RALEIGH — There have been a couple of striking contrasts recently between the public policies of North Carolina’s two largest counties, Mecklenburg and Wake.
On taxes, Charlotte and the rest of Mecklenburg have long had a much higher burden than Raleigh and Wake. In part, this reflects differences in the personalities of the leaders involved. It’s also partly explained by economic trends, and partly on party. On the latter: Charlotte has long had Republican mayors but not always Republican city councils, while the county commission was dominated by Democrats for most of the past two decades. Wake’s Republican Party is a more recent presence in its community but has generated far more fiscally conservative leadership — in Raleigh from the election of Mayor Tom Fetzer in 1993 through the end of the decade, and on the Wake commission from 1995 to 1998 under the leadership of commissioner Gary Pendleton.
Now, though, it looks like some reversion to the mean may be happening. After enacting the largest local tax increase in the state a couple of years ago, the Mecklenburg county commission went Republican in the 2002 elections. The resulting majority elected Tom Cox, a thoughtful Republican moderate-conservative, to the chairmanship. He and more conservative members managed to fashion a county budget this year that avoided a property-tax hike and, in fact, reduced the rate enough not only to offset property revaluations but also to offset the fiscal impact of the sales-tax increase the state essentially imposed on localities last session.
In Wake, the beginning of the story was similar but the ending wasn’t. After four years of a Democratic commission, and an unpopular property-tax increase, Wake voters elected a 5-2 Republican majority in 2002. Many taxpayers and GOP activists expected this to be the last word on allowing the community’s relatively low tax burden to surge. But this month, three of the Republicans joined the two Democrats on the commission to approve a 4-cent hike in the property tax rate. The political blowback for these three GOP politicians could be significant.
Several lessons present themselves. First, party labels bear some information but they do not necessarily communicate the underlying philosophies and tendencies of politicians. As with the prospectus of a mutual fund, it should be noted that past performance and a mission statement do not guarantee future results.
Second, politicians and taxpayers may not know all the statistics in debating public policies but they often have an intuitive sense of where things stand. Mecklenburg is tops among North Carolina’s urban counties in taxes. Many of its leaders and citizens understand this, and recognize why the community can’t continue to prosper with such a dubious distinction. In Wake, many recognize that even the new tax increase, while painful (and in my opinion completely unnecessary to fund necessary services in the coming year), will not vault the county into the top ranks of tax hells.
Lastly, localism and federalism are valuable things. Folks can see how communities are governed and adjust their behavior accordingly. They can decide where to live and where to locate their businesses. Over time, people vote with their feet, fleeing poorly governed communities for those with more prudent leaders. As long as the state doesn’t get in the way — say, by trying to coordinate local tax policy or mandate that all localities deliver the same services in the same way — the competition for people and businesses can be a healthy one.
Hood is president of the John Locke Foundation and publisher of Carolina Journal.