As a result of the November 2014 elections, Republicans now control 52 County Commissions. Democrats control 47. One county, Perquimans, is split. Prior to November, the numbers were R 53, D 45, with two being split.
Two counties switched from Democratic control to Republican control: Montgomery and Dare.
Three counties switched from Republican control to Democratic control: Wake, Lee, and Chatham. The loss of the Commission in Wake is the biggest blow to Republicans. The all-Democrat board will now proceed to raise taxes in order to fast-track light rail. Notably, Wake and Lee also saw two GOP incumbent House incumbents lose reelection. Interestingly, Thom Tillis won Lee by a comfortable margin.
One county, Jackson, switched from split control to Democratic control. Kay Hagan won in Jackson, a county Obama carried in 2008 but failed to carry in 2012.
Another county, Perquimans, went from Democratic control to being split. Tillis carried Perquimans with a 61-37 margin.
Individual commissioner numbers:
310 Republicans (+7 from before November)
270 Democrats (-1)
4 Unaffiliated (-2)
The most pro-Tillis county controlled by Democrats is Alleghany, which has a strong local Democratic tradition. The most pro-Hagan county controlled by Republicans is Guilford, also the largest county where they have control now that Wake is unanimously Democratic.
See anything wrong with this map? If there are any mistakes, be sure to chime in below.
John Wynne is the “conservative voice” at PoliticsNC, where he also provides polling analysis and commentary on legislative campaigns. When not writing about politics, he enjoys gardening and listening to opera. Contact: johncwynne@gmail.com.
It’s a bit impressive that Democrats managed to make gains in the # of county commissions in such a Republican wave year…of course Republicans have a harder time trying to tie Democrats to Obama on a county level lol
In addition, our analysis indicates that Democrats prevailed in almost 55% of all down ballot races on November 4th. Mr. Wynne’s piece warms my heart because I am a local government advocate and the change he notes in the Triangle was seismic. Lee County now has two legislative representatives who are Democrats (Reives and Salmon), Sanford Pittsboro, Raleigh and Cary are all led by Democrats and now Chatham, Lee and Wake join Orange and Durham to place 5 of 7 Triangle boards under Democratic leadership. This combined with Meckelenburg and Buncombe mean that the most vibrant places to live in the state are in areas that are blue. Finally, our local paper, the Chatham Record, ran an article this week that cited a report from the NC Department of Commerce that of all 100 Counties Chatham ranked last in level of economic distress, which is an indicator that all of the investment in infrastructure and quality of life measures by the Towns and County over the past decade has yielded positive outcomes. Leadership matters. Of course when perusing the list of distressed counties it is interesting to correlate them with legislative and local governing philosophy and ideology. Pittsboro and Chatham for decades eschewed such investments and once they green lighted liquor-by-the drink, began building schools, libraries, parks, green ways, improving water and sewer infrastructure, investing in transit, education and other soft and hard infrastructure the economic indicators for the area improved.
I concur with Wake County Commissioner Burns. Local and regional government especially in areas like the Triangle involve consensus building and long term planning horizons in order to ensure to a good quality of life for all citizens. There are critical regional issues for the Triangle regarding water, water quality, transit and transportation planning that will need Wake County’s leadership. As a former member of the Triangle J Mayors and County Chairs task force and chairman of the Triangle Area Rural Planning Organization I look forward to positive and forward thinking leadership in the Triangle in 2015 and beyond.
Forsyth in effect switched from Republican control to “fusion” control with the three Democrats (led by Ted Kaplan who received more votes than anyone running for anything in Forsyth this year) joining with Dave Plyler (one time Democrat, in more recent years a moderate Republican) to elect Plyler Chair.
“Three counties switched from Republican control to Democratic control: Wake, Lee, and Chatham. The loss of the Commission in Wake is the biggest blow to Republicans. The all-Democrat board will now proceed to raise taxes in order to fast-track light rail. ”
John, I usually enjoy your commentary and find it insightful, even when I disagree with your conclusions or analysis. But this is just lazy.
I hope you will apply your considerable analytical gifts to an understanding of the actual transit process in Wake County. There is no plan to raise taxes to “fast track” a “light rail” system.
In actuality, there is a months long process just getting underway to evaluate, analyze and propose transit alternatives from which the community will choose, and a proposed system (probably not including light rail for several years) will then be presented to the people of Wake County for consideration and approval through a completely democratic referendum.
If you can’t understand and communicate that without resorting to “taxes bad, Democrats raise taxes” then perhaps you should consider a new line of work.
If you’d like to actually understand this process, I invite you to attend any of the many workshops and planning sessions going on over the next several months. Or you could pick up the phone. I’m in the book.
John Burns
Wake County Commissioner
District 7
Jackson County actually flipped from R control to D control.
I recall hearing Jackson was a split county after the 2012 elections…I think Mr. Wynne is right on that one…
Wasn’t Guilford County traditionally a democratic majority before the General Assembly stepped in and gerrymandered it shortly after taking power in NC…sort of how they tried to give the GOP an edge in Buncombe? Is anyone else wondering if the General Assembly is going to step in and do something with Wake now that its county commision is fully controlled by Democrats? (they’ve already gerrymandered the school board for 2016). For the record I dislike when the General Assembly does things like that, it feels like an overreach. Did the Democratically controlled General Assembly used to step in and gerrymander County boards when they were in power?
*correction* Wasn’t Guilford County traditionally a democratic majority before the GOP stepped in and gerrymandered it
I will be surprised if they don’t.