Two Republicans named James are going head-to-head in the southwestern corner of the state for a chance to defeat three-term Democratic state Sen. John Snow.
They go by Jim and Jimmy. One’s an experienced public official, the other a first-time candidate for office. And they don’t see eye-to-eye on several crucial issues.
Jim Davis, an orthodontist, has been Macon County commissioner for 10 years. He says that makes him more qualified than newcomer Jimmy Goodman, a cabinetmaker and Tea Partier, who’s served on the county’s planning board for four years.
Davis said his professional political experience has given him “a better sense, in my opinion, of what’s important to the electorate.”
Goodman thinks the fact he’s never held elected office is a selling point to a growing crowd of angry voters, tired of politics as usual.
“I’m not an insider or a politician, just a hard working businessman who understands the value of a dollar,” Goodman said on his website.
Goodman, founding member of Freedom Works in Macon County, said attending the Tea Party March on Washington on Sept. 12 last year, in part, inspired him to run. His other motivation for entering politics is Macon County’s unemployment rate, which is approaching 14 percent. When asked what three issues were most important to him, he replied:
“Jobs, jobs, and jobs.”
While jobs appear near the top of every politician’s wish list this year, Goodman says he has a different approach.
Many politicians try to entice businesses into the area by offering targeted incentives. Goodman said he “wholeheartedly opposes” incentives, which he refers to as “bribes.” The only incentives a business owner needs to set up shop in North Carolina, he said, are lower taxes and less regulation.
Davis agrees that tax burdens and regulations are hurting the economy, and said less government is the only way to create more jobs.
Goodman claims Davis’ record shows otherwise. Davis supported a land transfer tax, which would have imposed a 1-percent sales tax on every household sold in Macon County. In a referendum, 75 percent of the people voted against the tax.
“Either the people didn’t want it or they didn’t understand it, because the commissioners failed to make a good case,” Davis said.
“Oh yeah, the politicians understand it better than regular citizens,” Goodman laughed. “The citizens understood just fine.”
Davis said he supported the land transfer tax instead of an increase in regular property tax, because he thought it did a better job of “putting the burden of increased infrastructure needs on the people that are causing those needs.”
Goodman argued the tax affects not only newcomers to the area, but people who’ve lived there for years anytime they want to sell their land.
Goodman also criticized Davis for supporting an arrangement to borrow money to finance school construction and renovations years after residents rejected a school bond measure.
“When the people tell you to do something, it’s your obligation to do it. They are the bosses. You’re not the boss. Jim Davis says he’s the boss, and we can just go jump in the lake,” Goodman said.
He said the loans, obtained through the U.S. Department of Education’s Qualified Zones Academy Bonds program, force the county to pay a higher interest rate — and spend $1.5 million more over the term of the loan — than it would have faced had the voters approved the bond initiative.
“Jim Davis is nothing but a politician … a tax-and-spend Republican, and that’s all he’s ever going to be,” Goodman said.
Davis said he wasn’t in favor of “building a Cadillac school,” just bigger, more central schools. He said Goodman’s desire to keep small, community schools was “cost prohibitive.”
Goodman admitted spread-out, community schools were not as cost effective as consolidated campuses.
“But if you ask the citizens of this county if they want to pay more for smaller schools or if they want the powers that be to make those decisions for us, I guarantee you the majority would’ve voted for higher taxes,” he said.
“They like the community schools,” Goodman added. “They get better education in the community schools. The worst school we have in Macon County is Macon County Middle School, where they bus people from all over the county.”
Sara Burrows is an associate editor of Carolina Journal.