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This week, we had a little housekeeping to do, checking in on several unfolding stories.
Friendly fire on the school board
One major unfolding story, which we published a piece on yesterday, involves the Republican-controlled New Hanover County Board of Education’s allegations that Republican David Perry has violated confidentiality and ethics policies.
It’s no secret that Perry has made controversial and offensive comments, both on the dais and social media – and he told WHQR’s Rachel Keith he’s working to clean up his act on that front. But Perry also told Keith he doesn’t think he’s broken any laws or policies. The same can’t be said of his colleagues, in Perry’s opinion. He’s accused them of their own questionable practices, including a secret text chain that skirts public records and meeting laws.
You can find Rachel Keith’s report here: Set to be reprimanded, Perry claims NHC school board’s been violating policy, open meetings law
Perry told Keith he’s had a rocky road with his fellow Republicans. I’ve watched, over the last year, as he’s run afoul of the party line several times, sometimes because he’s making a principled stand and sometimes because he’s sticking his foot in his mouth. And while usually the GOP – like any organization – tries to praise in public and punish in private, things don’t always work out that way.
In any case, public infighting in the GOP – or the Democratic Party, for that matter – is hardly new, and it’s not always news. But we take public meetings and records law pretty seriously. After all, if there’s one thing a journalist is allowed to have passionate opinions about, it’s government transparency. And if the squabbling gets in the way of serving the best interests of the district’s staff and students – and it seems like it does, at times – then that’s worth reporting on, as well.
On Monday, the board will meet to discuss the allegations against Perry. We don’t know where it will go from there, but we’ll be following it.
Notably, the bouts of dysfunction on the Republican-controlled school board (like those under Democratic leadership several years ago) aren’t just embarrassing; they come at a time when the school district is facing serious financial challenges. This week, we spent a whole hour on The Newsroom mapping out the daunting situation.
The Newsroom: Triple Whammy: A deep dive into New Hanover County Schools' funding predicament
TLDL: it’s bad and there are no clear answers.
The early voting story continues
We’re also still following the early voting story in New Hanover County. Since last Sunday’s column, it came to light that all six city council members and the mayor in Wilmington had – almost inexplicably – failed to read an email from the Board of Elections, asking if they wanted early voting sites.
Mayor Bill Saffo, who is currently running for reelection in a three-way race, put out a letter on behalf of the city, requesting two early voting sites. And, at the upcoming city council meeting on Tuesday, there’s a formal resolution to reinforce that message.
There seems to be unanimous support for the resolution, as there was for Saffo’s letter, so I expect it will pass unanimously. And, having taken the temperature of the folks at the Board of Elections, I’m pretty sure they’ll approve additional sites when they meet on Wednesday.
There is one minor note. The resolution notes, “The City has allocated certain funds in the FY26 budget for the purpose of supporting the 2025 municipal elections.”
The thing is, I’m not actually sure that’s true. Now, I have reported that the city has budgeted money ever odd year for municipal elections, which past budgets confirm, and I wrote that there was $243,817 budgeted for this year – which everyone on council seemed to agree with.
But that number was based on the recommended budget. The final budget doesn’t appear to be posted online.
So I went back and watched the June 3 budget meeting, where the city was discussing ways to fund the Wilmington Police Department’s equestrian unit (also known as the downtown ‘horse cops’). The horseback unit was initially slated to be cut, but based on public outcry, including from Republican Councilman Luke Waddell, staff set to work on ways to save it.
During the June 3 meeting, budget director Laura Mortell told staff that some additional funding could be shifted from an appropriation for local elections.
“As I was looking at the budget, we have about $240,000 for the election, which is every other year, so I can use that as one time fund budget, which made sense, and then we put the mounted unit back in,” Mortell told council (it’s at around 1:27:40 if you want check it out on the city’s YouTube channel).
Mortell went through this fairly quickly, no one really asked questions about it, and there was no accompanying slide for that part of the fund transfer, so I had to listen to it a few times to hear exactly what she said.
When we first reported on this meeting, we assumed she was talking about unspent money from past years. Because, why on earth would the city spend its election money knowing there was a municipal race coming up in the fall?
But, that’s why you don’t assume, because I think we might have gotten it wrong.
In fact, it doesn’t look like the city had any unspent money left over, at least looking at the detailed budgets (which include the ‘actual’ spending from previous years). And even if there had been unspent money, it would have gone back into the general fund, according to the city, so it wouldn’t be sitting in its own little pot.
What I think happened – and I’m waiting on the city to confirm this – is that the city spent its municipal election money on horse cops. Because $240,000 is almost exactly what the city had budgeted for upcoming elections, and that’s the number Mortell quoted as being moved to support the equestrian unit. (The issue came up again, very briefly, during the second reading, but there were no additional details provided.)
Did that have anything to do with them not answering emails, received the following week, from the Board of Elections? I don’t think so – but I don’t know.
Now, this isn’t the end of the world, and – if this is what happened – I can kind of understand the budgetary logic. Payroll for the mounted unit (and care and feeding costs for the beloved horses) has to be funded on July 1. So the city had to move money around before the beginning of the fiscal year.
Municipal elections, meanwhile, are paid for upfront by the Board of Elections, which then invoices the city. It’s possible the city could be into the third quarter of the fiscal year before it had to pay back the $240,000 or so – and by that point, there are likely a host of other places it could pull the money from. (As the resolution notes, “If funds are needed to support additional early voting locations, necessary budget items would be presented to Council at a later date.”)
It’s also worth noting that all of this happened during June, when the city didn’t have a permanent city manager – Tony Caudle retired at the end of May, and Becky Hawke didn’t start until after the budget had been passed.
I’ll let you know what I learn, hopefully on Monday. And, I suspect, city council may have to hash some of this out on Tuesday.
Having said all of this, I do want to acknowledge that while it looks like we will probably end up with three early voting sites in Wilmington, placed equitably around the city, I certainly understand people’s concerns about voter access and suppression.
I’ve had some folks suggest that the real test will come in the spring for the primary elections, but I’ll also be keeping my eye on the New Hanover County budget for next year, which will include funding for the 2026 general election. (That sounds a long way off, but the budget discussions start in January or February.)
Fox and Friends
This week, Wilmington comedian Cliff Cash, brother of author Wiley Cash, organized a protest against Fox News in Wilmington, part of a nationwide campaign. Initially, it looked like the county’s Democratic Party was a cosponsor, but they later dropped out.
Cash has been an outspoken critic of Fox, the Trump administration, and the MAGA culture that permeates both of those organizations, both on stage and online. He argued that previous protests – held in parks and public right-of-ways, lacked focus, and said he intended to direct his energy at a more practical target: the local Fox affiliate, WSFX.
WSFX is owned by Charlotte-based American Spirit Media, which has seven stations around the country. Five of those stations, including WSFX, are operated by Atlanta-based Gray Media, the country’s third-largest television station company. WSFX runs Fox content, but its local news comes from WECT – itself an NBC affiliate – and features recognizable names like anchor Jon Evans.
Cash’s position is that everything that contributes financially to Fox News is part of the problem, and every link in the network chain bears responsibility for the damage that Fox’s lies and misinformation has done to families and communities.
I didn’t say anything about Cash’s protest plans at first. I wasn’t convinced that picketing outside a smaller market, far from the headquarters of Gray and American Spirit, would be that effective – but that’s just my opinion. And multiple protests could build pressure. (Personally, I certainly agree that Fox has done a lot of damage, and you won’t see me wasting any ink defending them.)
It was when Cash started posted about “applying pressure that causes anxiety and panic and conversation” that I got slightly concerned. Anxiety and panic aren’t great ground conditions for conversation, for one thing. And for another, I wondered if the vagueness of this bold assertion could land the wrong way with some of Cash’s passionate fans.
I knew Cash understood the difference between WECT and WSFX and the somewhat complicated details of their relationship, and wasn’t there to harangue the reporters and staff there. But I worried that with a large crowd, some people might miss that nuance. Journalists and journalism are under attack these days, and the idea of WECT’s weekend staff having “Nazi” shouted at them on their way to work didn’t sit well with me.
Cash assured me he would make sure the crowd understood; I still felt uneasy.
So I posted on Facebook on the Friday evening before Cash’s protest, which was scheduled for Saturday morning at WECT’s station on Shipyard, near the Port of Wilmington. I made it clear that I wasn’t telling anyone what or how to protest – which I consider a sacred right, after all – although I also noted that I didn’t think the corporate owners of WECT and WSFX would be much swayed.
More importantly, I implored people to remember that WECT reporters aren’t the bad guys. Fran Weller isn’t a Nazi, Jon Evans isn’t a Brown Shirt. It sounds almost crazy to have to say that, but if you’ve seen the fever pitch of some protests, it’s perhaps a little less outlandish.
On Saturday, I went down to the protest. A little after 10 a.m. there were maybe five or six dozen people there (I think more showed up later). I saw familiar faces from other local protests there, including some friends of mine – one of whom told me that Cash had given the crowd pretty clear guidance on why they were there, and that the WECT staff was not the ‘target,’ so to speak. I spoke briefly with Cash, who was amiable if busy minding the protest. He noted he’d spoke with Weller on the phone and made his stance clear. I thanked him for keeping my fellow reporters out of the line of fire, so to speak, and we shook hands and went our separate ways.
Later, Cash saw a response I’d made to a comment on my Facebook post from Friday, where I noted that I’d “tried to talk some sense” into Cash (or something to that effect), and he took serious offense to it. But, that is what I’d tried to do, both privately and publicly, so I have to say I stand by it.
Cash later shared my post, writing in part, “This is a local journalist basically discouraging folks from joining me today. Read through the comments and see people saying ‘I was going to go until I read this.’ Y’all feel free to educate folks if you have some free time. Thanks to all who came out today. It would have been much larger without this and other examples of (incorrect) statements being made.”
Cash has over 180,000 followers on Facebook, and some certainly had some interesting comments for me. And it’s social media, so you have to take it with a grain of salt when people, who are from another town and have never met you, call you a liar or a Nazi or a Nazi-sympathizer. There was one gentleman who asked the comment thread to post my address, so that was fun. (I asked him why he wanted it, he responded he wanted to “send a thank you card.” Nice guy!)
I’m not saying this to put it at Cash’s feet. Social media is a dumpster fire and I don’t think anyone could put it out if they wanted to. I’m saying this to illustrate how poorly nuance and complicated ideas hold up when emotions are running high.
I had not tried to dissuade people from protesting – I encourage it. I had tried to reinforce the idea that the local WECT reporters are not fascists or Nazis – the kind of thing I’m now being called for speaking up for them – in the hopes that some poor kid isn’t harassed on their way to the Saturday shift in the newsroom. But what I actually said got drowned out like a mouse fart in a tornado, and perhaps I should have expected that.
Still, I stand by what I said. I’m sorry if Cash was offended, because I admire his passion and dedication. I hope he moves on with his protest. I’ll be getting back to local news.
