So, the good Gov’na has made many many promises over the course of her campaign. And, according to reports, those promises have been removed from her website. This seems to be a popular politician’s trick as we have seen the same shenanigans over at Obama’s website. I’ll comment on each in the coming days and then we’ll follow up on the Govna’s progress from time to time.
Thanks to the Raleigh News and Observer who was able to capture those promises and then publish them in today’s edition. They are:
EDUCATION
- Expand and better coordinate the Smart Start and More-at-Four pre-kindergarten programs.
- Build a volunteer corps to tutor students in math and reading.
- Require all troubled high schools to comply with research-backed restructuring.
- Ensure that high schools across the state are equipped to offer online college-level coursework.
- Establish the “College Promise” program to guarantee free or affordable college for students who graduate from high school, stay out of trouble and perform community service. The program would expand a state scholarship program known as EARN and increase the scholarships from two years to four.
- Waive tuition to all students who graduate from high school and then enter a community college full time.
ARTS
- Support sustainable resources for community arts councils and organizations. Help them get support from the private sector.
- Protect and develop cultural heritage sites.
- Support arts education and expand arts programs in public schools.
WATER
- Assist local governments with moving toward a tiered water billing system that would charge a higher rate to customers who use the most water.
- Help small cities and towns install better meters, build connections between regional water systems and repair leaking pipes.
- Establish water conservation standards for all new homes, businesses and state government buildings.
- Adopt tax incentives for business to improve water conservation standards in existing buildings.
CRIME
- Give law enforcement agencies equipment they need and fix funding gaps for high-crime communities.
- Boost the number of district attorneys, judges, magistrates and clerks. Increase pay for those positions.
- Toughen anti-gang laws, and attack gangs as organized-crime organizations.
- Enact harsher penalties for crimes involving guns and drugs.
- Give more money to law enforcement agencies participating in a federal program that allows local agencies to pursue immigration charges against illegal aliens.
- Make sure sentences for violent criminals are strong and long.
ECONOMY
- Dramatically expand and transform a state program that helps small towns and cities preserve and revitalize downtowns. Allow cities and towns to choose which economic development ideas best fit their needs.
- Support an $18 million tax reform plan to exempt small businesses from the first $15,000 of their income.
- Expand to $10 million a year a state fund that provides matching grants to start-up companies that win certain research or technology grants.
- Make the state a leader in biofuels, solar energy and other green technology industries.
- Increase the state’s investment in an N.C. State University partnership that fosters manufacturing businesses.
HEALTH
- Provide health insurance coverage for all North Carolina children by giving more money to N.C. Kids Care to expand who is covered. Create a system for families to buy insurance for uninsured or uninsurable children. Expand public outreach to ensure that all children who are eligible are enrolled in Medicaid and Health Choice.
- Encourage businesses to offer employees affordable health insurance through tax incentives. Establish an affordable small business-coverage policy that would be funded equally by the employer, the employee and the state.
- Support stem cell research using adult, cord blood or embryonic sources. The N.C. Biotechnology Center will oversee and manage the awarding of stem cell research grants.
- Every person served by the mental health system should have strong, effective case management.
- Establish “mental health courts” to link at-risk and minor offenders with mental illnesses to get them treatment before they spiral into a life of crime.
- Punish swiftly and fully those who abuse or neglect mental health patients.
GOVERNMENT REFORM
- Make government transparent: “I’m going to open the windows wide on the state capitol, and we’re going to let the sunshine in.”
- Create a Google-type search engine for scrutinizing all state contracts.
- Establish an independent budget-reform panel whose recommendations must be voted up or down by the legislature without amendment.
- Tighten controls to stop officials leaving state service from immediately going to work for businesses they were working with in their state jobs.
- Prohibit legislators from asking lobbyists to contribute to charities.
- Make unannounced, on-site inspections of state agencies. Meet with employees without managers present.
- Work in Charlotte three or four days each month.
- Change state policy to require that all e-mail messages be kept until the state develops a plan for long-term retention.
ACCESSIBILITY
- Field questions from the news media every week.
- Share her public schedules and prohibit staff from deleting e-mail messages.
- Hold at least four live town hall meetings during her 4-year term. Hold an online town hall meeting once a month.
TRANSPORTATION
- Strip most specific road-building decisions from the Board of Transportation. Convert the panel into an advisory board of directors.
- Road building and other transportation decisions will be based on data and need.
ENERGY
- Rely on scientific and environmental information to determine whether to allow oil drilling off the state’s coastline. North Carolina should share in the profits of any oil discovered.
