Remembering that H2GO Fiasco

This Week in Leland Corruption

While Debby Does the Carolinas, a little reading while we remain inside. Yesterday I happened by a local store, and the panic buying had already commenced.

---

Leland has been drifting into ugly waters for a long time. One such example was the H2GO fiasco that not only exposed lawlessness of one water board, but also the one that replaced it. In the middle were two towns—Leland and Belville. Both of those also had their share of corruption.

I confess, I never really followed the events both leading up to the debacle, nor did I ever really understand it, because, the legacy media never seemed to get to the real issue underlying it all. One thing that did seem true, the old board, and the new board that eventually took over, violated the NC Law, and did so purposely—all of them were lawless.

There are no heroes in this story—it is nothing but a story about complete narcissism. Believe me, I tried to find a hero. I like stories of courageous people sticking up for the voters. If you have followed this substack, you know I am quite critical of the present leadership in Leland, but at least we have people who are fighting them politically.

Not so with H2GO from 2014-2020. Let’s go in somewhat chronological order.

Early debate 2014-2015—Osmosis? Leftists Say No to Cost v. Benefit!

Before you go all Chimp about the heading—the leftists wanted RO at any cost, while the mindful wanted to keep rates low and also look for cleaner options. The former want this at the cost of your pocket book like the good socialist Democrats they are. The latter wanted it to be without rate increases and still find clean outlets for wells. Seriously that was the divide. In the end, even the mindful assented to the RO plan, but with a more responsible plan to get it.

Between 214-2015 there was a proposal to create a reverse osmosis plant in the area. For one reason, H2go was having to buy water from other areas, increasing cost. A new plant would 1) control costs and 2) provide a viable solution for water given the salty (and allegedly PFAS!) issues with the water near any ocean area.

Now my initial reaction to all this objection to reverse osmosis was, it works in California. After all in my old place of birth it seems to work.

It is this issue that seems to have caused the eventual contentious problems that came later. Out of this issue came the legal fight between the greedy town of Leland, and the equally greedy town of Bellville, whose sole existence is because someone wanted an ABC store and alcohol access. Fitting.

2017-2020: Must be the Season of the Witch—The Lawsuit

The background on the lawsuit is basically this: The outgoing H2go board in the dead of night voted 3-2 to transfer all assets to Belville, and then in a 3-2 Belville council decision voted to transfer (accept) all assets to Belville. It was reported the move was to save the osmosis plant. That is suspect.¹

Belville’s lawyers, mayor, and spokesperson have all maintained that the transfer was conducted entirely in accordance with the law. (Leland argues in court filings that a sanitary district has no authority to dissolve and transfer itself. Further, Belville paid just $10 for the $60 million in H2GO assets, an amount Leland has argued is too insignificant to be considered legitimate. Belville’s spokesperson said this amount for a transfer of assets including debt and maintenance costs is typical.)

What a sweetheart deal! Mayor Allen engages in a deal whereby the town made out like bandits, at the expense of Leland residents to be sure. He would do this again when he would side with Evolve in their latest development and gavel down most Leland residents in opposition to the Evolve coffin Apartments going up on Poole road. To say the least, he is not a trustworthy mayor.

Back to H2go:

When the transfer documents were introduced in the middle of H2GO’s Nov. 28 meeting, neither Gerken nor Trombley had been briefed on the idea, as Belville had planned. The transfer passed 3-2, with Gerken and Trombley voting against. Belville – which had deliberately held open its Nov. 20 meeting – reopened session on Nov. 29 at 8 a.m., and signed the documents necessary to cement the transfer.

A bit shockingly, WWAY had the best story on this debacle. Our old “friend,” and resident lefty Republican, Bill Moore’s comrade, Frank Williams, also had the audacity to chime in on this issue in the WWAY link.

I will say the move to Belville was not only disingenuous, but also unnecessary. But worse: it was illegal. This will become clear later:

The moves are the latest salvos in the battle over the future of H2Go, which took a major turn last Tuesday when outgoing board member Carl Antos, who lost by just a handful of votes to Beer in last month’s election, proposed conveying H2Go’s assets to Belville. Antos and fellow incumbents Ron Jenkins and Bill Browning, supported the plan, which had not been announced before Antos presented it during the meeting. The three men all support building a RO plant.

Briefly what was illegal? They violated ethics/meeting laws of this state. It is clear. This is not mere opinion.

Also, I think clear: this had nothing to do with clean water.

So they gave away the public assets of H2go to Belville in late November because the newly elected board member (Bill Beer) would have swung the vote to a more cautious RO implementation, and, well, some transplants to the area just could not have any of that!

Equally disgraceful, though, In December, in a midnight swearing in ceremy, the new board rescinded the transfer to Belville. WWAY was on top of it (good for them!). Illegal or at least unethical? You ‘betcha! More on this with pro-RO bias from WWAY.

Most of that original board either did not run, or was voted out. A new board was elected handily, and the RO business continued apace. From PCD November 2019.²

This, from PCD, notes how Mayor Allen and town engaged in illegal election activity before the election. It strikes one as arrogance of course that a town would enegage in another town’s politics, but that’s Allen for you. He sounds like a good old boy, but he’s really duplicitous in this way, and of course Bozeman just takes it from him because they are “friends.”

Regardless of all this coziness at our expense, the NC courts smacked everyone in a ruling that did indeed declare, the transfer to Belville was an illegal act (Allen engaged in illegal electoral activity) and also that the incoming board acted in violation of the laws of the state of North Carolina. Rare justice!

“The court finds that there was competent and substantial evidence to support the legal conclusion that the commissioners of both governing boards of H2GO and Belville, acting in concert, failed to act in good faith, and their actions were so clearly unreasonable as to amount to an oppressive and manifest abuse of their discretion,”

While the rescinding of the prior board’s actions in that midnight vote was valid, they acted in bad faith, which is a reasonable conclusion. Still, one was valid, and the other was not. That outgoing RO at any cost board took the brunt of the ire from the Court:

On Monday, Henry found no North Carolina Open Meetings Law violations based on the evidence presented — a claim that remains stayed per a January consent order.

However, based on the set of circumstances, Henry “reluctantly” concluded H2GO’s outgoing majority and Belville’s Board of Commissioners violated state ethics law by failing to conduct business in an “open and public manner.”

As I noted above, mine was not mere opinion. It was clear!

While I support RO in general, I sure as hell do not support it at any cost like the Democrat/Belville apparatchiks around here.

Speaking of morons by the way, Mayor Bozeman considered the ruling a victory for “our Democracy.” Oh shut up. By our democracy she means what democrats mean—ours is not your democracy. She wanted the money and the control—she did not want the democratic process to succeed. If she did she would have come out against Allen who stuck his nose into the H2go election. But no, she was silent about that part of “her democracy.” I am sure Bozeman and Allen can laugh about all this in the parking lot of the Belville’s ABC store with whiskey wrapped in paper bags for effect.

As I wrote: there are no heroes in this story.

Oh Belville thinks they won. Laughably, they did not. Essentially, they got spanked for sticking their nose into something above their pay grade. There’s a lot of rumors, and accusations around this unseemly display, but let’s close this off for now.

2023 Election

The election is 2023 saw a consolidation and more/less end to the controversy that had surrounded H2go for nearly a decade. Most of the anti-RO candidates were crushed, and the voters settled on people more/less pro-RO.

I think none of that matters. What matters more is that a sense of stability came through the voters.

Steve Hosmer and Barry Laub won pretty handily. A third, the radical leftist, and Democrat Party precinct hack, Joanne Levitan, lost. That latter part is a blessing to this county—Levitan is a active socialist who is given to TDS, and supported that incest child showerer Joe Biden. She is also good frands with our favorite nutty Leland Council Members, C actor McHugh and Sluggo.

She was for the building of the baseball stadium, and thinks there’s white supremacists all over Brunswick county. There was a recent “event” that she thinks is proof that whyte people are bad.

A group called Patriot Front, who, no one seems to be able to find, but who march around after being bussed in by, likely, Democrats, is her proof. And McHugh decided to take action by cutting down his comrade’s a sign. Not sure, if that is how free speech is protected in this country, but at least we know that Democrats like Levitan and McHugh hate speech they disagree with. And they will take unilateral action to silence people they disagree with.

I not a fan of speech I disagree with too, but we have this thing called the first amendment. It seems likely to me, that the slave party Democrats would create this sign to blame it on their enemies. I mean this really does seem like some Democrat psy op to create a story so they could be lauded heroes.

For the record: PF can fuck off. Republicans took away your slaves, and we can do it again.

Regardless, Democrats publicly think this group is somehow connected to Republicans without evidence, which tells me….projection. As noted, it is just as possible this group is a psy op from the feds, or the Democrat party itself. After all, Democrats do believe they are the only ones who should control this country, and they love to deny blacks the vote—as they just did this month when they nominated Harris, against the wishes of their black voters. SAD!

Patriot Front Democrats Leave sign, then tear down, then praise themselves for tearing it down.

Republicans have denounced this group, and there has been no connection into what or who this group is, which is suspicious. For all the intensity on the left, they just cannot seem to find out who runs the group, as they cannot find the pipe bomber outside DNC headquarters on J6. hmmmmmm.

I would love to know who they are. My bet is fed, or Democrats. After all, the party of actual white supremacy is the Democrat Party. Patriot Front is Democrat more likely, so I will refer to them as Patriot Front Democrats.

But that is all nevermind in Levitan’s conspiratorial blue anon world. She irresponsibly takes things at face value if it serves her passion.

I note all this because Levitan has high aspirations. Let’s make sure they remain aspirations only. There’s a lot more about this NY (of course) transplant we could say, but let’s just leave it here.

Brunswick County ain’t got nothing that Levitan can fix.

Edit: I am hearing from responsible officials, that they believe Democrats put this sign up to create suspicion for their own political ends. Ya Think?

Update: Harris just passed over for VP frontrunner Shapiro because he is Jewish, and there is only one party that hates the Jews—the Democrats. There is more evidence that the sign in Leland that McHugh tore down was in fact from the Democrat party Front group. The timing of the sign could not be more suspect given Shapiro was about to be chosen. Shameful.

Update 2: Here is Harris VP saying there is no 1st Amendment to free speech but that which the govt decides. Levitan and McHugh are of same mind:

https://x.com/EndWokeness/status/1821215515605381197

1. You’ll notice that in this story Belville was created to start an alcohol ABC service for presumably, the drunk elites running it to this day, and also, how Leland wanted to dissolve H2go to eliminate a “direct competitor”—-which is to say the least criminal to the residents.

2. I should add, that Mayor Allen is no hero in this mess. He is in fact part of the cause of the mess. He has told this person that he loathes Leland and has since Belville’s inception.