Lost among all the bond talk at last Thursday’s Guilford County commissioners’ meeting was the debate over the proposed quarter-cent sales tax, which Commissioner Skip Alston says is the backup plan to build a new jails should the bond fail:
Alston said Democratic Commissioner Paul Gibson and others supporting the hike wanted it to pay for the jail annex if voters deny bond financing proposed on the same May 6 primary ballot. Overall, voters will consider bond projects totaling $672 million.
Years ago, Sheriff BJ Barnes, a Republican, proposed seeking a sales tax increase to pay for a new jail. Commissioners resisted, and Barnes later dropped the idea.
“This pays for the Gibson-Barnes jail,” Alston said. “The sheriff has his six votes to build the jail, and this money would be used to pay back loans to build it.”
The vote to put the sales tax on the ballot was bipartisan, with Republicans Billy Yow, Mike Winstead and Linda Shaw joining Democrats Paul Gibson, Kay Cashion and John Parks in voting yes.
