Author Archives: Jon Lowder

Is Winston-Salem Pursuing GMAC? If Not, Should They?

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Talk about coincidence: a couple of days ago I was talking with some friends and we were discussing GMAC restructuring so they could get some of the government's bailout funds.  Someone asked where GMAC was headquartered and we all agreed that it was probably Detroit, but we weren't sure (we were in a bar and not inclined to do a quick online search).  The next morning I read that GMAC was indeed headquartered in Detroit, but they were considering a move to Charlotte because they already have operations there, the CEO used to be a Bank of America exec and kept his home in Charlotte after taking the position at GMAC, and they figure there will be some banking professionals looking for work when Wells Fargo starts laying people off.  (Since GMAC has restructured as a bank holding company they need to hire bankers).

So, are our economic development people here in Winston-Salem thinking about going after GMAC?  I think they should and here's why:
  • We have our own banking professionals suffering from the financial industry turmoil.
  • We have lots of nice office space ready and waiting. 
  • They'll be a bigger fish in our pond, thus more likely to get attention from our local leaders.  Businesses love that. 

Sure it's a long shot, but it's one of the better opportunities our community will probably see for a while so why not go for it?  And if someone says that we should play nice with our neighbors to the south my reply is, "Remember the Alamo merger!"  

You Know It’s Bad When the Hospital Hoses Its Own Employees

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Did anyone else appreciate the irony of Baptist Hospital having to settle a lawsuit with their employees over health benefits?  From the article:

The lawsuit said that Baptist "violated the duties, responsibilities and obligations imposed upon them as a fiduciary" under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act, or ERISA.

The lawsuit accuses Baptist of requiring employees to pay more for services rendered at the hospital through MedCost than alternative health-care plans would have, including higher co-payments and lower discounts. It also said that employees paid higher fees than those required by MedCost from other corporate clients.

You may remember that I complained about my wife's MRI at Baptist last fall, so let's just say I'm sympathetic to the employees.

Pictures of That Fly Ash Spill in Tennessee

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A photographer from Banner Elk flew over the site of the fly ash spill in Tennessee and sent the pictures and write up to the folks at the Freakonomics blog.  You can see the pictures and read her comments here.  This is scary stuff:

Three days earlier, a retention pond for fly ash (a waste product from burning coal) burst in Kingston, Tenn., spilling an estimated 1 billion gallons of sludge containing years’ worth of waste from the Tennessee Valley Authority’s adjacent coal-burning power plant over an area of 300 acres, Griffith explains. 

And you might recall that we have an operation similar to the TVA's here in the Triad

Businessman Uses His Sign to Call City Leaders Names

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Since joining my town's Zoning Board of Adjustment I've heard a few complaints from people about various zoning rules, but I have to say that none of those people have ever taken to calling our town leaders names on their business' signs.  In Polk City, Iowa one businessman has taken his frustration out with town leaders by using the sign in front of his business to call them names.  If you click through to the article you'll see two pictures of his sign.  On one he wrote "Our Mayor and Council Sure Are Ass—-" and on the other he wrote "Our Mayor Sure is a Lieing Little Nazi Turd."  That's what I call freedom of expression, bad spelling and all.

Dr. David Slawinski, Possibly the Smartest DDS to Ever Live

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Esbee wrote of her sons' dentist appointment at the office of Doctors Merhoff and Slawinski.  Then I noticed a comment that referred to the office as "Glamor Shots Dentistry" and that meant I just had to click through and check it out.  When I clicked through to their site I immediately thought, "This Slawinski guy is the smartest dentist I've ever heard of.  There's 18 people in that office and he's the only guy."  

I guess that makes up for having to stick your fingers in the mouths of thousands of germ-infested kids.

North Carolina Colleges Rated a Good Value by Kiplingers

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Kiplinger's released its "Best Value" college rankings and North Carolina's schools ranked pretty well.  All of the following are Kiplinger's overall ratings for in-state tuition.

Public School Category
#1 UNC-Chapel Hill
#18 NC State
#25 UNC Wilmington
#29 Appalachion State
#43 UNC Asheville
#98 UNC Greensboro

BTW, my alma mater George Mason University came in at #46 and in general Virginia also did very well.  UVA was #3, William & Mary #5, Virginia Tech #15, Mary Washington #23 and James Madison #28.  

So if you put Virginia and North Carolina together we have 11 schools in the top 50.

Private Universities Category
#5 Duke (Just ahead of Harvard)
#20 Wake Forest (Just ahead of Georgetown)
#29 Elon (Just ahead of U of Southern California)

Private Liberal Arts Colleges Category
#4 Davidson (Just ahead of Washington & Lee)

All in all North Carolina stacked up pretty well, although even the "best value" schools had some scary price tags attached to them.  I pine for the old days during my first semester at George Mason (fall 1985) when I lived at home and paid $750 in tuition for a full 16 hour class load. Now it's $3,756. Ouch.  BTW, if the school's tuition had risen at the same rate as inflation then the cost would only be about $1,430. Of course by the time I graduated in 1989 I think the tuition rate was already over $1,100 for a full class load so I shouldn't be surprised it kept going up at a fast clip.

We North Carolinians are More Bummed Out Than the Rest of the Country

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Apparently people in the Southeast have a lower level of confidence in the economy than the rest of the country, and we here in North Carolina have the lowest confidence in the Southeast.  According to this article 70% of us have less confidence in our job security than six months ago and 35% of us feel it's likely we'll lose our jobs in the next six months. News like this won't help.

I have a bold prediction: ABC stores are going to do record business this year.

Davie County Hospital Adding Sleep Lab

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Sometimes I just get confused.  I distinctly remember sitting in the public hearing the state held when it was evaluating the competing proposals for hospitals in Advance (WFU BMC) and Clemmons (Novant).  The folks at WFU-BMC made it clear that they needed to build the hospital in Advance because the Davie County Hospital in Mocksville, which they currently own and run, is antiquated and it just didn't make any sense to try and upgrade it at its current location.  Thus my confusion: if the hospital in Mocksville is such a dump then why are they opening a new sleep lab there?

Dangerous Water?

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Ed Cone points to an interesting and scary article in the New York Times about coal ash ponds similar to the Tennessee pond that recently burst and contaminated hundreds of surrounding acres.  If you look at this map you'll see that there are a couple just north of us here in Forsyth County.  My question is this: What's the risk that those ponds could be contaminating the water system that feeds into the Triad?

I think I found a copy of the EPA report referenced by the New York Times article here.  The report lists two cases of proven damage in North Carolina, one at Hyco Lake (Roxboro) and the other at Belews Lake.  The Duke Power Allen Steam Generating Plant is listed under the category of potential damage.  If you look at the location of Belews Lake on Google Maps you'll see that it's right in the heart of the Piedmont Triad, right by Walnut Cove (see below). I'm no expert on the watershed of the Triad, but that seems awful close for comfort.


According to Ed's post the Environmental Integrity Project is set to release a report on hundreds of these sites this afternoon.  Should be interesting.

Josh Howard Get Front Page Smack Down by Greensboro Newspaper

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Josh Howard, a native of Winston-Salem and former player for Winston-Salem's very own Wake Forest University, got a front page going-over in the Greensboro News & Record because his foundation is the name sponsor of a scholastic basketball tournament being held in the Greensboro Coliseum.  Essentially the article points out that Howard's been in some trouble of late and points out that due to his recent behavior it may not be the best idea to have his name attached to the tournament for high school players.  

The article also quotes the tournament organizer as saying that Howard's foundation came to them about sponsoring the event, not vice versa as is normal.  Clearly the implication is that Howard is trying to repair his tainted image.  Well, duh.  What's he supposed to do, go out and smoke a joint while driving 120 MPH down I-40 and blasting a recording of Jeremiah Wright's infamous "God damn America" speech?  Of course he's going to try and repair his image, and if it means sponsoring a tournament then I guess that's what he's going to do.  Should the tournament have taken the money?  Maybe not, but I also don't think it's the end of the world.  Howard's behavior has clearly been stupid, but he hasn't hurt anyone other than himself that I know of.  

On his blog the News & Record's editor discusses the decision to carry the story on the front page.  Personally I think it's a story for the front page of the sports section at most.