guilford County. Two of the statements he makes are, "Everybody's kid out there is somebody's kid," and, "What's good for everybody is good for everybody."

Branson is being supported by Guilford County Commissioner Billy Yow, Guilford County Sheriff BJ Barnes and Sixth District Congressman Howard Coble.

District 5

Democratic District 5 candidate and At-large County Commissioner Paul Gibson is easy to get along with. He has been elected three times to the Board of Commissioners at large and it's simple to see why. Just about everybody that knows Gibson likes him, and everybody in Guilford County seems to know him. A lot of folks remember his father, Sheriff Paul Gibson. So Commissioner Paul Gibson has two generations of name recognition working for him.

If you ever see an open seat next to Gibson at what you expect to be a long boring meeting, take it, because you will be entertained. Gibson is funny and he cares about people.

But Gibson doesn't think you pay enough taxes. He believes the problems of Guilford County can be solved by taxing people more and having the county government spend more money. He talks about how he doesn't want to raise property taxes, but in 2005, 2006, 2007 and 2008 he voted for Guilford County budgets that included property tax increases. In 2009 and 2010 the budgets didn't have tax increases and Gibson voted against those budgets. Now he wants to raise the sales tax because he thinks county government needs more money.

Jeff Phillips says he believes that the county needs to spend the money it has more efficiently.

Phillips is in favor of "limited government." Gibson says that he doesn't know what that means.

Gibson says that the schools need more money for maintenance. He has been on the Board of Commissioners for the past eight years; if he believes that then he should have voted for more money for school maintenance. But the idea that the schools need more money for maintenance is absurd. The schools have several hundred million dollars in bond money that can be spent on big maintenance projects like replacing roofs and putting in new heating and air-conditioning systems, but according to the school board the schools never have enough money.

Gibson says that people have "a God given right to good health care." Phillips says he believes that those who can afford to pay something should pay something for their health care, and that the eligibility requirements for free health care should be looked at carefully.

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Phillips says he is against raising taxes and wants to operate the government more efficiently. He has some good ideas about saving money in administrators and putting more money into employees like teachers who actually do the work.

Phillips big problem in this campaign has been shooting himself in the foot. Phillips has written that the property tax values in the 2012 revaluation were fixed so that the commissioners could get more money without raising taxes. As to who fixed them and how it was done, Phillips doesn't even speculate on, but he says he believes the property values in the new revaluation were artificially raised so the county would have more revenue without actually raising taxes.

Phillips also misquoted Gibson when Gibson was asked at a forum how to handle illegal immigrants and Gibson said to put up a big sign that says "welcome everyone." Phillips got the meaning of the quote right, but if you put something in quote marks, not just the meaning but the words need to be right and they were not.

The Phillips campaign reported that he was endorsed by Sixth District Congressman Howard Coble and Coble did not endorse Phillips. People who have been around politics for any length of time in Guilford County know that Coble is very precise and particular about who he supports and what level of support they receive.

In this case the Phillips campaign sent a proposed statement about Phillips for Coble to approve. Coble crossed out endorsed but accepted the major portion of the statement, and depending on which of the many stories from the Phillips campaign you believe, somehow endorse was put in a headline over the statement by Coble on the Phillips campaign website.

Phillips took the word down as soon as the Coble campaign contacted him about the problem, but it is a great example of taking something that should have been helpful and turning it into controversy.

When Phillips received the statement with endorses crossed out, that would have been enough to tell most people that Coble was not endorsing Phillips, but it was not.

It also shows how big a man Coble is that he would allow Phillips to use his name or photo because Phillips ran against Coble in the Republican Primary in 2010.

Phillips says that it is just a misunderstanding. But Phillips is a member of Conservatives for Guilford County (C4gc), which seems to have more than its fair share of misunderstandings.

Despite his mistakes I am endorsing Phillips. The mistakes he has made I am writing off to inexperience, and if Gibson is elected and the Democrats maintain control of the Board of Commissioners you can expect taxes to go up and for the government to be as inefficient and wasteful as it is now. If we can get some new blood in there, even if the new commissioners are not perfect, then perhaps we can stop the growth of Guilford County government, slow the wasteful spending and get local government back on some kind of reasonable budget.

Phillips is right, every taxpayer in Guilford County should be concerned about carrying over $1 billion in debt. But the Democrats who got us there don't see a problem with the borrowing or the budget. In fact, they want to raise and spend more money.

The Guilford County school board spent $3 million on not building an airport area high school. The county commissioners don't have much control over school spending, but school spending has reached beyond ridiculous. How do you even spend $3 million on not building a school? Someone has to put a stop to it and the Democrats are not going to do it.

I know what limited government means and I'm all for it.

District 6

Republican, Democrat or independent, there should be no question about who to vote for in the District 6 Guilford County commissioner race. Republican Hank Henning, a former marine and an Iraq War veteran, has a well thought out, articulated plan for what he would like to do as a Guilford County commissioner. He also survived not one but two primaries to win the Republican nomination.

Democratic District 6 candidate Linda Kellerman didn't want to be a county commissioner. She filed on the last day thinking, incorrectly, that no Democrat had filed. When she found out Dan Miller had filed she tried to drop out of the primary, but it was too late and her name was still on the ballot. However, she announced she had dropped out and during the primary she was at the polls handing out campaign material for her opponent, Miller, but despite all of that she won the primary. Miller should be entered into a contest for the worst campaign of 2012. How do you lose to someone who announces they have dropped out of the race and then campaigns for you? It proves that Democrats in Guilford County will vote for any candidate with a woman's name on the ballot. You might see a lot of male candidates start to change their names to Pat, Chris, Kelly or Leslie.

But Kellerman won the primary and decided to stay in the race. However, she doesn't appear to have even done the basic research that you would expect of someone thinking about running. In short it appears she doesn't know what a county commissioner does. At forums her answers are incredibly short. At the beginning of most forums candidates are given two minutes to introduce themselves and tell the audience why they are running. Kellerman doesn't use a minute. At the League of Woman Voters forum she said she was running because she was "very concerned about education." That's nice, but who isn't? Henning wasn't at that forum so she could have had had free reign, but she barely said more than Henning who wasn't there.

She doesn't want to rule out raising taxes and believes that illegal immigrants deserve all the same rights as citizens.

Henning has signed a no-tax-increase pledge and Kellerman said that he was eliminated options to deal with Guilford County's debt. Kellerman, of course, is right, which is the whole idea of a no-tax-increase pledge. It encourages elected officials to cut spending rather than raise more revenue.

Henning is a fiscal conservative and says he believes that by cutting wasteful and unnecessary spending the county can get back on the right track fiscally.

District 8

Finally, we wholeheartedly endorse Ray Trapp for District 8 Guilford County commissioner. Trapp is running unopposed for the seat held for the past 20 years by current Chairman of the Guilford County Board of Commissioners Skip Alston, who endorsed Trapp, which probably has a lot to do with him being unopposed.

Trapp was the youngest and the first black chairman of the Greensboro Zoning Commission, which means he was also the youngest black chairman, the youngest male chairman of the Zoning Commission, the youngest black male chairman of the Zoning Commission and so on.

But he did a good job on the Zoning Commission, serving two terms as chairman, and should do a great job as a Guilford County commissioner.