Orange County commissioners to discuss war funding

A resolution regarding opposition to war funding is back on the Orange County Board of Commissioners’ agenda tonight after being tabled in October.

Chapel Hill resident Mark Marcoplos first proposed the resolution, entitled “Resolution To End the Expenditure of the Public’s Tax Dollars by the U.S. Congress for Excessive and Unaffordable Warfare Funding,” to commissioners at a Sept. 21 meeting through a public petition.

The item was added to commissioners’ Oct. 19 agenda, although Commissioner Steve Yuhasz moved to table discussion on the issue to a later date.

The resolution states that the war in Afghanistan causes “great and unnecessary harm to the people of the nation of Afghanistan and to U.S. military personnel and their families,” and proposes commissioners to encourage N.C. senators and congressmen to oppose further funding.

“This is a very local issue,” Marcoplos said. “We’re talking about money that is leaving Orange County that would be much better spent on local needs.”

Commissioners haven’t warmed to the resolution.

Yuhasz said he questioned whether the board had the authority to speak on national defense policy.

“International affairs aren’t really within the board’s purview,” he said. “That’s not what the people who elect the board expect us to comment on.”

Commissioner Barry Jacobs said local governments passing resolutions on national policy is a practice that should be used sparingly.

“You need to be sure that this is where you want to put your chips,” he said. “As a local government, I’m not sure we have a lot of national policy chips to bet.”

But Marcoplos said local governments have an obligation to speak out on behalf of their citizens on how their tax money is being spent.

“We’ve noticed that over the years, you can sign petitions, you can turn up on the national mall with thousands of people, and legislators ignore it,” he said.

“But if local governments were to speak up with this loss of funding, I think it could be very powerful.”

Commissioners will also receive the annual financial report, which documents how the county is managing its finances.

Clarence Grier, the county’s financial services director, said last fiscal year the county had a deficit of $6.2 million. This year, the balance is at a surplus of $1.3 million.

“We have a good financial position, but we need to maintain what we currently have,” he said. “If we collect the revenues that we did for 2009-2010, we should be fine.”

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