This battle has come to a close, but the fight for individual liberty, limited government, personal responsibility, private charity and free markets lives.  Please keep the pressure on your local, state and national leaders. Let your voice be heard.  Thanks.

Sincerely,

Ed Page

Someone should probably write a country song about that post-election, “morning after” feeling…

What if I’da voted?
What if I’da cared?
Now I’m status-quo-eded.
Now I’m kinda scared.

Don’t wonder “what if.”  Vote. Tell a friend. Tell a coworker. Tell everybody.  Spread the good news.

Either that, or warm up your steel guitar.

For the last four years, I have had the opportunity, honor and privilege to represent your area on the Sanford City Council. Many friendships have developed over those four years and countless hours have been spent improving the area.

We have made significant strides but we still have work to do. Regrettably (for me), the municipal maps were redrawn that resulted in the Historic District be removed from Ward 2.  I must preface that even though I am no longer the representative for the Historic District that I will always be accessible for each of you in the future. When I moved here in 1991, I moved to Summit Drive, where I rented for 13+ years. For me it was a very special place then and it is today.

This letter however is not about my service to you — it is about having someone join me to share the similar ideas and passion to represent that I do.

Representation of the Historic District deeply concerns me. Many of you have poured your life savings into turning houses that were a significant part of Sanford history into homes.  You have a beautiful area and we need sensitivity in keeping your neighborhood safe and beautiful.

Today, I stand in supporting Ed Page for City Council.  I have gotten to know Ed and his family over the course of the last 10 years and grown to appreciate his professionalism, his drive, his thoroughness and his love for “the neighborhood”.

Every voice in the Historic District needs to be heard.  We need you to join with us and ensure that representation will not be absent for the next 4 years.  Please join me in supporting Ed for Sanford City Council for Ward 4.

Election day is November 8^th and early voting has begun and will end on November 5^th.  Hours are from 8:00-5:00 M-F at either the McSwain Center or the Lee County Board of Elections. Also next Saturday, November 5^th early voting will be open on Saturday from 8:00-1:00. This is perhaps the biggest election in the history of your neighborhood.

I sincerely hope that you will join me in support of Ed Page for City Council. He is committed and he is ready to fight.  A few priorities from Ed include: empowerment of law enforcement, removing barriers to businesses, refocusing and lowering taxes.  For additional information on Ed and his priorities for Ward 4 please go to http://4edpage.wordpress.com.

Thanks to each of you for allowing me to be your representative for the last four years and I look forward to having representation from your neighborhood with me on City Council for four more years.

Respectfully,

/s/ Charles Taylor

Charles Taylor

Sanford City Council Ward 2

The demagoguery that can follow such a stance is disappointing, but not surprising.  It is amazing how demanding people can be when it comes to using other people’s money to fund their favorite projects.  Suggesting that they and their like-minded friends should voluntarily support those causes elicits incredulous responses and astounding accusations; apparently, if you don’t support taxpayer funding for something, you don’t support it at all.  Ergo, I don’t support babies, puppies, the elderly and the arts.  Here’s the problem with that:

Red Cross, Salvation Army, Breadbasket, Bread of Life, Haven, CARA, Lee County Partnership for Children, Stevens Foundation, Easter Seals-UCP, Communities in Schools of Lee County, Christians United Outreach Center, Matt 6, SLIDR, TLC Home, Lee County Industries, Samaritan’s Purse, Shriner’s Hospitals, churches, community centers, …

This is only a partial list of very worthwhile causes that people in Sanford support.  I have supported them all with private funds, contributions or volunteer time at one time or another.  If you think that our City Council should support non-profits with taxpayer dollars, how do you decide who to fund?  How do you decide how much to give?

I feel strongly that this is ultimately an issue of individual liberty.  You as the taxpayer should have the right and responsibility to support these entities with your voluntary contributions as you see fit.  You can pick your favorite cause.  You can give to organizations that you feel do the best work or make the best use of your dollar.  It should be your choice and your responsibility.

Too often “free market” is associated merely with consumerism, but private charity is a significant component of free market economics.  That’s the “free” part of “free market”.

ENDORSEMENT: Sanford City Council Ward 4 (4-year seat)

The candidates: Incumbent Walter H. McNeil Jr. vs. Ed Page

The Herald’s endorsement: Ed Page

Walter McNeil’s service to the City of Sanford and to its governing body — spanning parts of four decades — is certainly laudable. The retired educator has been a steady fixture on the council as long as most residents can remember. Pick out anything having to do with the city or city government and Walter McNeil likely had a say in it at some point during his career as a councilman.

But being long-tenured isn’t the re-election guarantee it once was. Nor should it be. The privilege of serving results not just from the path you’ve taken, but from the trail you’re helping to blaze. A close watch of city council meetings and review of McNeil’s recent contributions to the council shows that, though well-intentioned, he’s no longer at the forefront.

In fact, far from it. His challenger in Ward 4, Ed Page, lacks McNeil’s experience. (In this election, everyone does.) But during his campaign and in forums and interviews with The Herald’s editorial board, Page’s assertiveness, his well-reasoned and analytical approaches to problem solving (owing to his background as a criminal attorney) and his energy and enthusiasm for the task at hand make him the more appealing candidate. He gets our endorsement for the Ward 4 seat.

McNeil’s drowsy approach to preparation for council business, plus a spate of “no” votes on recent issues that would have resulted in a greater need for inspection and introspection from council members — in other words, more effort and diligence — frustrates us. It also dampens the council’s effectiveness and stifles creativity at a time when — as has been shown on the county level — “outside the box” thinking can lead to more intense meetings, but still yielding improved services and better end-user satisfaction.

Don’t misunderstand us: the city is in sound fiscal condition and, unlike many municipalities, hasn’t been forced into the kind of urgent reaction to problems that ultimately point to a lack of foresight.

But our economy has forced changes upon us. In recent terms, McNeil hasn’t been a source of fuel or even the spark to move the council, or the city, forward. One can’t be fully effective if you’re not fully engaged and connected, and McNeil — his gentle, patriarchic nature notwithstanding — isn’t. His preference to stand aside to let the city manager and the city’s paid department heads do all the work is the polar opposite of some of the unfortunate micro-managing in which some local boards have taken part, but it’s simply too quiet, too little.

Page, on the other hand, seems to have demonstrated a capacity and desire for full engagement. Any question about any issue facing the city begets an insightful, reasoned response with a clearly-stated opinion at the end. The residents of Ward 4 — and the council — need more decisiveness. Page will bring it.

What impact would losing McNeil have on the board? What will gaining Page add to it? In that dichotomy is a clear answer: Ed Page in Ward 4.
© The Sanford Herald 2011. Used with permission.

On my honor I will do my best
To do my duty to God and my country…
~The Boy Scout Oath

Today, I signed a pledge to the residents of Sanford that, if elected, I will not support or vote for a raise in their taxes.  I signed this pledge because I believe in small government focused on its core functions, doing them well and cost-effectively.  I signed this pledge because I believe that there is room in the Sanford City Budget to cut spending and lower taxes; consequently, I can foresee no reasonable set of circumstances under which I would support raising taxes on the citizens of Sanford.  I signed this pledge because — at a time when most families in Sanford are tightening their belts and budgets – it is irresponsible for the city to refuse to do the same.

I do not make this pledge to bind my future deliberations or actions.  I make this pledge to openly and publicly acknowledge my existing thoroughly-considered beliefs and goals and to inform the voters of Sanford where I stand.  Moreover, this is not the only pledge I make to the residents of Sanford.  If elected, I also pledge to be transparent about what I believe and why I believe it.  I pledge to adhere to those beliefs with conviction.  I pledge to be open and available. And I pledge to actively fight fraud, waste, abuse, and a “good ol’ boy network” that values connections over merit and ability.

I have made a considered effort during the course of this campaign to make my positions known to the voters of Ward 4, through appearances at three public forums, a Chamber of Commerce luncheon, my completion of a questionnaire to be published by The Sanford Herald at a later date, radio interviews and my website.  This pledge further clarifies where I stand.  I believe that the voters are entitled to know each candidate’s intentions, and should be wary of any candidate that will not clearly state their convictions.  I encourage the voters of Sanford to learn where I and my opponent stand, compare my stated positions with the thirty year record of my opponent, and vote their conscience.

Early voting sites are at the Board of Elections at 225 S. Steele St and the McSwain Extension Center at 2420 Tramway Rd.

Hours are:
Monday through Friday, 8 am to 5 pm,
Saturday, November 5th, 8 am to 1 pm.

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I –

I took the one less traveled by

and that has made all the difference

~ Robert Frost

Being a limited government conservative, I believe strongly that governments should stick to their core functions, do them well and cost-effectively, and leave everything else to private individuals, businesses and charities.  Inevitably, the folks that want to expand government to be all things to all people will demagogue this philosophy as being against whatever pet project they favor.  They are missing the point.  Small government does not mean being opposed to children or education or the elderly or parks or animals or golf courses or the arts.  It simply means that we think some things should be privately funded through the free market and private charitable giving.  It’s not about whether certain programs are good or bad, it is about who pays for it and why. It is an important difference.

At last night’s Sanford Herald forum, I came out against the City of Sanford operating a golf course.  I don’t have anything against golf, golfers, or golf courses.  The folks that suggest that the city course generates some amount of tourism to the region are missing the point.  All the benefits gained by the existence of our municipal golf course would still exist if it were privately run.  If it cannot survive as a private entity, that in itself tells us something about what value it truly has in the marketplace.

Similarly, several candidates last night referred to the Temple Theater as a jewel and suggested that it was appropriate to support it with taxpayer dollars.  I disagree.  If the Temple is valued by local businesses and individuals, then they will support it through ticket purchases, donations, sponsorships and the like.  Those decisions should be made by the individual, not the city.

At its heart, small government conservatism is about freedom.  The freedom to choose what causes we will support with our resources.  The freedom to open a business with as little interference and regulation as possible.  The freedom to exercise our rights in our own property.  Please join me in promoting freedom and refocusing Sanford government on the core functions of police, fire, water and sewer, and streets and infrastructure.  We can make Sanford a better, freer place to work and live.  I would greatly appreciate your vote starting October 20th.

Unfortunately, what is commonly known as “Incentives”, usually shorthand for grants or tax credits/breaks targeted to specific companies, have been repeatedly shown to be wasteful and ineffective at their intended goal.  Politicians love to think they can manipulate the economy with nip and a cut, but that is pure ego. The truth is:  our economy is usually too complex to be managed to this degree of detail with any foreseeable results, and the unintended consequences can be worse than the original problem.  I use the small “i” incentives because I do believe government policy affects business behavior.   The difference is like the farmer analogy: we can plow and water and weed a furrow and encourage growth, but can’t control how many ears or kernels of corn a specific seed will yield.

Instead of rewarding a select few businesses (often selected through political clout and patronage, and usually companies from outside the city that will come in and compete with existing business), I do not believe that our city government should be in the business of attempting to pick winners and losers.  When government starts doing that, it invariably leads to cronyism, waste and other abuses (or at a minimum, opens up government to charges of the same because of the appearance of impropriety).  See, for example, this article about an incentives deal in Brunswick County in which Democrat politicians brokered an incentives deal that lined the pockets of their donors.

Instead, I would like to see policies that allow broad-based tax cuts across the board, and possibly additional tax cuts for special, identifiable geographic areas that are blighted, depressed or otherwise a priority for growth (like the two downtowns).  This would tend to promote growth in these areas and reward local business owners that might like to move into or open up in those areas.  It also benefits those who have already made the investment, rather than using their tax dollars to benefit a potential competitor (keep in mind, our businesses compete not only for customers, but also for labor).  If revitalizing downtown is a priority for our city, it makes no sense to me that businesses in those areas have to pay an EXTRA tax of $0.13 (per $100 in value) to be there, in effect punishing behavior which would she instead be seeking to reward.

As a city, we need our municipal taxes to compare favorably to surrounding and similar communities.  A company or individual with the option to open up a business here or Lillington or Siler City or Pittsboro or Southern Pines or Apex is going to look at a host of variables, but high on the list are going to be taxes and regulations.  I would suggest that we have an opportunity to be noticeably better than those communities in this area.

Here is more on the topic:

‘Consider this from economist Fred Sautet: “While across-the-board tax cuts expand economic activity, targeted tax incentives are inevitably financed at the expense of established businesses. Today’s winner of [incentives] is tomorrow’s victim of a broad increase in business taxes. Assuming, that is, this employer sticks around.”’

http://www.nccivitas.org/2007/incentives-tread-all-over-fairness/

“[Nobel Prize-winning economist F.A.] argued that the sea of knowledge necessary to grow the economy and create value for society simply can not be held by any individual, or even a committee of lawmakers. Rather, such knowledge is dispersed among millions of individual actors making decisions that affect their own interests. When lawmakers intervene in the economy in an attempt to add jobs, they are delving into a complex system that involves literally millions of varied priorities, needs and outlooks contained in the collective — yet dispersed — knowledge of consumers and entrepreneurs.” http://www.nccivitas.org/2007/incentives-wont-create-jobs/