According to the “2024 State of the City Address” by Greensboro Mayor Nancy Vaughan last week, Greensboro is doing great.
Maybe it should have been billed as “2024 State of the City through Rose Colored Glasses.”
How could a speech on the state of the city in 2024 not mention that the city manager had unexpectedly resigned under suspicious circumstances 15 days earlier.
Which is more important to the “state of the city,” the fact that the city manager suddenly stopped coming to work and then resigned, or the fact that Greensboro is now home to a professional bull riding team? According to Vaughan, the bull riding team is worth talking about when considering the state of the city, but the sudden resignation of the city manager after slightly more than two years on the job is not worth mentioning.
The city has an experienced and capable interim city manager in Deputy City Manager Chris Wilson, and the resignation of former City Manager Tai Jaiyeoba is by many not considered bad news, but whether people see it as good news or bad news, it has more effect on the state of the city than temporarily having a free bus painted to look like a trolley in the downtown area, which Vaughan also highlighted.
If instead of calling the speech the “state of the city” it had been called a pep rally for Greensboro, then Vaughan’s speech would have made more sense.
How can a mayor talk about “great strides in public safety” and not mention that in 2023 the city set an all-time record for homicides with 74? The average number of homicides per year in Greensboro is 48, and the previous record was 62. How does making great strides in public safety result in a record number of homicides?
How can Greensboro hope to solve some of the issues that it has – like a severe lack of housing and anemic growth when compared to similar cities in North Carolina – if Greensboro’s leaders don’t recognize that Greensboro is not a Southern version of Lake Wobegon, “Where all the women are strong all the men are good looking and all the children are above average.”
And the streets are in deplorable condition.
I second that. Using the old High Point road is like driving on a washboard.
Amen to that!!
Greensboro’s streets look like black and white checkerboards. People have to look ahead and swerve to avoid a dip, or a manhole cover that is 2″ below the pavement surface, etc. If you drive on West Market street in the residential areas, the current pavement and curbing at the sewers drains are so thin that water stands when there’s a heavy rain causing drivers to move to the inside lanes next to the medians to avoid flooding. That means they need to upgrade their sidewalks and drainage on the streets, or scrape the current streets down 3-6 inches and pave them again.
This council is very good at handing out money to non-profits, many of whom are related to city council members, yet they don’t provide a sufficient amount of funds to pave more streets.
Of course, WFMY won’t do a story about the horrible streets since they want to continue to be in good graces with the council.
WFMY (2) and WGHP (8) are both Left wing shills, operated by liberal propagandists.
Thanks John! Excellent article and classy without calling it, the mayor and the council BS!
1. Corruption.
2. Increased crime , of all types.
3. Big tax increases.
Greensboro is at least trying to be come a big city…………..Should make “Big City” happy.
Well said! Queen Nancy is a true politician. Like so many other politicians, “If you say it often enough you’ll believe it!”
La vie en Marx.
Gee, John… We managed to have that high homicide rate because of our defunded and smaller police force, which some unfortunately will consider a plus. Regrettably, a smaller, leaner more inclusive, equitable and diverse police force has a few shortcomings , but what the heck. We’re making real progress now.
Police force wasn’t defunded. GSO is just too cheap to pay a competitive wage and provide other perks critical to attracting officers. Who wants such a s**t job for such a s**t wage when unemployment is as low as it is lately.
OMG Chris you and I finally agree. Although I believe the refusal to pay competitive wages was a defacto defund. This council still refuses to have a real take home car plan. 20 cars a year for 5 years. They tout the new large class. We shall see how many graduate and make it through field training.
Big city where are you??!!
Defund de facto.
I agree. I can’t think of much else that happen in Greensboro that is better news than the City Manager resigning.
Did she brag about the massive tax increase?
For one when this city had a population of 180-200k we had the same amount of murders if adjusted for population under Billy yow and BJ Barnes, we averaged about 40 murders a year during that time! Two anemic growth? Yes when compared to Raleigh and Charlotte two of the fastest growing cities in the country they are not top twenty in growth they are top ten, we have exceptional growth when you add highpoint which has grown due to Greensboro’s rising rents and better growth then Newark NJ and much of western PA or CA I’m tired of you guys crying about the good ole days what good ole days under that leadership we lost cone mills and a major Tobacco group, we had no job prospects and real estate values where in a constant decline UNCG was and afterthought and A&t was extremely underfunded under the new leadership all this has changed , have you reported on the new med center coming to East market street or the new dorms A&t are breaking ground. This new jobs in SE Greensboro the roadwork that has been completed? The loss of power have you guys where rose colored glasses about how prosperous this city and county was I will take anemic over declining any day
We are talking about the city Bigcity. You are talking about county commissioners. Half the people in here need a civics lesson. If you are using county numbers then your statistics are incorrect. Shocking.
Since I’m not in the demographic that is killing each other keep on hoping for those Big City stats. When you are talking about how great Greensboro why don’t you ask your mostly minority city council why they don’t talk about how many black males were in the 74 homicides last year? They don’t talk about it because they can’t blame whitey for that when they have quietly defunded the police and do not want the police in their districts arresting people.
look @ johns’ photo taken @ los alamos when they detonated a big one . . . musta done some damage . . . ? i am fighting cynicism/pessimism as i get older – it’s hard being a fossil – waiting for $$ to be deposited.
For one when this city had a population of 180-200k we had the same amount of murders if adjusted for population under Billy yow and BJ Barnes, we averaged about 40 murders a year during that time! Two anemic growth? Yes when compared to Raleigh and Charlotte two of the fastest growing cities in the country they are not top twenty in growth they are top ten, we have exceptional growth when you add highpoint which has grown due to Greensboro’s rising rents and better growth then Newark NJ and much of western PA or CA I’m tired of you guys crying about the good ole days what good ole days under that leadership we lost cone mills and a major Tobacco group, we had no job prospects and real estate values where in a constant decline UNCG was and afterthought and A&t was extremely underfunded under the new leadership all this has changed , have you reported on the new med center coming to East market street or the new dorms A&t are breaking ground. This new jobs in SE Greensboro the roadwork that has been completed? The loss of power have you guys where rose colored glasses about how prosperous this city and county was I will take anemic over declining any day.
Well there you go …..Greensboro is growing faster than Newark NJ. That’s quite the thing to hang our hat on. Anybody else get their updated escrow figures this month?
Don’t forget city the reason we lost Cone Mills was because the Democrat administration signed NAFTA and a few years later another Democrat signed CAFTA which sunk Lorillard and the tobacco industry. So now we have another Democrat administration in downtown that has lost the ACC and Wachovia headquarters. Now as far as housing costs Greensboro is finally catching up to the rest of the country. New med. center in East Greensboro, isn’t this the second or third time it’s been tried. Give it a break City. Come on over and carry my briefcase tomorrow, I’ll give you a little spending money.
I still recall Bill Clinton, upon signing NAFTA, stating that “Not One American Would Lose Their Job Due To NAFTA!”
Thanks Buddy. K I remember that also. I’ll bet big city doesn’t even know what NAFTA or CAFTA means
Ross Perot was closer to the truth.
“That giant sucking sound” being American jobs going to Mexico.
Stop voting for incumbent City Council members. Time to toss out the trash.
They put in sidewalks on Westridge Road, but they can’t fix the pavement! What a waste!
Yes, this is nuts! And the thing is. . . no one wants to walk on Westridge Road due toi the traffic! That’s true with a lot of the sidewalk projects, including the ones going from Guilford College all the way to the I-74 by pass. When was the last time you saw anyone walking out there?
They’re putting in sidewalks on Westridge near Battleground. What they needed to do is make that a 4-lane road due to the heavy traffic they have from people getting to Battleground. Am sure the people who live on Westridge would fight it, but that’s a major artery now, not some lovely quaint neighborhood with flowers and trees.
This council thinks Geekboro is some quaint small town you see in movies with parents and kids walking on sidewalks under a canopy of trees and flowers. That’s where their mind is, versus reality.
City, City. City you are sooo dumb. I’ve told you before go back to school pay attention and get an education about civics and local government. The 74 murders were in in Greensboro last year not Guilford county. BJ Barnes was the Sheriff of Guilford County not the Chief of Greensboro, Billy Yow was a county commissioner and had NO connection to the city council of Greensboro. Get your facts straight before you speak. Oh yeah after school if you need to earn some spending money let me know I need my RV, cars or motorcycles washed ( Harleys of course) my boys are back in law school and won’t be home until May. Just let me know your schedule.
We need a new mayor- one who doesn’t cry all the time and spend her money on plastic surgery.