News

Thorns & Roses: Ice cream, drama kings, friend of Pardee

By Bill Moss, Published: June 8, 2012

Rose — To Chris and Mary Jane McDonnell, two volunteer leaders of Celebrate Flat Rock.The event has grown from a few dozen participants to a full-fledged happening attracting retirees, young families and middle-aged working folk from across Henderson County. Saturday's event featured great music, free ice cream, the sheriff's K9 unit, Blue Ridge Fire Department's enormous American flag, a blowup slide for kids and more. Village Council members praised the work of the McDonnells, who start early and work till the last scrap of litter is picked up from the grounds.

Thorn — To the Henderson County Board of Commissioners, who put on an embarrassing exhibition of self-righteousness pomposity, stunning intellectual inconsistency and just plain ignorance in consuming the past two months crafting a budget. We say "crafting" charitably. No statecraft to be found in the historic Courthouse. Mossback mountaineers and Confederate Bushwhackers got along better. Chairman Tommy Thompson, a certified mediator who spent three decades as the clerk of Superior Court playing Solomon to divorced couples, feuding families and irate property owners, could not herd these five elected keepers of the county treasury. Vice Chairman Bill O'Connor declared that he loves the other commissioners like brothers then accused them of voting like Democrats, which in Henderson County is about as brotherly — and fitting — as accusing a Navy Seal of being soft on Bin Laden. Having voted gleefully to write a $1.6 million check for Sierra Nevada, which actually is a private enterprise, Commissioner Larry Young threw a tantrum when his four colleagues vote to spend $100,000 to help Flat Rock Playhouse, because it's a "private enterprise," which it isn't. It was almost bad enough to make us miss the backroom deal-making in the 3M days, when Bill Moyer twisted arms for the votes of Charlie Messer and Chuck McGrady before ramming through a motion to get something done. We don't know how many trees the county sacrificed to print the budget but if it was one sapling it was one too many. Next year we'll skip the novel and wait for the movie. But we won't recommend children see it.

Rose — To state Sen. Tom Apodaca, who keeps saving our bacon Raleigh by blocking mischief from various threats, not least of which is Tim Moffitt, the one-man wrecking crew from Asheville who has the billy club out for Mission Hospitals and UNC Health Care. Apodaca, taking the lead for the Senate, and former House speaker Harold Brubaker took on the job of forcing UNC Hospitals, Rex hospital and WakeMed into a peace agreement after months of warfare. WakeMed accused Rex and UNC of predatory practices in their merger, which is similar to the management agreement Pardee made with UNC. Although the News&Observer of Raleigh reported that the treaty broke in favor of WakeMed. Pardee trustee Bill Lapsley, who is also on the UNC Health Care board, portrayed it as positive for Pardee. "It was very pleasing from my perspective and Pardee's," he told Pardee trustees last week. "I think it's a good thing that these issues are off the table and we can continue to have a long-term relationship with the UNC health care system." If we didn't have Apodaca playing defensive tackle at 16 West Jones Street, who knows what'd happen.