In early July, Scott Dacey, a member of the Craven County Board of Commissioners, declared himself a candidate for the U.S. Third Congressional District Congressional seat currently held by Walter Jones.
Mr. Dacey refers to himself as a “conservative,” and his campaign website says that he “…is constantly working toward reducing the size of government,” but his voting record as a county commissioner shows a contradictory picture. Mr. Dacey has voted to increase the size of county government many times.
Examples include Mr. Dacey’s voting to add a new Federally Qualified Health Center in Havelock (which requires new expenses for operating a building, paying for new employees to hustle up new “clients,” etc.), Mr. Dacey’s voting for a new program to enable Trillium (Mr. Dacey is on their board) to train 20 clinicians in “grief counseling,” Mr. Dacey’s voting to commit $500,000 of Craven County taxpayer money (plus $47,500 in 2018 and $95,000 each year thereafter) to create a First Street Workforce Development Center, and Mr. Dacey’s voting to have Craven County participate in a Metropolitan Planning Organization (by pretending communities as diverse as New Bern and Havelock were a single community) thereby raising the county’s public transportation costs.
Therein lie the contradictions. Mr. Dacey says he “is constantly working toward reducing the size of government,” but virtually every vote he makes increases the scope of local government, the size of its staff, and the cost of both.
