Sunday's letters: Here's why the sales tax failed

The sales-tax vote

Regarding "Read their lips: No sales-tax hike" (Our Opinion, Nov. 8):

Your editorial misses the point. Vote for the sales-tax increase for schools, they say. We say OK, more money is needed, and we vote yes.

Politicians then reduce money from the general fund by the amount of the tax increase and spend that money on a pet project. If more money is needed for schools, increase the general fund contribution.

Many of us have seen these political sleight-of-hand tricks before and no longer vote for these increases.

Fran Williams

Disrespecting veterans

Nov. 11 was Veterans Day, a day to honor military veterans living and dead. (It was originally Armistice Day to commemorate the end of an awful war and to say, "Never again!" But clearly that hasn't worked.)

When I was a GI in my second year of active duty, the president-elect, and soon-to-be commander in chief of U.S. forces during a time of war, was getting his fifth draft deferment. This one for an alleged bone spur, from a podiatrist whose daughters maintain that it was done as a favor to the president-elect's father, Fred Trump, in return for favorable treatment of the doctor's rental property owned by Fred.

In any event, let's remember veterans with special attention to the president-elect, and soon to be commander in chief of U.S. forces during a time of war, who has shown how he respects veterans, living and dead.

He has called them "suckers" and "losers"; he has publicly disrespected a former prisoner of war (John McCain) for being a prisoner of war; in 2018, he traveled to France for a major commemoration of D-Day but failed to show for the event because it was raining; he has violated the sanctity of Arlington National Cemetery with an unpermitted campaign photo shoot, just to name a few instances.

So, remember the veterans as well as the man who took great pains (even phony heel pains) to avoid becoming a veteran and then showed contempt and disrespect for them.

Kim Carlyle

The writer is a member of Veterans for Peace.

A better way

This letter is in response to a recent N&R editorial that cited my past opposition to the proposed Guilford County quarter-cent sales tax (Nov. 8). While I opposed the sales-tax referendum in 2014, I later sponsored a bill (HB 120 in 2021) that would allow the Guilford County Board of Commissioners to propose a sales tax that would be used exclusively to support our local school system.

The bill would have allowed the Board of Elections to place language on the ballot informing voters that the revenue derived from the quarter-cent sales tax would be used to support public schools. It also would have made it legally binding for the funds to be used for schools, so a future majority of the Board of Commissioners could not divert the funding for another purpose.

Taking this approach would provide clarity for taxpayers and guarantee that the county would spend the funds for the stated purpose. If voters had this level of information and certainty in how the funds would be used, I believe it would pass in a referendum. A sales tax of this nature would ease pressure on property taxes, with a high percentage of the revenue coming from people who don't live in Guilford County.

Although the bill passed the House on a 102-5 vote, it did not make it through the bicameral process. However, I believe there could be an interest in our business community in supporting another effort to enact this legislation.

Jon Hardister

The writer is president of the Triad Real Estate and Building Industry Coalition (TREBIC).

Wait ... what?

As an independent voter who always votes for the person regardless of political party, my hope for every presidential election is that America will choose a qualified, deserving, inclusive and honorable leader who will unite and serve all Americans.

Unfortunately, our 2024 election was won by an uncouth, divisive former president who betrayed his previous oath of office, brings out the worst in people, caters to loyalists, has undermined our democracy and the very tenets of the Constitution, is a convicted felon, and cares first and foremost about himself, not our beloved country.

The world's view of our most recent presidential election undoubtedly is: "What was America THINKING?"

What indeed. May God help our treasured nation.

Marcia James