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Governor Stein's budget leaves employees, retirees behind · The SEANC View

• 0:00
  Music.
• 0:10
  Hello and welcome to maybe a little special edition of the Scenic View podcast.
• 0:15
  We're in here a day early.
• 0:17
  The governor's state budget proposal came out today, a Wednesday,
• 0:21
  March 19th, and we're here to talk about it.
• 0:24
  I'm Jonathan Owens, your host slash communications director.
• 0:27
  With me is Artis Watkins, the executive director of Scenic and government relations
• 0:33
  director Suzanne Beasley and Sam Klein, our podcast producer.
• 0:36
  We're in here on a beautiful Wednesday afternoon to talk all about what Governor
• 0:42
  Stein has proposed and take it away, Suzanne.
• 0:46
  No, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to call you out like that. We got this budget,
• 0:49
  I guess, what, around 11 o'clock today.
• 0:52
  Is that about right? It was maybe a little bit of a surprise for us just out
• 0:55
  of the blue, but we were expecting it this week.
• 0:58
  So let's just talk about it, I guess. Let's just dive right in.
• 1:00
  And he has the high-level highlights for our members are always the pay raises and bonuses.
• 1:08
  In his proposal, he has a 2% pay raise this year only for state employees across the board.
• 1:15
  And then also a $1,000 bonus and some extra bonus leave depending on years of
• 1:22
  service, if I read that correctly.
• 1:25
  For retirees, there's a 2% bonus, not a cost of living adjustment.
• 1:29
  Yeah, that's so confusing.
• 1:32
  A COLA is a cost of living adjustment, and that is something that is recurring.
• 1:36
  That increases your base benefit or your salary if you are active. So it's a bonus.
• 1:41
  It doesn't have anything to do with a COLA. It's a bonus. So in his budget,
• 1:45
  he does call it a cost of living bonus, but a one-time cost of living adjustment,
• 1:50
  which is basically just...
• 1:51
  Yeah, that's become popular in recent years since there's not been a cost of
• 1:55
  living adjustment. Somebody decided, let's just start calling the bonus the cost of living bonus.
• 2:00
  And a bonus is inherently not
• 2:02
  a cost of living adjustment because it's not there the next year. Right.
• 2:06
  Yeah. So it didn't try to keep up with anything. It tried to patch a hole and
• 2:10
  then a hole gets put back in your ship January the next year.
• 2:13
  Or in this case, because of the fiscal year of the state, July of the next year.
• 2:17
  It just seems like that's the trend for the last few years, that they're just
• 2:21
  going to start doing bonuses every year for retirees.
• 2:24
  And we've talked about why that is on several occasions.
• 2:27
  Yeah, you know, the retirement system is built to produce its own COLA from investment gains.
• 2:32
  And obviously, investment gains have not been enough to sustain the pension
• 2:35
  administrative costs and then provide a cost of living adjustment.
• 2:39
  So that leaves us going to the legislature every session and asking for funding.
• 2:43
  Speaking of funding, the governor's budget. actually doesn't fully fund the
• 2:48
  retirement system. We've talked about in recent years, the legislature has contributed
• 2:53
  a good amount to the retirement system to keep it going.
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  Obviously, employees contribute 6% a month, faithfully always have.
• 3:00
  The legislature in the past had some times where it contributed literally nothing.
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  And after the system suffered from it, they've been trying to make up for that.
• 3:09
  But the governor's budget underfunds by 206 million across two years.
• 3:16
  The retirement system. Well, he can make that up with Bitcoin investments. Oh, my gosh.
• 3:22
  No, we are not advocating that. I mean, that's, has that happened in recent years?
• 3:28
  Is that like a new, seems like it's always been funded to me, right?
• 3:32
  No. Well, obviously, like I said, in recent years, yes.
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  Whatever the actuarially required contribution was, certainly Treasurer Falwell
• 3:42
  was really adamant about that because his concern was this unfunded liability
• 3:46
  that would occur and risk the system over time.
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  So we'll find out where Treasurer Briner stands on this. The ball's in his court now.
• 3:54
  But this is a whopping underfunding of the retirement system.
• 3:58
  So for our retiree listeners, we will stay on this.
• 4:01
  Yes. I wanted to touch on that because our retirees have been the most vocal
• 4:06
  about the raise situation in recent years. And I'm glad that we started off
• 4:10
  with them this time, talking about the budget.
• 4:13
  Right. Well, and I mean, ask anybody, can they live on what they've been living
• 4:17
  on forever now with no actual increase?
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  And just a bonus of a percentage of retirement pay.
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  And retirement pay is already a greatly diminished amount from what you were
• 4:28
  making with the state. And then you take just a 2% part of that.
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  That might get a tank of grass and groceries, a little bit of groceries.
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  Which leads us to the other side, the active employee 2% raise.
• 4:41
  What are your thoughts on that? And then, yeah, let's just start with that, I guess.
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  I have some other thoughts, but. Everybody's looking at me.
• 4:49
  Okay, so the governor, we talked about it on the podcast last week,
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  after the state of the state, it was very clear Governor Stein has a real desire
• 4:59
  to make North Carolina the best paying state in the Southeast for teachers.
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  I think that's a laudable goal. The Southeast is not really the most impressive
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  in pay for anything, but certainly you're not going to get people to go into
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  the teaching profession if you don't pay them better.
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  And so he suggested a 10.6 percent average teacher raise over two years.
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  That's not problematic if you could give
• 5:24
  equity and do the exact same thing for the rest of state government because
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  we have a 20 percent vacancy rate across state government and that is 20 percent
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  vacant out of a number of state employees that is down by 24 percent from what
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  we had working for the state 15 years ago.
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  So our population's grown by 16%.
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  We've got 24% less people trying to take care of that increased population.
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  20% of those positions are vacant, and you're going to offer them 2%.
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  I don't mean to get into the weeds, but, you know, there's like local supplements
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  for teachers as well, whereas there's no local supplements for prison employees.
• 6:04
  Yeah. And, you know, that's going to be a thing in the schools because the certified
• 6:08
  personnel are the teachers and the school administrators.
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  So your principals, assistant principals, again, your teachers or central office
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  folks, they're the ones that are going to get the 10.6 percent over two years
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  under Stein's proposal.
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  Now, your teacher assistants, your technicians, your clerical,
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  your other non-certified folks who work to keep our schools going,
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  who we're also having a hard time retaining, they're with the rest of state
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  government in Stein's proposal getting the 2%.
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  So the total amount being proposed to be spent on teacher and administrator
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  increases is $726 million over the two-year period.
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  And to take the other folks in the schools as an example, they're down here $18 million.
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  So $18 million on folks that work in schools who aren't teachers or administrators.
• 6:59
  Yeah, and the teacher raises are each year, so two years, whereas the rest of us only get the one year.
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  It's a proposal for one year for everybody else. And then correctional officers
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  do get, in Governor Stein's proposal, 6.5% in one year.
• 7:14
  Again, since it's one year and not two, Governor Stein's point about the teacher
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  raises is, look, we got a crisis of people leaving the teaching profession.
• 7:22
  Well, we have a crisis where we have more than 60 percent vacant prisons in terms of employees.
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  That's the most dangerous thing I can think of. And he's proposing four percent
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  less than he is for the teachers.
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  So the bonus, the one thousand dollar bonus in the first year,
• 7:39
  I can see where that would be popular. I think that people appreciate that.
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  Something on top of. I mean, the raise is obviously the goal of.
• 7:49
  To share a little bit of the gravy, so to speak. Yeah, where does that come from, I guess?
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  That's non-recognizing money. It would be one-time money. And my fear there
• 7:57
  is, who's going to say in the legislature, okay, we're going to spend that one-time
• 8:03
  money there and not on hurricane relief? Yeah.
• 8:08
  So it seems like, it doesn't seem like, pay needs to be pay.
• 8:12
  Same reason for retirees that it needs to be a real COLA. Just getting something
• 8:17
  one year and then getting that taxed at the bonus level, which is a big hit.
• 8:22
  So you're not getting $1,000 to be clear.
• 8:24
  Yeah. True. But just getting something one year isn't changing your life.
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  Obviously, inflation is far exceeding 2%. And we're talking about premium increases coming.
• 8:35
  And there we have it. Then you start going behind.
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  That's what I was going to get to next. So you have the state health plan board
• 8:42
  of trustees considering a premium increase. I can see a scenario where some
• 8:47
  employees may lose money in their check and their take-home pay.
• 8:52
  If the legislature just adopted this, yeah, all the state employees would. Yeah.
• 8:58
  Two percent? Yeah. Yeah, they all would. That was actually a common comment
• 9:03
  that I saw on our Facebook post about the governor's budget was people saying,
• 9:08
  with the premium increases, two percent is just going to put us further in the
• 9:12
  hole than we already are.
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  I mean, I agree with them because they haven't even heard the whole proposal.
• 9:17
  We don't know how much. It's not just premiums. Yes. Out-of-pocket maximums,
• 9:21
  deductibles, specialist visits, drug co-pays.
• 9:25
  By the time you add all of this up, it'll take your paycheck away faster than anything.
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  So, yeah, I would assume they all go backwards if all they get is 2%.
• 9:34
  And North Carolina is the most expensive state in the union for...
• 9:39
  Can't say it enough times, John.
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  Say it louder for the people in the back. We're number one. Yeah.
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  Maybe the beauty of the moment is that this is the governor's proposal and it's
• 9:52
  just the beginning of the budget process. So the legislature ultimately makes
• 9:57
  the final version of the budget.
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  So we've still got a ways to go. But the governor's budget is the ceiling for the budget proposal.
• 10:04
  So this is kind of a low ceiling, if you will.
• 10:08
  Well, you know, Governor Stein said he really wants to continue the spirit he's
• 10:13
  got of cooperation with the General Assembly.
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  And I thought, well, you're doing a great job because this is setting that bar
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  so low in terms of how to take care of the workers.
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  It's not hard to match it or beat it. And that is, it's a hard pill to swallow
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  for workers, especially because the governor is in a different position than even the legislature.
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  So many of the state workers, through their agencies they work for,
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  which are cabinet agencies, their ultimate boss is the governor.
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  That's their boss, who is recognizing some people to get more than his own people.
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  That's tough. That's a very tough pill to swallow. And you can never lose with equity.
• 10:54
  Never. You know, that's always been our message. That will continue to be our
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  message. Pay equity. Yeah, pay equity.
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  Yeah. Thanks, John. I don't want to get into that. Yeah.
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  Well, we like all equity for what is worth. But yeah, when you're giving out,
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  when you have a tight budget, equity is the only way to go.
• 11:13
  Again, okay, I think it's a cool idea. Become the paragon in the Southeast for educators.
• 11:19
  Now, that sounds like something you do. You make a bold move like that.
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  Definitely go for something like that when you've got so much surplus.
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  It's just one of those amazing years. So you want to do something bold.
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  I don't see how you do it when you yourself say there's a fiscal cliff coming for the next few years.
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  So this, according to Governor Stein, is his last chance to do anything meaningful.
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  Yeah, that was a good point you brought up earlier when we were talking to the
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  press on some things. Well, I'm very confused by it.
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  Like, you yourself said it's going to get bad after this year.
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  Okay, if that's the truth, and this is the last little token pay you can give
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  state workers for potentially several years more, 2%?
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  Yeah. That's it. It just seems kind of a bizarro world to me in that you have
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  the governor saying, oh, we're about to fall off a financial cliff,
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  and the other side saying, no, we're not.
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  It just seems like those are reversed. And then the governor says,
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  and yet I'm going to spend $700 million, and we're going to become number one
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  in pay. but just for one group.
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  That's weird to me. I don't get it. And what it does to public workers is it
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  makes them feel the way public workers all over the country are feeling. And I don't
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  The Governor Stein that I've known since he was Senator Stein is not the kind
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  of person who would like making people feel that way,
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  but he needs to know 100 percent that's what they're feeling because they're
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  letting us know loud and clear that they feel he doesn't give them any more
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  credit than public workers are getting at the federal level or anywhere else.
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  It's just right now it's like popular to hate on public employees and not to
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  do for them. And let's be honest, if there's a real concerted doge effort here,
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  they're not going to go after teacher positions.
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  No. They'll be very unpopular, but we're the kind of low-hanging fruit, if you will.
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  Yeah, and I actually had a conversation with an appropriations chair about,
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  I mean, there's like 16,000 vacant positions in North Carolina right now.
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  And so we see what's coming ahead with, you know, but there was a little bit
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  of talk about, you know, maybe taking away some of those positions and reallocating that money.
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  So that discussion led into what agencies need the lapse salary money for,
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  not to mention that we need those people in those positions to fully provide
• 13:40
  the services that taxpayers are paying for here in our state. Right.
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  Because I, you know, I get it, the whole idea that certainly trying to be number
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  one in teacher pay is something you're doing for children. But let's think about this.
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  Newborn screenings, when a child is born, newborn screenings are being delayed
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  that affect their health because we don't have enough state employees.
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  Elevators are very tough to inspect on time at this point because of vacancies.
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  What is on bottles of chemicals that are sold?
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  Pesticides and things that the Department of Agriculture makes sure are what they say they are.
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  Our children, if we don't have enough state employees to get that done,
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  may get exposed to something that can hurt them gravely.
• 14:24
  So caring about children has to be an overall thing, right?
• 14:29
  And not just when they're at school. Well, that's seven, eight hours of their day.
• 14:33
  Somebody said this to me today, a colleague at the building,
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  not long after the budget came out and everybody's over there,
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  you know, little chatter going on. And someone said, well, you know what?
• 14:43
  Those teachers have got to have a clear road after a hurricane in order to get
• 14:47
  to the school. Right. A safe bridge to go across. Yeah. Yeah.
• 14:50
  So. And everyone else. Right. And everyone else. The infrastructure.
• 14:54
  I had that conversation as well this week. You know, state employees,
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  retired state employees are the ones responsible for the infrastructure of this great state.
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  And the reason why people want to keep coming here is because we've got good infrastructure.
• 15:07
  We're not going to maintain that at this rate. So where do we go from here,
• 15:10
  Suzanne? Which side goes first this year? The Senate's got it first this year. Okay.
• 15:14
  Yeah. I guess we don't have any indication when that'll come out, right?
• 15:18
  Not yet. And I had just made my rounds yesterday. So I did talk to some appropriations
• 15:23
  chairs who were like, we haven't even gotten to the pay raise portion.
• 15:27
  Well, that's concerning.
• 15:29
  Well, you've got to take it with a grain of salt, too. Let us spend the rest
• 15:32
  of our money first and then we'll throw you a ball. They're not going to tell
• 15:35
  us everything they're doing.
• 15:37
  Well, the concern, obviously, and Suzanne kind of alluded to it earlier,
• 15:41
  we heard it when Director Meyer of the Office of State Human Resources was testifying
• 15:46
  before the oversight committee. House oversight. House oversight.
• 15:49
  Somebody on that house oversight committee made a comment.
• 15:53
  One person made a comment about pay isn't everything to people.
• 15:55
  You know, some of them want more vacation.
• 15:57
  Okay, we're hearing from people that pay is, in fact, everything because they
• 16:01
  can't pay their light bill with a day off.
• 16:03
  And we're also hearing in that committee, we heard something about the 16,000.
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  And could we use some of those, take some of those positions?
• 16:13
  Now, these are positions that are not unneeded, they're just not able to be
• 16:18
  filled because we don't pay enough.
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  But as expected, when they've had to sit there because we can't fill them and
• 16:24
  we're not competitive, now people are looking at them thinking,
• 16:27
  we can just take some of those.
• 16:29
  We're getting by, right? Yeah, right. Yeah, then in the meantime,
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  you're working people to the point of depression and burnout.
• 16:39
  And newborns are getting delayed in their screening and autopsies are getting
• 16:44
  delayed and all the things we've talked about a million times.
• 16:47
  This has effects on the taxpayers. So it's like, yeah, we don't need these.
• 16:52
  If the employees could come in and talk to you about it, they'd explain to you
• 16:55
  exactly why you need and exactly how dangerous in some cases it is for the people in your district.
• 17:01
  But I am afraid that that's where they're going to want to go.
• 17:04
  That or say, it'd just be cheaper to privatize. But it won't.
• 17:08
  Never is. No. We've been there, done that.
• 17:11
  The prisons, there were two privatized prisons and the state had to pull them back.
• 17:14
  So we're going to get a little light for Sam to push whenever she wants to speak,
• 17:19
  because I've seen her over here.
• 17:20
  She's on the safe or something. You got to jump in, girl.
• 17:23
  I'm thinking that the legislature is sitting there thinking,
• 17:26
  oh, if we get rid of the jobs, the vacancy rate lowers because we don't have
• 17:31
  those jobs anymore. They don't exist.
• 17:33
  I mean, yeah. It looks like a resounding success. And it looks like,
• 17:35
  oh, we're full because it's all there. You're absolutely.
• 17:39
  You've got it. You get the nail on the head. And think about it.
• 17:42
  We've reduced costs. we've brought that vacancy rate down.
• 17:46
  And then people hate the idea of public employees. For the most part, they really do.
• 17:51
  If you tell them we've cut the number of employees, yay. Now, if you told them.
• 17:56
  You're going to have to wait in longer lines for this. Or if you're a business
• 17:59
  and you need something from the Secretary of State's office,
• 18:02
  it's going to take longer. They're like, no.
• 18:04
  That's a key point there. I was just thinking the same thing when you were saying
• 18:08
  that, like, yes, people hate the idea of public employees, but they also hate
• 18:12
  when their DMV lines are really long. They have hearings about this DMV.
• 18:16
  Or when they find out how unsafe they are, if we don't have enough people.
• 18:20
  And then if you tell the public, hey, what if we privatize it? Oh, I like that.
• 18:24
  Let businesses handle it. If they think they're going to pay less per hour,
• 18:29
  the people doing the jobs, if it were privatized, would make less per hour.
• 18:33
  But the company would charge you more per hour for those people's work than
• 18:38
  the state costs for public employees to do it. Because that's business.
• 18:42
  They've got to make a profit. They're not there to be a charity.
• 18:45
  Exactly. So you've got to add in some profit, right?
• 18:48
  So, you know, but it sounds good. And if you don't deep dive into it or even
• 18:52
  shallow dive. Quite frankly, there's not a lot of diving with most people these
• 18:55
  days and see a headline and roll on.
• 18:58
  I mean, I get it because before I ever worked briefly for the state,
• 19:02
  I would have been easy to say, yeah, let's not have all those public employees,
• 19:07
  you know, till you get to work for the state and get in a file cabinet.
• 19:10
  File cabinets were used at the time and realize, oh, my goodness,
• 19:13
  I didn't know they did all this stuff.
• 19:15
  So that's why we're here, to let you know they do all that stuff.
• 19:19
  And the retirees, the reason we can never forget them is they did all the stuff.
• 19:24
  And they did it for at least 30 years.
• 19:27
  And they did it for less than they could have made in the private sector.
• 19:30
  And they were really talented people who didn't have to be with the state for the most part.
• 19:35
  You know, most people, I'm not going to say everybody was anything,
• 19:38
  but most people working in the state were really, really good.
• 19:42
  And they could have worked somewhere else. But what they liked was the stability
• 19:45
  of the thought of a retirement with a cost of living, because there always was one.
• 19:50
  And then they get to retirement and the rules have changed. So it's a terrible breach of a promise.
• 19:56
  It was also probably more difficult then because they didn't have all the technological
• 20:00
  advancements that we have now.
• 20:02
  100%. So they were doing even harder work. Yeah. But your earlier point about
• 20:07
  the vacancy rate going down, that's something for us to watch.
• 20:09
  I mean, they're going to start touting that. they're going to start saying,
• 20:12
  look what we did. We lowered the,
• 20:15
  Yeah, I mean, you know, to a certain extent, this is part of politics.
• 20:19
  You know, everybody sells stuff the best they can.
• 20:22
  I just think, again, to sum up Governor Stein's budget, the feeling I have more
• 20:26
  than anything is confusion.
• 20:29
  If you think we're about to go off a cliff, why are you taking on one of the
• 20:33
  most ambitious things I've ever seen and leaving your workers, for the most part,
• 20:39
  with a 2% parting gift before they spend a couple of years struggling to make
• 20:45
  it when we all know prices are going like crazy and only likely to get worse?
• 20:50
  So recent years, we've had these discussions, maybe not in podcast form,
• 20:54
  but we ultimately usually get to the point where we say, well,
• 20:57
  the governor's budget really doesn't matter that much in the grand scheme of things.
• 21:01
  Does it matter a little more this year because there's not a supermajority in the House?
• 21:06
  Well, I think the speaker already indicated to the press, I saw one article
• 21:10
  that he felt like there were some areas they can't work together on.
• 21:13
  They couldn't agree some of the governor's proposals around tax credits and
• 21:18
  things like that. But that on salary and things like that, he,
• 21:21
  I'm not going to put words in his mouth, but it was something about,
• 21:24
  you know, it looked promising there.
• 21:26
  Well, I guess so. Here we are. Again, it's just, if that's the bar.
• 21:30
  Yeah. I bet everybody's going to cooperate really well.
• 21:34
  But I am prayerful, the legislature, that we'll be able to convince them that
• 21:38
  this is really, it's just bad policy and that it's time to do something for folks.
• 21:43
  One thing that I just kind of wanted to get your opinion on,
• 21:45
  I saw in there that he had mentioned doing child care facilities at some of
• 21:50
  the agencies and implementing some of those because there are people who choose
• 21:55
  to leave the workforce because they have child care barriers and it's too expensive to afford it.
• 22:01
  My question is, who's going to work in those facilities when we already have
• 22:05
  such a large vacancy rate?
• 22:06
  We can't even fill the other positions. Who's going to be taking care of their children while?
• 22:11
  Yeah, I don't know that that's a question we can answer from the budget.
• 22:14
  I do see that it's like a million dollars of non-recurring.
• 22:18
  Yeah. So that's not going to cover a lot. It's not. But we've heard from our members before.
• 22:24
  Things would be easier if they had child care. Yes.
• 22:27
  It's a 12-hour shift. Which does make sense. So, yeah, going in a great direction there.
• 22:31
  However, a million dollars doesn't do a lot for making these facilities. And you have to make it.
• 22:36
  We've all paid for child care, so we're like, a million dollars.
• 22:39
  That'd be one kid, right? Right.
• 22:41
  Yeah, especially in Raleigh, I hear that it's really high. It's bad.
• 22:45
  And we've talked about, as an association, that it's harder to get younger people
• 22:50
  involved because of the lack of child care for our meetings and for things,
• 22:56
  you know, like we've debated about having child care, say, at our convention where folks can come in.
• 23:02
  Yeah, and bring their kids. Because I did notice on the sheet we have in front
• 23:05
  of us, it said child care barriers contribute to 34 percent of mothers and 20
• 23:10
  percent of fathers leaving the workforce.
• 23:13
  Yeah, I mean, it's a real problem. It really is a real problem,
• 23:15
  especially probably in the Raleigh area. I think it's a needed thing without question.
• 23:21
  With the amount of surplus that's available this year, is there going to be
• 23:24
  enough to actually do it?
• 23:26
  Again, I don't see how some of these ideas, which are good ideas, I don't see how they get.
• 23:33
  Done within the money that we have.
• 23:35
  I assume there's probably a couple of ways to tackle it, too.
• 23:38
  Like you could have it in your office or you could subsidize it in some way.
• 23:42
  That's what I'm wondering. It was like some of these. Like an expense report.
• 23:46
  Yeah. Some of these things that will get built for employees in certain areas, I'm not going to say.
• 23:52
  And then the price for them is higher than the market, right?
• 23:56
  So it's not solving anything. I mean, that's what I wonder.
• 24:00
  Yeah. So I think our opinion on that would be it's a good idea,
• 24:03
  but we'd like to see how it's implemented, which gets to your question,
• 24:06
  like, how do you pay for that? You're right.
• 24:08
  Sam, devil's in the details. So that's the governor's budget proposal.
• 24:13
  Suzanne, what can we do from here? You said the Senate is next.
• 24:17
  What can members do? Yeah. So go to scenic.org backslash engage and you can
• 24:22
  find your legislators and contact them. That's what we need you to do.
• 24:27
  Contact them and tell them, tell them your story. Tell them why a pay increase
• 24:32
  is important in your life.
• 24:34
  You know, you're not just a number on a spreadsheet. So they need to hear your
• 24:37
  stories. And that's where you can start.
• 24:39
  Help continue the advocacy efforts and the fight for something meaningful in
• 24:43
  your paycheck. All right.
• 24:45
  Just one other state employee item I wanted to mention, Artis,
• 24:48
  because we talked a little bit about it last week.
• 24:50
  NC State is hiring Kevin Howell to be their chancellor.
• 24:54
  And you said you have a connection to him, right? Well, I went to law school with Kevin.
• 24:59
  Okay. He was a Tar Heel. Oh, no.
• 25:02
  Then we're making major news. So I want to be I want to be very clear about
• 25:07
  a couple of things about Kevin Howell.
• 25:09
  Number one, he is about as decent, honorable and nice a person as you will ever
• 25:13
  meet in your life, in all of political life. I don't know that I've ever known anybody.
• 25:18
  I think more highly. And he's been that same person for, you know,
• 25:22
  like the four years since we graduated from law school in our 20s.
• 25:28
  But no, I've known him for almost 35 years and he is.
• 25:33
  Excellent person, but he is more importantly, not just an excellent person,
• 25:38
  but how often do you combine that with one of the smartest people around,
• 25:42
  one of the absolutely most devoted to that institution always was.
• 25:49
  He was a Tar Heel because they didn't have a law school at NC State.
• 25:52
  He went there for undergrad. He went there for undergrad.
• 25:55
  He was actually a student body president when he was there.
• 25:59
  And he was really such an achieving person, but you wouldn't know it to talk
• 26:04
  to him because he's just as down to earth and nice as they can be.
• 26:08
  But I'm telling you, he will do amazing things there because his heart's in
• 26:12
  it. He is smart as anybody I've ever met in my life.
• 26:16
  And I'm just as excited for them. Yeah, we're happy for you, Kevin.
• 26:20
  Congrats to him. And we look forward to working with him as well.
• 26:23
  We have a lot of members at state.
• 26:25
  Yeah. And they had a good one in Chancellor Woodson in there.
• 26:28
  It's pretty rare that you just luck out several times there.
• 26:32
  I guess it's not too strange. Carolina has a Duke grad as their chancellor now, right?
• 26:37
  So I guess all the institutions. Well, you know how a lot of people won't count
• 26:41
  their grad school as. Did you hear how I said Duke grad?
• 26:44
  I know. Well, I really think you are becoming some kind of closet Duke fan,
• 26:49
  but we'll talk about that later.
• 26:51
  So, yeah. Yeah, you're really thinking about it. You had a moment.
• 26:54
  You're throwing me off now. Yeah, because you had a moment of introspection.
• 26:57
  People really think this about me. Felt wrong, didn't it, John? Yeah, it really does.
• 27:01
  So, I guess we'll just get to our question of the week.
• 27:05
  John's wacky weird question of the week.
• 27:06
  Music.
• 27:12
  All right. So, spring has sprung. And you can feel the pollen in the air.
• 27:18
  I was driving home yesterday. or yesterday it was raining I think it was Monday
• 27:21
  and you can see a little bit of a green tint to everything my windshield's a
• 27:26
  little green does the pollen bother you guys too much?
• 27:30
  It rained yesterday? wait, is our question of the week do we have seasonal allergies?
• 27:35
  Pollen is awful I was just making banter there thank goodness for medications,
• 27:40
  well just making sure I didn't know if we were going to start has anybody had a colonoscopy?
• 27:44
  Let's talk oh no.
• 27:48
  I did go to the... Never mind. You almost told it.
• 27:52
  Yeah, I think everybody in this room deals with seasonal... I think most people in this state do.
• 27:58
  Well, I don't think it works as you get older, sir. It really does.
• 28:01
  Isn't it supposed to be like the number of deciduous trees and we have some...
• 28:04
  We have so many. We have some crazy high number.
• 28:07
  Yeah, I think... You know, when you look around and you see a lot of beauty...
• 28:10
  I don't think it's deciduous. I think it's evergreens. Like pine trees and ragweed,
• 28:15
  those produce a lot of pollen. I don't know.
• 28:19
  Deciduous and... I don't know. I don't know. Deciduous. Deciduous means that
• 28:24
  they lose their lives in the winter. Oh, okay. I was thinking that was... Okay.
• 28:27
  Everything's just blooming and there's pollen, y'all. But my question of the
• 28:31
  week is, what is your favorite springtime activity?
• 28:35
  And I'll start this one, I guess. I love... You know, it's like the start of
• 28:39
  baseball season, right?
• 28:40
  So opening day is... Well, they played two games in Japan the last two days,
• 28:46
  the Dodgers and the Cubs. But, yeah, baseball is about here.
• 28:49
  And then second, I guess, would be the Masters, which is in a few weeks.
• 28:53
  But that's always just so beautiful with the azaleas.
• 28:56
  And it's so minor sports related, obviously.
• 28:59
  Suzanne, I always go to you first. So what's going on? I have grandbabies now.
• 29:04
  So obviously anything playing outside will be fun.
• 29:07
  They're both big enough to run around and, you know, go down the slide.
• 29:10
  Don't do that again. I won't do that again. I heard you got hurt on the slide.
• 29:14
  I did. I had a butt plant. Bam!
• 29:18
  It was unfortunate, and I am too old to do that. So I think anything outside,
• 29:22
  obviously, with the kids, but anything blooming, too.
• 29:25
  I mean, flowers. I went out and cut the—I call them buttercups.
• 29:29
  You know, I have them in a little jar now. Oh, yeah.
• 29:31
  On my— Dandelions? Is that what that is? Daffodils. Oh, okay.
• 29:35
  Sam, what's up? So I've lived in a park or near a park since I've moved to Raleigh,
• 29:41
  and it's become one of my favorite things to do in the spring.
• 29:44
  I will grab a basic sheet from a bed set and I will take my dog on a walk and
• 29:50
  And he has a 30-foot leash that I have for him. And so I'll just put him on
• 29:55
  a 30-foot leash, lay out the sheet, have a little snack tackle box,
• 29:58
  and read a book while he just plays.
• 30:01
  Nice. That's perfect. Because it's not too hot at that point.
• 30:06
  Once it gets too hot, I'm not doing it.
• 30:08
  So I saved artists for last because I didn't tell her what the question was.
• 30:11
  Right. So I'll give her a little chance to. You know, I was stumped at first, but I don't know why.
• 30:15
  Because if I get a chance, and I did last weekend, fishing is what March is about to be. Oh, yeah.
• 30:21
  Because the water, the inland water starts to get, some of the inland waterways
• 30:24
  will get warm enough that you can actually do some fishing.
• 30:28
  And I wouldn't go out in January or February and do it anyway because I hate
• 30:32
  the cold too much these days.
• 30:33
  But March, it can be cold out there on the boat, but you can hit it just right.
• 30:39
  I hit it just right. It was awesome.
• 30:40
  I see some boats. I drive adjacent to Jordan Lake on the way to work,
• 30:45
  and I've started to see a few boats out there.
• 30:47
  So in summer, it'll be packed. Yeah, and the lake's going to be warm enough.
• 30:51
  You go to Jordan Lake? I used to a bunch. Okay.
• 30:54
  No, this, but I was saltwater fishing over the weekend for red drum. There you go.
• 30:59
  Because North Carolina's got the red drum. We've got the best ones.
• 31:03
  Biggest one on record, I think, was Buxton. Is that murder backwards? Oh, my gosh.
• 31:11
  Red drum. Red fish. Some people call it red rum. Red rum. Okay. But we digress.
• 31:16
  But I digress. and that is the scenic view podcast for this week be sure to
• 31:21
  read your scoop and email us at podcast at scenic.org if you have any questions
• 31:27
  for us and we'll see you next week.
• 31:29
  Music.