Last night our Mayor said he supports a .01 sales tax increase. It was very reminiscent of our last Mayor who said we should support a theater. That Mayor told us how we would not need a property tax increase to buy this theater and everything was going to be OK.  He said the theater was going to take care of itself.  That plan to build the theater was going to actually pay for itself and bring jobs. Our theater was going to fix everything.  This tax increase is just like that theater. Sales taxes are not going to fix everything and we can now see that there were a lot of unintended results from that theater decision. The theater actually left the people of Roanoke Rapids in worse condition than when the cotton mill closed. The residents of Roanoke Rapids cannot buy insurance to protect us from our city council’s decisions. You people make choices that  alter our lives and then we have to pay for your decisions for years.  Your vote affects our lives, our jobs and our investments.

What is worse than a property tax increase? Lost sales! Without sales taxes we don't need property here in Roanoke Rapids ... Our town is going to turn into a ghost town if businesses decide to pull up stakes and move just 1 mile outside of RR. What are the benefits of relocating outside of the city limits of Roanoke Rapids? You don't have to pay a higher tax. Companies don't have to collect higher sales taxes. How are more taxes going to bring more jobs to Roanoke Rapids?

If we are trying to make Roanoke Rapids a better place to live how come it seems like it is getting worse? We already have the highest taxes in the state and things haven't improved. More taxes are not going to make anything better here. More jobs, more industry and more sales are the only fix to the problem here in Roanoke Rapids. More taxes and more government has never fixed anything.  What are the unintended consequences of our rash tax decisions?

Kim Simpson of Timeless Tea said that people will not drive 50 miles to save $1 when buying a TV. How about a company buying $1,000,000 worth of paper from the paper mill? Will big paper buyers search for alternatives to save $10,000 on a train loaded with paper? Will it hurt White Motors who routinely sells $50,000 worth of cars?

Make Roanoke Rapids a better place to live. Make it a safe place, a more affordable place, a warm and charming place where people want to move and retire. Slow calculated growth is the only answer to our problems. The only protection we need here in Roanoke Rapids is from the government that tries to fix everything.

Sometimes when a person is drowning they struggle and fight to save themselves when all they need to do is stop and relax and just float for a while. You people have the task to save an entire city from drowning, don't struggle and cause us all to drown. Throwing taxes at us is like a lead weight not a life saving device. We need to downsize, cut cost, slow down and cut spending.

The people that tricked us into buying this theater have insurance.  We need to look into going after those insurance policies. A judge has already determined that Rick Watson committed fraud and the Northeast Partnership were grossly negligent.  We need to look backwards and learn. We need to try to cleanup the past before we can continue into the future.

John R. Jolly Jr. Special Superior Court Judge for Complex Business Cases wrote, “Watson was grossly negligent and committed fraud, and the Boards of Directors of the NC Commission and the NC Partnership were grossly negligent in allowing Watson, and others, to aid and advise the City  in moving the Theater Project forward when they were charged with knowledge of Watson’s conflicts of interest involving the NC Commission, the NC Partnership and Moonlight Bandit. As a result, the NC Commission unlawfully caused tax funds to be paid to private parties, including Watson, and the State of North Carolina was deprived and defrauded of such funds.”

Jim Garrett

Roanoke Rapids