By Brooke Crump

I’m the Montgomery County Democratic Party chair. Before you scroll onto the next article because you are a member of a different political party or you’re tired of hearing about politics in general, let me say that I know that we don’t all vote the same and we don’t all care about the same issues. I mean, I’ve got a degree in political science and sometimes I’m just over it all. But that’s the beauty of democracy. We’re all allowed to have different opinions, even if it can sometimes get really messy.

Sometimes I want to share things with y’all. Other times I have to. And I have to share my recent experience as Montgomery County Democratic Party chair in recommending a replacement for Wayne Wooten on the Board of Commissioners.

How did I end up party chair? I’m not quite sure, if I’m being honest. I’m relatively new to Montgomery County, a lawyer and a mom. I’m busy. But I’m a card-carrying member of the Democratic Party and when I was nominated for the position, I decided it was a job I was willing to take on. I made it a point, however, to ask for patience as I learned the ropes.

So I was going about my business, figuring that politics would take a break over the summer (LOL), when I got a text message from a county commissioner saying he didn’t plan to seek reelection. I was in the middle of a busy workday and I thought that sounded like a problem for another day, so I told myself to give the commissioner a call later to follow up. Upon returning from vacation, my husband surprisingly checked the mail (I know, right) and I discovered a letter of resignation from District 2 County Commissioner Wayne Wooten, effective a week later. 

Crap, I thought. Wayne Wooten is a registered Democrat and I felt pretty sure that people would be turning to me for answers on this. We had a party meeting scheduled a few days later, so I tabled that problem for Tuesday. Meanwhile, post-vacation work was hitting me in the face and my son had an eye appointment scheduled in Concord. As I sat in the ophthalmologist’s play area a party member called and was shocked to have heard of the resignation through the grapevine.

It turns out, people were really were looking to me for answers.

I arrived late to the party meeting because I had to fling my child out of the car to his nanny, and at the meeting I read an email I had only just received an hour prior from the county manager. Meanwhile, we had a congressional candidate who just happened to be at the meeting and the district party chair, who personally came to track me down. Here I was, a new party chair, new to the party in general, somewhat new to the county, and all eyes were on me. So I did what I always do when my back’s against the wall. I started swinging.

In the email, the county manager laid out the process the commissioners had chosen for Mr. Wooten’s replacement. Some folks were displeased with the process. For starters, there was an application that would be available online beginning June 30, which just so happened to be the week of the Fourth. The email also suggested times that the executive committee could meet to consult with the commissioners. To be quite honest, I felt like both the party and I needed more time to handle this issue. So I voiced our concerns to the powers that be. I made some calls to higher-ups. I inquired into the time frame and the process. I fielded calls from concerned party members. I researched the statutes. I researched the party rules. And then I decided it was time to just do the dang thing.

At the end of the day, the county commissioners are the ones in charge of appointing a replacement to the board and they were ready to get ’er done by the next board meeting due to upcoming public hearings and the need for a tie-breaker.

So I suited up and called a meeting. And last night, we got it done. We followed the rules laid out for the Democratic Party to follow when making a recommendation to the commissioners, and after two hours of intense dialogue, we endorsed Grant Hinson as for the District 2 county commissioner appointment (you can look up your district here in case you’re wondering; don’t worry, I’m just learning the ins and outs of all this, too).

I don’t want to bore y’all with the details but for the two of you still reading at this point, North Carolina General Statutes § 153A-27 and § 153A-27.1 govern the process of replacing a member on the board of commissioners when a vacancy occurs.  § 153A-27.1 only applies to certain counties and those counties are listed in the statute; Montgomery County is not one of them. So we don’t have to worry about that one. That means we fall under Statute § 153A-27, which basically says that the remaining members of the board of commissioners shall appoint a qualified person to fill the vacancy and they must do so within 60 days or the clerk of superior court will fill the vacancy. To be eligible for the vacancy, a person must be a member of the same political party as the member being replaced (here it’s a Democrat) and a resident of the same district as the member being replaced (District 2; think Biscoe, y’all). The board shall then consult with the party executive committee (yours truly and my Democratic leaders) but the board is not bound by that recommendation. 

That’s it. That’s what the law requires. You gotta be a Democrat and live in District 2. Anything else is fair game. The statute does not say what the commissioners can and cannot require. They could appoint Big Foot himself if he is a registered Democrat and lives in the district. They can disqualify whomever they wish because it is not a right protected by the Constitution to be considered for an appointment. Basically, the commissioners were free to handle this process as they saw fit.

The Democratic Party must follow the plan of organization when nominating a person to fill a vacancy on the Board of Commissioners. That plan of organization (Rule 3.11) states that if an office is elected by a district within the county (District 2) only those members of the county executive committee who reside in the district shall be eligible to vote. If the county chair (me) does not live in the district (I do not; Team Mount Gilead, y’all) then I am to preside over the meeting but shall have no vote. Who is on the executive committee? Chairs and vice chairs of each precinct, along with executive officers of the county. Rule 2.02 determines the voting process for those District 2 executive committee residents, which is somewhat complicated but the key is that you must have a quorum to vote (Rule 11.03), which means that 40 percent of the people who can vote on that committee must be present. Well, we had a quorum, y’all. Grant Hinson was the only person nominated, and the nominations were closed. I did my best to give the party a pep talk and we shook hands and agreed that we had done right by the party by following the rules and landed on a result.

So what does this really mean? Well, the Board of Commissioners determined that the only two qualified applications received by the deadline were from Jackie Morris and Grant Hinson. Because they were both qualified candidates (both had run for the office in the past and Jackie Morris had previously served the board well), there was no need to extend the deadline. As mentioned in the Montgomery Herald, Sabrena Conrad submitted an application but was determined not eligible by the board because she was not registered to vote in District 2 prior to the day of submitting her application. Again, I won’t bore you with the total ins and outs of the law but, basically, to be eligible for office in a district, you must be a registered voter qualified to vote in an election for the office sought (state Board of Elections rule). If you moved 30 days prior to an election, your address change is qualified if you update it with the Board of Elections 25 days in advance. You can still vote in an election with a same-day registration change of address, but you will be given a provisional ballot and you must confirm your address change with some sort of documentation. It’s possible that your vote might not be counted.

What determines where you live? The law says that it’s where you don’t plan on moving from. So that lake house you seem to want to go home to every night for a year? If you don’t plan on ending that lake life romance any time soon (and why would you?), then that’s your new residency. At the end of the day, the Democratic Party did not make a determination as to the third applicant’s qualification of residency. They determined that the district was welcome to nominate her and they would challenge her ineligibility if she was the party nominee. Because she was not, the party is not taking issue with that determination.

A board meeting to interview applicants was scheduled for Thursday, July 11, but has since been rescheduled due to an emergency. I was also informed that Jackie Morris has since withdrawn his application, which means that Grant Hinson is now the only qualified applicant and the Democratic Party’s District 2 executive committee’s recommendation for commissioner. 

This process is to be continued at the regularly scheduled board meeting on July 16. If you, too, have become enthralled by this process, I encourage you to join me at the commissioners’ meeting. They decide on really important stuff, y’all. Like a possible new elementary school. And teacher supplements. And fire taxes. Bring your kids; the world needs more babies crying in the back of a room. Democracy, like motherhood, ain’t always pretty. But it’s something to really be proud of, y’all.