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Democrats rip GOP, elect new chair

Blair Jenkins, right, was elected chair of the Henderson County Democratic Party.

Speakers at the annual convention of the Henderson County Democratic Party elected a new chairman to lead a battle against policies of the new Republican governor and majority they said was setting back the state.

Blair Jenkins, an active community member, fundraiser, grant writer and most recently regional organizer for President Obama's re-election campaign, was elected chair.

The Republican agenda in Raleigh, she said, is energizing the Democratic Party.

"We are building our precincts to get every registered Democrat and every progressive unaffiliated voter over to our side and we're going to be doing a fullcourt press on that front," Jenkins told the Lightning in an interview. "And when we do that we are going to win here locally, statewide and hopefully nationally."

Local Democrats oppose what the Republican majority is trying to do, she said.

"What's going on in Raleigh right now is not right for human beings in this state, not on education, not on health care, not on Latino issues," she said. "There is nothing that speaks to what human beings in this state need and that's what we're energized to work on."

The turnout Saturday of 137 people was 40 more than last year and more than the Republican Party's turnout, she said. "We had people signing up in droves to take on volunteer jobs," she said. "I feel like we've got a whole new energy coming into this party, saying what I'm saying, that this cannot stand."

Also elected Saturday were Donald Reid, first vice chair; Dr. Clay Eddleman, second vice chair; Liz Agnello, third vice chair; Gayle Wayne, secretary and state Executive Committee; Peggy Law, treasurer; and Ken Blackwell, Tony Wayne, Paul Goebel and Louisa Goebel, state Executive Committee.

IMG 0081Former state Rep. Ray RappFormer five-term state Rep. Ray Rapp, who was ousted in 2012 after  Republicans redrew the state legislative boundaries, warned in a keynote speech "of the extremism that is being experienced every single day" in Raleigh by the GOP, which won the governor's mansion and supermajorities in both legislative chambers in a historic takeover in 2012.
"Every day there is a new piece of legislation that's introduced, there's action that's being taken, that is putting North Carolina progress in the ditch and we have got to get the wagon out of the ditch and back on the road," said Rapp, of Mars Hill. "That's our job."
"Do you realize in the first 15 working days and the first three weeks of the current legislative session ... let's just tick off what these rascals have done. Reject the expansion of Medicaid to roughly 500,000 of our needy citizens. I mean even Gov. Scott in Florida, one of the leading opponents of Obamacare, the Affordable Health Care Act, signed on to it because he said, simply, 'I cannot turn my back on a half million of my fellow citizens.' Our governor did it and that's wrong."
"Now the Republicans always want to talk about cutting taxes," he went on, "but in the first 15 days they eliminated the earned income tax credit. That is the largest tax increase in the history of the state of North Carolina."
He slammed a bill filed by Sen. Tom Apodaca to eject incumbent board and commission members and replace them with new appointees by the governor and Republican-controlled Legislature.
"I had a call from the Asheville paper asking for a comment on it and I said, all I can say is it takes my breath away, this raw grab of political power," he said. "It is back to Lord Acton: Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. That's what's going on in Raleigh today, folks, and we've got to stop it."
The bill cosponsored by state Rep. Chuck McGrady of Hendersonville to give Asheville's water system to a regional water authority, the speaker said, is a dangerous shift of power to an unelected board.
"What they're doing by creating a regional water authority is just not fair, not when you take a municipality's holdings — this is a taking, make no mistake about it. But it's worse than just a taking. You need to look at what these rascals are doing by creating this regional water authority. This is an authority that will have the power to control not only water and sewer but they have taxing power as well and guess what? They aren't answerable to you, the citizens. It is an independent group."
People paid little attention because Asheville situation was a local matter.
"Well, then the folks in Charlotte found out that they're going to take away the airport authority," he said. "The sixth largest airport in the world that Charlotte's runs very effectively is now going to be regionalized."

The party also adopted resolutions opposing the regionalization of the Asheville water system and in favor of shifting some areas of national defense spending to job creation programs and another condemning Gov. Pat McCrory and the Republican Legislature for rejecting Medicaid expansion.