(upbeat music) - [Narrator] This is Carolina Business Review.

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- It was 30 years ago or so that the phrase, and I quote, "It's the economy, stupid," end quote, was made popular by a then democratic strategist for a presidential candidate.

It was James Carville in Bill Clinton's presidential campaign that made the point during recessionary times that people voted with their pocketbooks.

Welcome to the most widely watched and longest running program on Carolina business, policy, and public affairs seen across North and South Carolina for more than three decades now.

And with all the social and political drama going on, just maybe it is really more about the economy for many people.

We will partly use that place as a jumping off point for our dialogue and other issues going on as well as across the region.

And later, the former big city mayor, North Carolina Governor, co-chair of the No Labels Party, and public media television host of Unspun, Pat McCrory, joins us.

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On this edition of Carolina Business Review, Joe Waters of Capita, Brian Etheridge from Leadership North Carolina, and special guest Pat McCrory, former North Carolina Governor.

(upbeat music) - Hello.

Welcome to our program.

Brian, good to have you back.

Joe, nice to see you.

This is great.

- Good to see you.

- It is good to be back and thanks for having us.

- Absolutely.

You might not feel that way after this question.

So how is, no, I'm being kind of facetious, Brian, but leadership, and certainly we are in the political leadership season, but how is the growing dissatisfaction that folks have had in general with leaders, and not just in politics, but in big corporations, in communities, et cetera, et cetera.

How does that growing dissatisfaction inform what you talk about in maybe some of these closed sessions with the next generation of leaders?

- I think that's a great question.

And you know, we're asking this question in the heat of July, so naturally we're all a little uncomfortable if we're outside of air conditioning, so it makes it a little more stressful.

But to answer your question directly, I think a lot of folks are really pragmatic and really interested in how do we solve problems.

What we found through the six pillars of the Leadership North Carolina program is it takes leaders having conversations with one another and really investing in relationships with one another across these systems of economic development, environment, education, health, human services, government, inclusive leadership.

It takes time to build those relationships.

And that's how you get beyond the divides.

You find what you've got in common.

Unfortunately, it takes time.

- But where does it break down between, it all works well in the classroom, and then you get out in practice or you get out in public and it's just like everybody runs for their baselines.

- It's, what what we have found that works well, is when those relationships are fed, that when folks go out, they've got a network of about 1500 alumni that they can call on to say, hey, I'm working on this, this is the problem in this part of the state that we're trying to work on.

They've got public and private sector folks that they can call on.

You know, that's not without, that's not with the media involved, but it really makes a big difference to have relationships and folks you can trust to level with you of, here's how I'd go about, you know, addressing that challenge.

- Yeah, Joe, and same question, but maybe a little bit different, in your practice around influencing, talking, researching about public policy, how does that same question I asked Brian about the leadership part about practicing the good stuff?

But then it just completely breaks down when money gets involved and when folks start feeling a little bit more personal about the issues?

- Yeah, well, first of all, I think a lot of people have good reason to distrust leaders.

We have not, over the last 30, 40 years, given ordinary people a lot of reason to trust our quote unquote leadership class.

And I think one of the ways that we solve that is values-based leadership.

We need people to lead with character and purpose and perseverance, solving problems and improving lives for ordinary people.

I'd love to see more of that from our political leadership in particular.

But yeah, people don't have a lot of reason to trust our leadership class, as I say.

- You know, I don't wanna, this could be several programs.

So I want to be careful about asking this question.

Brian, how do you, and I'm gonna say in a vacuum, how do you talk about all the character and the integrity of leadership without having a dialogue around maybe the spiritual renewal of that?

Where most people will say, well, that's my moral compass, that's my true North.

How do you not have that dialogue if you can't talk about a spiritual element?

Or do you?

- We actually take a look at leadership in North Carolina of looking at the whole person.

So we want folks to kind of, you know, level with one another and kind of build a level of trust where they're willing to show a little bit of vulnerability.

And if that includes, you know, touching on some of their family, touching on their faith, we're okay with that, knowing that other folks are gonna be coming at it from a different perspective.

And just being mindful that you've got 54 other folks in the room that you wanna build a relationship with and being really intentional about that.

- Completely change of subject here.

I wish we could go deeper into that.

So, thank you.

Joe, about 10 years ago, there was a Harvard study about mobility, and upward mobility and mobility and economic opportunity, and Charlotte and the Triangle specifically, we could say our proxies for the Carolinas, both were abysmal.

And that's probably an understatement.

Charlotte is proud as Charlotte is about its progressiveness in New South City and the Triangle as well, Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill in general.

We're near the bottom of being a place to have true economic mobility.

10 years later, Dr. Chetty did the same study and both communities have moved up slightly.

Charlotte, I think from 50th or 48th- - 50th to 38th, yep.

- And Raleigh maybe to 31st, but still not good enough for what these new south, progressive shining city on the hill type of thing.

What does that say about the Carolinas?

- Well, I think the thing, and we're still digesting the data, it came out just yesterday, but I think one thing that it absolutely says is a childhood in poverty continues to drive poor economic mobility outcomes over the course of one's life.

And so it says, first of all, that we need to address poverty in the earliest years of life.

We need to make sure that families have the economic security to raise their children in some sense of economic security, because that seems to be the number one indicator.

The other thing, of course, to say is that we continue in the south to deal with the legacies of slavery and the legacies of racial discrimination.

There continue to be gaps, even though those gaps seem to have narrowed in the latest study that Dr. Chetty did, again, released just this week.

But we have to continue to address those racial wealth gaps, those racial disparities.

And that's gonna be something we will continue to need to wrestle with here in the Carolinas.

- Brian, does economic opportunity, does that come up as a dialogue for you all?

- Absolutely.

We touch on it in a couple of different places and we've been doing it for several years.

One, during our health and human services session, because you're talking about adverse childhood experiences and things of that nature and what the trend lines are looking at, looking like for different populations, but we also talk about it during education and economic development because what you realize is all these things are interconnected.

There may be different systems, but they all have an impact.

And it goes back to a lot of those root causes.

- Can you, did you wanna say something else there?

- Yeah, I just wanna say that I think I would love to see the dialogue move away from a focus on programs, what programs can we deliver for families in poverty, to more of a focus on income.

Turns out there's a cure for poverty.

It's money.

Let's do things to get more money into the pockets of more people by having good, well paying jobs.

- Yeah, and this is the third rail, and I know how this question has been answered in the past.

Is it about the income and class or is it about race and income?

- I think it's both.

And I think we'll continue to wrestle with this as the latest Chetty data is wrestled with.

But it seems that race may be less of a factor in the latest tranche of data that he's released and class overall because lower income white's doing pretty poorly.

- Yeah.

Okay.

Well again, that's another one we could do several shows on.

Gentlemen, thank you.

We're gonna bring our guest on just a second.

Coming up on this program, we talk about the economy and business on this program quite a bit, not surprising.

And we've had this next gentleman and his predecessors on quite a bit.

He is the Richmond Federal Reserve President.

His name is Tom Barkin.

Tom will be a guest on our program again and then also North Carolina and South Carolina, in fact, have a new DOT secretary, both, but North Carolina's will be on.

His name is Joey Hopkins.

He will be joining us about infrastructure and transportation in the old North State.

According to a 2020 Pew Research study, about 91%% of this country say that conflicts between party coalitions are either strong or very strong.

But when you drill down into that, 71% say that the antagonism is very strong politically.

I'm not sure anyone believes this is going in a good direction right now.

Joining us now is former big city Mayor, North Carolina Governor, co-chair of what was trying to be third party, the No Labels Party, and public media television host of Unspun, Governor Pat McCrory.

Mr.

Governor, Mr. TV Host, Mayor, welcome back to the dialogue.

- Still trying to find a job.

- Keep working on it, Governor.

But seriously, thank you for being on our program.

Let's go to the No Labels Party.

The idea, was it meant to be a third party place to have a dialogue?

And if so, why did you leave?

- Well, initially, No Label has actually been around for 10 years, but this past year, year and a half, Joe Lieberman, Dr. Ben Chavis and myself were approached about saying, listen, we've got a dilemma in our country.

The two party system is failing.

Y'all three have been a part of that two party system.

And 65 to 70% of the American people do not wanna rematch of who it looks like is gonna be on the presidential ticket.

And we're looking at giving the American people an alternative.

And so we spent an enormous amount of time coming up with a common sense agenda, which me and Ben Chavis helped write, me and Dr. Ben Chavis, which I think shows something about how people can come together and agree on issues.

A man I tremendously respect and have become very close friends with.

And Joe Lieberman of course, who's just, I miss him tremendously because he died shortly after our process kind of fell apart.

But we had several great candidates to choose from.

But there was so much pressure from the political monopoly of the Republican and Democratic Party that literally pressured people who were considering joining the No Label ticket, and the finance people and the campaign people, they would basically tell us out of the Washington environment, if you join No Labels, you will never work in Washington again.

- So governor, I've gotta ask you this question.

You've been there.

Is this about power and control?

- Absolutely.

- Is that what this is?

- It's all about power and control.

Power and control, which then brings money.

And you know, Washington's built on power and control on both parties.

And if you try to break up that duopoly, they will threaten you because a lot of people are making money off that power and control.

And that's not just in Washington.

It's also true in Columbia and Raleigh, too.

And if you do anything to interfere with that status quo, you're risking your career.

And since then, I mean, Ben Chavis was head of the Black Publishers Association, took tremendous political risk and business risk.

Joe Lieberman was basically kicked out of his party.

And I'm not re-invited to Republican events anymore, even though I was, you know, one of the first Republican governors in 25 years and Republican mayor of Charlotte.

But I'm willing to take that risk because I think our country needs to open up dialogue of problem solving, which you're not hearing on the current presidential trail.

No one's talking about the solutions.

It's all about personality and style at this point in time.

- Well, we're gonna come back to that, but Brian, question.

- Absolutely, so Governor McCrory, you know, North Carolina has been, in this region in particular, have been really fortunate over the past few years.

CNBC has previously ranked North Carolina as number one for business.

This year we moved to number two, and you've had that role in economic development and kind of being the flag bearer for North Carolina as our previous governor.

Is that a blip?

Are there things that we need to be paying attention to as a state to get back to number one from your perspective?

- I wouldn't be too concerned about those ratings.

I think they're kind of overrated and a little political.

I think they were one and two while I was governor, too, and went back and forth, and you saw the things that separated us, really made no difference.

But the economic environment is very important.

And I think the three biggest factors, one is affordability, quality of life.

And the two biggest probably are education, education choice, both K-12, and university and community college.

And also taxes, which is part of the affordability issue.

And right now the Sunbelt states are booming.

They don't know what to do with all the business.

And in fact, there might be a certain point in time where you, I think the Sunbelt states can maybe be a little more selective and not have to give up so much to bring people in.

Because if you give up so much, you're not gonna have money to pay for the infrastructure to support that new industry, regarding roads and rail and water systems.

And sooner or later someone's gonna have to pay for this.

So I would probably, I don't know if this is conservative or liberal, but I sometimes don't think the economic development recruiters are being selective enough, especially in the metro areas which are now in demand, versus us begging for people to come to Charlotte.

Like the old days, we'd have to say, where is Charlotte?

Charlotte, North Carolina.

You don't have to say that anymore.

People know what Charlotte's all about, or Greenville or Charleston and so forth.

- Sunbelt may be booming, but I was just reading some information from University of North Carolina that in 78 of North Carolina's 100 counties, deaths outpaced the number of births.

How do we make sure that North Carolina's future isn't just about metro Charlotte, Triangle, and a couple of counties on the coast where people wanna retire?

How do we spread that booming opportunity across the state?

- Your stats are absolutely correct.

We have several small counties.

They're small in population and always have been that are still losing population.

The generational farmer, the third or fourth generation, is moving to Charlotte or Raleigh or Greenville or Columbia or wherever or New York City.

And that's gonna be the major challenge.

And I think the way you do that is through infrastructure.

You connect the rural areas with the metro areas.

So as the metro areas become unaffordable, then they'll go 50, 60, 100 miles out, and build a new town and village.

And now with Zoom and because of COVID, you're seeing a whole dynamic where it really doesn't matter where you live anymore.

And I think the small rural towns can benefit from especially affordability and maybe even education.

- North Carolina's profile is raised now during the presidential election.

Governor Cooper is mentioned as a possible VP candidate.

How would you handicap that for him and for North Carolina?

- I would probably put ahead Shapiro and Kelly, because of Pennsylvania and Arizona, the new Harris ticket will probably have a better chance to win one of those seats or states.

And they're more important at this point in time.

North Carolina is gonna be very tough to win.

And I think they're doing analysis.

Will Governor Cooper make a difference in North Carolina?

Will he pull North Carolina to the blue?

The benefit of what's happened already though for the Democrats is that Harris's campaign is gonna help the council of state, the Governor, the Attorney General, and the Auditor and Treasurer, Democrats who were running, who were really falling behind because Trump had, in some areas an 8 to 9 point lead, which is unheard of.

So, that would help the gubernatorial and other Lieutenant Governor races.

So I think Harris helps the Democrats at this point in time.

And they'll never say this on the record, but off the record, they're glad Biden's out.

They know it helps them politically.

They just couldn't say it.

Like on my TV show, Unspun, now, you know, I tell you what politicians are thinking, but not necessarily saying.

Believe me, during the last three or four months behind the scenes, the Democrats are going, this isn't working, Harris is bringing a jolt in, but it's gonna be close no matter what.

- So since we're on it, and you've kind of answered the question a little bit, what about in North Carolina, which you know a little something about, what about a Stein/Robinson matchup and what about one of the hottest congressional seats in the country, Dan Bishop and Jackson?

- Well, the good (mumbles) are interested in North Carolina.

Again, I was elected for the first since Jim Martin, which was over 20 years.

But the North Carolinians have a history of voting more conservative at the federal level.

But at the state level, those tickets split about 2 or 3%.

Maybe their spouse or daughter or son is a school teacher, therefore they'll vote Democrat at the state level and then vote for, in the past Jesse Helms, but against Jim Hunt for US Senate.

So Jim Hunt could have been undefeated as a governor forever, but he ran for US Senate and he lost.

So this is the dynamic of, even Roy Cooper being considered for the national ticket.

Will he really bring people to the federal government that would vote him for governor, but maybe not for VP or for US Senate seat?

That's the unique dynamics of North Carolina.

There is ticket splitting in North Carolina, and believe me, I know, as someone who lost by 10,000 votes out of 4.6 million, that was due to ticket splitting.

- Next question, kind of going back to infrastructure is, you know, back in 2007, while you were mayor of Charlotte, you kind of helped lead the charge on light rail.

And that's been a tremendous boom for this region.

As we look to 2024 and beyond, where are the areas that we need to focus from your perspective on infrastructure in North Carolina, as Joe was talking about, like some of those communities that need the opportunity to benefit from some of this prosperity?

- Well, first you gotta realize, there's a lot of political risk.

When I did that as mayor over 14 years, it was called the McCrory Line for five years during construction.

And it wasn't a compliment because it was over budget and late, and now they call it the Blue Line that it's successful.

And I'm proud of that.

So it's gonna take a politician to take some risk in finding the funding and developing a plan that you can see that this is what it'll look like in 2075.

Because that's how long it'll take.

So we need a visionary to go, this is what it'll look like, and this is the way we're gonna finance, and the dilemma in bringing up the financing, as I learned with toll lanes, where I lost 30,000 votes in Huntersville and Cornelius because of toll lanes, no one's gonna touch toll lanes since my election.

And you notice no one's talking about it in North Carolina.

- Do they work though?

- It's working.

It's working, but there's a negative to it.

It's a regressive type of tax.

But it does work, especially, unless you wanna wait another 10 to 15 years for a road to be built.

So, that's the political dilemma.

But gas taxes, no one's gonna touch it.

Increasing your property taxes, no one's gonna touch it.

The electric cars is gonna take revenue away from the gas tax.

So is someone gonna recommend a new tax on electric cars to help pay for roads?

No one's gonna touch it.

So that's where the political courage of risking a future political election will be needed if you're gonna have, whether it be light rail, or new highways.

- We have about three minutes.

- So one of the responsibilities as governor or mayor is to really steward the institutions of the public trust.

We talked about distrust.

I'm just curious to hear from you, based on your experience, how can we rebuild the trust in institutions here in the Carolinas so that they're fit for a purpose for the next 100 years?

- I think we've gotta stop talking, including the business community, and politicians like myself, and Trump and Harris and so forth, or former politician, quit bringing up the issues of race and gender and sexuality and age and all the things that we're not allowed to bring up in a job interview.

You know, we have very specific rules, EEOC rules, where you can't bring up these issues.

But for whatever reasons, politicians and the media bring them up all the time.

We've gotta look at each of us as individuals with aspirations to fulfill our potential, as individuals, as communities, and as states and as businesses.

And I think we've gotta learn to talk more holistically because as me, and as Joe Lieberman and Ben Chavis learned, once we got in a room away from all the political pundits, we found out we agreed on 90% of the issues and we liked each other.

And that's what we've gotta get back to.

And that's what No Labels was all about.

And I was honored to be a part of it.

- You said as a former politician.

Are you really?

Do you have political ambition?

- No, no.

First of all, I'm realistic.

I couldn't get elected in either party primary.

And that's where the monopoly is.

You have to go to the fringes and say exactly whatever the current environment is in the primary.

And second, it's a time in my life where I need to use the wisdom of what happened to me, the good, the bad, and the ugly, and convey that to future leaders.

And that's my time.

That's what people, who at that time when I was in my thirties, first ran for city council, like people like Bill Lee and others, who gave me wisdom.

And now I get it.

And I need to take advantage of that wisdom and help communicate it and warn people because I have no agenda anymore, because I don't have to worry about getting elected.

And so I'm gonna tell you not only what I say, but I actually think it.

And I don't have to be worried about the political repercussions, which everyone is so scared of at this point in time.

- Thank you, Governor.

Well stated.

Thank you for being a guest, and we'll continue to literally watch you on Unspun.

So good luck going forward.

- And meet the press occasionally.

- And meet the press occasionally.

Keep it up.

Joe.

Good to have you on the program.

- Thanks Chris.

- Thank you.

Good to see you again.

Thanks for staying.

Thanks for hanging out.

Brian, always nice to see you.

- Good to be with you.

Thank you friend.

- Thank you.

Until next week, I'm Chris William.

We certainly hope all your business is good and you have a good weekend.

It's hard not to.

Summer in the Carolinas.

Goodnight.

Next week.

Bye.

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Thank you.

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