Have you ever thought about the difference between paying rent and owning a home? When you rent, your monthly payment helps cover the cost of living there, but it usually doesn't build anything for your future. Home ownership is different. Each payment you make on a home may help build equity, which is the value you own in the property over time. As that equity grows, it can become a financial asset that may support your long-term goals.
Owning a home can also provide stability. You have a place that's yours where you can build memories, establish roots, and truly make the space your own. And the good news is that many people are surprised to learn there are programs designed to help first-time homebuyers get started, including grants and assistance programs that may help with down payments or closing costs. Learning about your options is the first step toward making an informed decision about your future. Visit ToolsForHomeOwnership.com.
It's 505, and welcome in to a Friday edition of the Carolina Journal News Hour on Charlotte's FM News Talk, 107.9 FM, WBT. I'm Nick Craig. Good morning to you. Nearly two years after Hurricane Haleen destroyed Lake Lur's upstream flood gauges, emergency responders are still relying on visual observations of river conditions while the town operates a dam that affects communities beyond its municipal boundaries. We will see the two-year mark of that storm come up this weekend.
We go back to a heavy rainfall that happened earlier this week on September the twenty third, which triggered flash flood warnings, temporarily closed the temporary road being built from Halleen between Chimney Rock and Batcave, and prompted Lake Lure officials to release additional water into the Broad River. The flooding occurred five days before Helene's second anniversary and nearly two years after the Lake Lure Emergency Service Director Dustin Waycaster told reporters that replacing the town's destroyed gauges will require engineering work and coordination with equipment manufacturers. Here's what makes it interesting. Rutherford County residents living downstream are affected by Lake Luhr's dam operations, even those that are outside the town limits, do not pay municipal property taxes and do not vote in town elections. It is important to note that North Carolina law establishes state oversight of dam operations as well as emergency planning intended to protect downstream communities regardless of whether or not they fall within the municipal boundaries.
In October of 2024, just days after Helene ravaged western North Carolina, Waycaster, who was then Lake Lur's fire chief and emergency management coordinator, explained that Helene had destroyed the town's stream gauge system, saying at the time those gauges no longer exist, so we're really going to have to do some hard work in the next coming days. The town previously used a what pressure sensors, bubblers and radar sensors to measure upstream water levels and share those measurements with the state's flood monitoring system. Waycaster said replacement equipment would be would require significant engineering studies and recalibrations before they were reinstalled, saying we're going to make contact with our representative from those companies and get that reinstalled. That was now nearly two years ago. Until then, the town would depend more heavily on the National Weather Service forecasts and monitoring equipment that did remain at the dam.
There were very few pieces of monitoring equipment left, most of it, as you can imagine, completely destroyed by Hurricane Helene.
However, two years later, the upstream gauges remain unavailable, according to Chris Melton, assistant chief of the Lake Lur Fire Department and the chief of the Chimney Rock Volunteer Fire Department, saying every place that we had them got washed away. He explained that rebuilding bridges and identifying suitable installation locations have complicated those replacement efforts, saying in part, it's not just that we're waiting around, but there's just a lot of factors that come into play with these sensors. Without the former automated monitoring network, responders must physically observe river conditions, with Melton saying we're just kind of doing it old school as it stands right now. Let's jump to some state law here. North Carolina dam safety law establishes state oversight of dam maintenance and operations.
Most of this falls under North Carolina General Statute 143-215.31, as the state may supervise dam operations to safeguard life and property, including establishing standards, addressing potential hazards, and downstream consequences. The law does not give municipalities unrestricted authority to release water without regard to downstream safety. Neither does it prohibit every release that increases downstream water levels during heavy rainfall. For high hazard and immediate hazard dams, the law requires owners to submit emergency action plans known as EAPs to the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality and the Department of Public Safety for review and approval. The Department of Public Safety includes the North Carolina Division of Emergency Management, who, as you would imagine, has a pretty heavy say and is in this process.
These EAPs must address potential emergency conditions, response procedures, a notification plan, and downstream inundation areas according to state law. Available public maps are part of the town's EAP and show an area over 50 miles that could be impacted, for example, if there was ever a complete and total failure of the dam structure, which in this case extends across multiple counties to the South Carolina state line. The law requires annual plan updates and renewed approvals with approval plans distributed to local emergency management agencies that could respond in the in the condition of which there is a dam emergency. State approval of the emergency action plan, however, does not establish that every operational decision receives separate authorization. Waycaster said in 2024 they accepted a plan that dated back years.
In August 2025, a statement, the town said that, quote, sirens were installed in Lake Luhr after the 1996 flood, with Rutherford County Emergency Management working closely with the Lake Luhr Fire Department and emergency management officials to install new state-of-the-art sirens throughout the town of Lake Luhr in September of 2024, just before Hurricane Helene ravaged the community. North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality Secretary Reed Wilson told the Carolina Journal on September the 16th that he knows that the mayor wants a new dam. He mentioned that during a visit near Lake Adger in mid-September. The National Weather Service issued a flash flood warning at 11.52 p.m. on September the 22nd for portions of four western North Carolina counties.
That included Rutherford, Buncom, Henderson, and Polk, with Rutherford County Emergency Management activating flash flood sirens at 2.22 a.m. on September the 23rd, according to an incident timeline. Notifications from companies called Everbridge were carried out the same timestamp with transmitting that National Weather Service warning of immediate danger.
However, the documented county notifications came approximately two and a half hours. After the alert came through from the National Weather Service, with the county saying that personnel monitored conditions overnight and distributed emergency information through multiple channels. Lake Lure announced additional dam releases following heavy rainfall just before 10 a.m., according to the statement. Gates were opened more than three feet and downstream sirens were activated and local campgrounds also notified. Fortunately, due to the small release, no evacuations were required, but earlier that morning it was unclear.
Again, the warning came in from the weather service around 11 p.m. Sirens didn't sound until 2 a.m. and folks were left wondering exactly what was happening. By 4.30 p.m. the next day, the lake had returned to approximately normal full pond elevation.
With the town and county not attributing earlier upstream upstream flooding and timing discrepancies to its release in their public statements. Several boats were free-floating in the lake according to details shared by residents on social media, while others shared photos and videos of flooding within five miles south of the dam, which is important to note outside the town limits downstream in Rutherford County. The flooding coincided with Governor Josh Stein's announcement of a long-term Western North Carolina economic recovery plan, with the governor saying while the headlines about Helene have faded over the last two years, the work remains. The plan addresses infrastructure and economic recovery.
However, it does not establish when Lake Lur's upstream gauge system will return, which is left to town leaders working with emergency management and FEMA. For downstream Rutherford County residents, questions do remain about how dam operations are coordinated with local emergency managers and when automated monitoring will be restored as there is a significant downstream effect when the dam has to, the gates have to be lowered and water is released. This is one of many stories over the last two years that we have been continuing to track out in western North Carolina as so many areas continue the process of doing their best to rebuild after Hurricane Helene. You can read some more detail on this story. We've got it over on our website this morning, CarolinaJournal.com.
Look for the headline, Lake Lur Flooding Raises Downstream Questions. Have you ever thought about the difference between paying rent and owning a home? When you rent, your monthly payment helps cover the cost of living there, but it usually doesn't build anything for your future. Home ownership is different. Each payment you make on a home may help build equity, which is the value you own in the property over time.
As that equity grows, it can become a financial asset that may support your long-term goals. Owning a home can also provide stability. You have a place that's yours where you can build memories, establish roots, and truly make the space your own. And the good news is that many people are surprised to learn there are programs designed to help first-time homebuyers get started, including grants and assistance programs that may help with down payments or closing costs. Learning about your options is the first step toward making an informed decision about your future.
Visit ToolsForHomeOwnership.com. Have you ever wondered why some people seem to age slower? Like they figured out some secret the rest of us missed?
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Welcome back to the Carolina Journal News Hour, Charlotte's FM News Talk, 107.9 FM, WBT. Continuing our trek towards the November the 3rd midterm elections, if you have not already taken an opportunity to look at your sample ballot, boy, it is a lengthy ballot. There is a lot on there, no matter where you live in North Carolina. To walk us through some of those details this morning, it's my pleasure to welcome Andrew Pomerance, CarolinaJournal.com, to the news hour this morning. Andrew, I guess we'll start off at the top of the ticket, the race that we've been talking about a lot, one that's gotten a lot of coverage in our Carolina Journal poll, the race between the former eight-year governor and Roy Cooper, former head of the RNC and North Carolina Republican Party, Mike Wally.
That's on the top of the ballot, correct? Yeah, Nick, that'll be the first thing voters see come November on that ballot. And, you know, we ballots have now been sent out. We're still weeks away from the election, coming up on it here quickly. But ballots have been received by voters.
Early voting starts just in a couple of weeks here, three weeks from October 15th, right? And so we are running towards election day. And at the top of that ballot, we originally coined as this a billion-dollar set-up race. It has not turned out to be that. You know, polls have continually showed former GOP chair Michael Watley down in that race, but running against former Governor Roy Cooper was always an uphill battle for him, right, with that name ID, with that recognition for former Governor Cooper there, who's never lost a statewide race.
And so Michael Watley on this ballot with Governor Roy Cooper. That race, as of the September Carolina Journal poll, we had Michael Watley down about 15 points. Polls showing anywhere between about 8 and 15 points. We're on the high end there of that split. Unfortunately, for Mike Watley and his enthusiasts.
But as we kind of run into this home stretch, I think voters will continue to turn out. We'll still see that voter block of undecideds and independents begin to shift. And I think that race will tighten dramatically before Election Day. And it should be an interesting race to follow. I think one that people across the country are going to be watching as control of the U.S.
Senate is up for grabs potentially this year with a number of swing states across the country, including Texas and so many others and Georgia just to the south of us. And so an election that's gotten a lot of coverage. President Trump, Vice President J.D. Vance has been in the state talking about this election.
So one we'll be following closely all the way up until election night and one that I think Michael Watley hopes comes out in his favor. Yeah, and you said something very interesting there to note. And I always like to remind our audience of this: a poll is not an election prediction. A poll is a snapshot at a single period of time. We saw our Carolina Journal poll out just a couple of weeks ago.
We've seen other polls in the last couple of days, Andrew, as you've noted, that kind of keep that gap eight, nine up to potentially in our Carolina Journal poll, 15 percentage points.
So, for Michael Watley to be successful, there is a lot of work and very little amount of time to make that happen here across the Tar Heels State. And right, we've heard this push, this post-Labor Day push that was supposed to come, and we've seen kind of contradictory reports of President Trump's PAC pushing money into North Carolina, other PACs potentially pulling money out of North Carolina.
So I think it's an interesting balance right now of whether National Republicans still identify this race as competitive and will they up to Election Day? But this is something, you know, we Republicans in North Carolina have historically run ahead of polls and or finished ahead of polls on Election Night. And so, you know, this was a seven or eight point race. I think Michael Watley would be feeling pretty good about himself at this point, maybe a five-point race with the number of undecideds that we identified in our latest Carolina drone polling, but at 15 points, obviously an uphill battle here. It'll be interesting to watch where that number finally comes down at and whether National Republicans are willing to still continue to dump resources into the state as we get closer to election night.
Yeah, great points there. We'll keep a close eye on that. Let's move down to Congress. We've got 14 congressional districts. Really, earlier this year, we were really only looking at one.
That's North Carolina's first congressional district as the one that would be competitive. That is where Representative Don Davis currently sits in northeastern North Carolina. It's been a very interesting 45 days, however, in the western half of the state. Congressman Chuck Edwards resigning after a House Ethics Committee report. Representative Jennifer Bulcom being put into that seat, nominated for that by the executive committee out west.
That is a race now that looks very competitive in a district that if you asked people six months ago what's going to go on in NC 11, they would have told you easy win for Republicans. That's a tight race now as well. Yeah, Nick, if you remember back to just last year in 2025, you know, Republicans nationally saw North Carolina as potentially an opportunity to expand their majority in the House by, you know, doing some redistricting out in NC1 and making that district more competitive. Like you mentioned, that is Democratic incumbent Don Davis, who's now served Congress out there for a couple of years, versus his former challenger, Republican Lori Buchout, who's running again. She's a former military officer and has served in that area now for a while.
And so a really interesting race that Republicans in a normal year, it's an R plus five district over at the Civita Center for Public Integrity. That's a district that Republicans in a normal year would feel very comfortable about winning. That's a district that Trump won overwhelmingly. And so something that normally wouldn't be competitive and would be seen as an easy pickup for Republicans. But in this midterm climate, with President Trump's approvals, where they are, that is a district that we continue to see poll right around even.
Going to be definitely a close race out in NC1. And as we get towards election night, it'll be interesting to see if Don Davis, who you know has always kind of been a moderate or self-described moderate in a lot of ways, is able to hold on to a district that is continually to skew more towards the Republican side. Like you mentioned with NC 11, this has definitely been the black sheep right of the North Carolina Congressional Caucus now for the past couple months here with Representative Chuck Edwards having to, you know, pull out of this, or not having to, I guess, choosing to remove himself from the congressional race here after a House Ethics Committee found him in violation of rules there around some sexual harassment and some workplace. Net bad things. Um we can leave it at that with uh some guns and roses.
Um But here, you know, we saw Lori Buck out, or I'm sorry, we saw Jennifer Bulcum be selected by the congressional caucus out there. And since then, she's hit the ground running. A large number of endorsements have flown into that district, including President Trump's endorsement, Speaker Mike Johnson's endorsement. In fact, with a lot of money, right? And so this is a district that, you know, we have an NC or R plus four.
And so a closer district than NC1 on paper, but a district that Trump has won time and time again was not close, particularly close back in 2024 in the last congressional cycle. And so it'll be. Interesting to see, you know, with less than 100 days, was Jennifer Balcom able to convince enough voters that she was the right choice for this district, a former House representative in the North Carolina General Assembly. And so you know, has a background in elected office and is from out that way. And, you know, Jamie Agar, her Democratic opponent, a longtime North Carolina Democratic family who's had a number of elected officials come through, is running against her.
And he's been very popular, kind of that bluegrass North Carolina blue dog Democrat model.
So it'll be interesting to see those two districts turn out in November. But the whole country will be watching those two districts closely to see how the control of the U.S. House kind of shakes out. Yeah, one more comment there on NC11. Not only has he been running a pretty strong grassroots campaign, Andrew, he's raised a lot of money in a very large district.
North Carolina's 11th congressional district is 16 counties. This, of course, happens to overlap with an area that just two years ago was also hit incredibly hard by Hurricane Helene. Many communities still trying to rebuild.
So it's, I guess, a real possibility that some things have changed in the western half of the state in the last 24 months or so. And when President Trump and J.D. Vance have been in the state, Vice President J.D. Vance have been in the state the past couple of months, this is a point they both mentioned: that NC-11 was this big district. It is a changing district.
This one, I think, Vice President Vance said, you've got to get out to all those counties. You're going to do a lot of driving over the next 90 days of that election cycle. And so, you know, but it's a growing district in some of these more. Rural or suburban areas. You know, you think about the areas outside of Asheville and how fast that area is growing.
And inside that district, how fast does Asheville's growth begin to really drive which direction elected officials in that area have to represent? And so it'll be interesting to see. I think this is a really interesting challenge, and I think a district that going forward will be a real challenge for Republicans to hold. Yeah, we'll be keeping an eye on North Carolina's first and eleventh congressional district. We'll turn our attention to the North Carolina General Assembly coming up after this.
You're listening to the Carolina Journal News Hour. Have you ever thought about the difference between paying rent and owning a home? When you rent, your monthly payment helps cover the cost of living there, but it usually doesn't build anything for your future. Home ownership is different. Each payment you make on a home may help build equity, which is the value you own in the property over time.
As that equity grows, it can become a financial asset that may support your long-term goals. Owning a home can also provide stability. You have a place that's yours where you can build memories, establish roots, and truly make the space your own. And the good news is that many people are surprised to learn there are programs designed to help first-time homebuyers get started, including grants and assistance programs that may help with down payments or closing costs. Learning about your options is the first step toward making an informed decision about your future.
Visit ToolsForHomeOwnership.com. Have you ever wondered why some people seem to age slower? Like they figured out some secret the rest of us missed?
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Welcome back to the Carolina Journal News Hour, Charlotte's FM News Talk, 107.9 FM. WBT, I'm Nick Craig. Good Friday morning to you. We are walking through what is a very lengthy ballot for the 2026 midterm elections here across the state of North Carolina. Andrew Pomerance joins us.
Andrew, let's jump over to the thing that you love covering. The North Carolina General Assembly. Every single member of the General Assembly, unlike what we see in the United States Senate, is on a ballot every two years. We've got 170 members combined between both of the chambers. And we're going to see a very interesting year as Republicans have been successful in holding majorities, in some cases, supermajorities for the last 15 years.
Democrats looking to make a power play, more particularly in the North Carolina House, and potentially gained control there. What are you following on the General Assembly side? You have to love the craziness to follow the North Carolina General Assembly in an election year where. All 170 members are on the ballot, right? There are 170 different elections going on.
You know, there are only the SIFTAS Center listed about 28 districts that are truly competitive in the House or in the Senate, right?
So it's an overwhelmingly majority of these races are shoe-ins. We could, you know, I bet comfortably on those now. There are some really interesting races throughout the state, especially in Wake County, where there are still remaining three Republican representatives, and those three are in very tough races in R plus less than three districts in this year where, you know, generic ballot, we see about on the General Assembly side, about an eight-point difference. Democrats being up eight points on that generic ballot.
So definitely an uphill battle for some of those Wake County and Mecklenburg County Republicans that still remain in those kind of R plus one or R plus zero districts. And really when it comes down to the General Assembly and these races, we're looking for two things. One, the majority, right? The overwhelming majority currently held by House and Senate Republicans, Senate Republicans 30 to 20, House Republicans 71 to 49, plus two independents, right? And so that's the first thing.
Are Republicans going to be able to hold, remain in the majority? And I think, you know, most people will tell you yes. There's probably a lot of optimism about being able to hold that majority. But the other side of this is with a Democratic governor, you know, will they be able to maintain that veto power? It's something.
That has been super crucial for them the past couple of years, especially in getting large legislative packages through after the governor has vetoed those. And so that number, I think, is the one to watch. Republicans in the Senate cannot lose a single seat in terms of veto proof majority if all members are present.
So they have to hold that number at 30. The House is already one seat down, and so they have had to give a lot on some of these veto overrides. And what they had, now they've had a couple independent members who were former Democrats who had left their party for one reason or another. They are not running again, or they were defeated in their primaries. And so those independent members will not be around next year to help them on these veto overrides.
And so if that number falls well below 71, I think you'll see the governor feel more empowered, House Democrats feel more empowered. And I think you may see a large stand still happen down the General Assembly. Yeah, great points to note there. And of course, as we covered in great detail earlier this year, a Senate leader Phil Berger losing his primary election.
So he will not be coming back to the North Carolina General Assembly as we transition into the legislative long session next year. We do expect some more activity from lawmakers before this year is over. Stay tuned until after the election. We are hearing some rumors in November and even potentially December, some additional work from lawmakers in this current legislative session. We'll keep you up to date on those details.
Let's continue working down the ballot, Andrew. A race that doesn't necessarily have an immediate impact in terms of the majority on a body, but something that could be relevant in years to come. This is the North Carolina Supreme Court. These races for Supreme Court and some of the Court of Appeals races over the last 10 years, Republicans have been very successful in gaining majorities and just blowing Democrats out of the water in some of these races. There's been some close ones as well.
What are you tracking in the race between uh Anita Earls and Sarah Stevens? Yeah, a race that could turn out to, like you've mentioned, be really important down the road with a number of these Supreme Court seats coming up for a reelection in just the next couple of years, right? And elections that have historically been very close here in North Carolina. Sarah Stevens is a former Republican lawmaker down at the General Assembly, spent years down there before jumping into this race against incumbent Democratic Justice Anita Earls. Sarah Stevens across the board has continually polled ahead of Michael Watley.
And so this has actually been the closest race in terms of statewide races. On most polls that have gone out, we've seen it down to just two points on recent high-point polling rate. And so this is a race that could be closely contested.
Something where, you know, if Republicans are not going to vote for Watley because of maybe disagreements with President Trump, this is a race where they may still come home to the base and vote for Sarah Stevens here. And so this would be a big pickup for Republicans who already have the majority on the Supreme Court, right, but want to hold that going forward. And with a number of those seats coming up in the future, this is one that. He'll definitely go under the radar uh in terms of elections, but could have real uh repercussions going forward. Yeah, we'll, of course, keep a close eye on that.
All right, when we wrap up the ballot, when you get all the way to the end, now this is going to be different in every municipality because there are a lot of local bonds and a lot of local referendums that are taking place across North Carolina.
However, Andrew, there are three constitutional amendments that we discussed in detail earlier this year as lawmakers were hammering out some of the details and going through the process of putting those on the ballot. Let's start with the first constitutional amendment here and kind of work through all three. Yeah, the first one is a voter ID constitutional amendment. It is an expansion on language we passed back in 2018 as a constitutional amendment here in North Carolina. This expands that voter ID requirement to everyone, no matter which way they vote.
So no matter if that is an in-person voting or a mail-in ballot or an absentee ballot. This is just an expansion of that. When we passed it back in 2018, we had this, you know, still pre-I think pre-COVID. This is we passed it in terms for in-person voting, and that was it, right? And so this would just expand that.
Protection there. This is an issue that amendment that is polling overwhelmingly popular with Republicans in the latest Carolina Journal poll. 95% of Republicans supported this amendment, 65% of Independents did. Only about 40% of Democrats did, right? And so still about 66% of the overall electorate supported this amendment, but even with that lower support from Democrats.
An amendment that I think it will have a real impact. Voters may think we're doing this again, but absolutely, and this is something that should just be added to the North Carolina Constitution. Yeah, and will you, again, based on the polling that we've seen, not election predictions, but based on the polling, very, very strong support here. We did see some of that same strong support in 2018. That's the first constitutional amendment.
Let's talk about the personal income tax rate. This has been a big discussion over the last 15 years when Republicans took control after a hundred-plus year of Democrat control in 2010. One of the first things they got to work on, Andrew, was lowering the personal income tax rate in North Carolina. They've been doing that, and now they're asking voters to put a hard cap on that number so that future general assemblies would not be able to raise it above that percentage. Yeah, prior to Republicans taking control of the General Assembly in 2011, that personal tax rate was up around potentially 9% at times, right?
And so much higher than it is today. We're currently at a 3.5% rate, or projected to be. We are working towards a 2.5% rate here in North Carolina, right? But back in 2018, that same year we had that voter ID amendment, we also voted to cap the personal income tax from 10% down to 7%.
So we are currently at a 7% cap. We've not been at 7% for a number of years under Republican leadership in the General Assembly. And this just asks that we bring that cap down again, now half it down to 3.5%, right? And so something that is naturally going to happen isn't something that will, you know, this necessarily affects policy right now or your individual tax rate currently. This is something that's prescheduled to happen.
This is just a protection for the future, right?
So if we look towards the future and for whatever reason, It's different people, different parties in control, they would not be able to raise that personal income tax back above that 3.5%, which the General Assembly has it down below now. Yeah, and that same thing with the voter ID amendment does poll and has consistently polled pretty strongly over our Carolina Journal poll and some other statewide polls that have been taken over the last couple of months. Great point there, Andrew, about how it won't have an immediate impact but could linger in the future. The third constitutional amendment is something that could have an immediate impact on voters all the way from the mountains to the East Coast, to the Atlantic Ocean, to the Virginia and South Carolina border. This is putting a levy limit on local municipalities.
We're talking about cities and counties. As we've heard from many of our readers and many of our audience members in the last couple of years, their local property tax bills have been skyrocketing, sometimes 15, 20, 25% year over year. Lawmakers, I guess, have heard some of the cries from their constituents, and they're looking to tackle this as well. Yeah, this is an issue the General Assembly took up even before they came back for the legislative short session this year. It's an issue that, while over that break, they held committee hearings and proposal hearings for how to address the rising property tax issue and the burden that property tax were putting on so many different individuals across the state, right?
And so out of those discussions came this property tax levy limit amendment. And this is just a cap on how fast counties can raise those property taxes, right?
So it doesn't say how high they can go or which way a county has to do it, but just how fast it can raise so that we, as North Carolinians, can adjust to those property tax raises over time and not be surprised by a 20% raise in a single year, right? We're seeing that across the state now as localities try to speed up this process before this amendment goes into place and that expectation that it will. The Senate put together a committee to further study property taxes, right?
So this is an issue that's not going away. anytime soon. It's something that the General Assembly continues to put emphasis on. And with this levy limit legislation or amendment here, this is something that will begin to control the rising property taxes across the state. Yep, polling very strong as all three constitutional amendments in our most recent Carolina Journal poll very much above 50 percent.
So, we'll watch it and we'll be keeping an eye on those and, of course, watching those returns come in on election night. A lot of time still to go now between now and November the 3rd. We'll be keeping a close eye on all of the details across the state of North Carolina. Continuing coverage, as always, over on our website, CarolinaJournal.com. We appreciate the update this morning.
Andrew Pomerance joins us on the Carolina Journal News Hour. Have you ever thought about the difference between paying rent and owning a home? When you rent, your monthly payment helps cover the cost of living there, but it usually doesn't build anything for your future. Home ownership is different. Each payment you make on a home may help build equity, which is the value you own in the property over time.
As that equity grows, it can become a financial asset that may support your long-term goals. Owning a home can also provide stability. You have a place that's yours where you can build memories, establish roots, and truly make the space your own. And the good news is that many people are surprised to learn there are programs designed to help first-time homebuyers get started, including grants and assistance programs that may help with down payments or closing costs. Learning about your options is the first step toward making an informed decision about your future.
Visit toolsforhomeownership.com. Good morning again. It's 5:55. Welcome back to the Carolina Journal News Hour, Charlotte's FM News Talk, 107.9 FM, WBT, the National Republican Senatorial Committee, also known as the NRSC. Is calling out a recent Politico article and report that indicates that their focus would shift away from races in North Carolina in Georgia, with the NRSC publicly calling a response to the article fake news.
According to the Politico report during a closed-door meeting this week, Senator Tim Scott, the Republican from South Carolina, who's also the NRSC chairman, said that the organization would focus on Maine, Alaska, Ohio, Iowa, Texas, Michigan, and New Hampshire. With Politico claiming that four sources in the room were granted anonymity to share those private details. And according to the Politico article, that, of course, leaves out North Carolina's Senate race between Michael Watley and Roy Cooper, and Georgia's Senate race between Mike Collins and John Osoff. Despite these claims, several NRSC sources, including Tim Scott himself, had publicly called the report from Politico, quote, fake news, with Tim Scott saying, The media is desperate to hand Democrats a win, but this is a new low, 100% fake news. Nathan Brad, a senior advisor to Scott, who was also in the room, said in response to the report: No wonder that the Trump administration banned Politico.
As someone in the room today, this story is entirely made up. There are slides, U.S. senators and staff who can and will tell you that this story is complete bogus. With that, we are, of course, continuing to keep an eye on the North Carolina Senate race as a recent polling, our Carolina Journal poll out just last week, shows at this point a 15-point advantage, 15.1 to be exact advantage for former Democrat Governor Roy Cooper. Other polls that have been released in the last couple of days.
Show that margin could be as little as seven to eight points, but still very much above the margin of error and a contest at this point that has seemingly not materialized in terms of a very competitive election.
However, we have seen some issues with polling over the last decade or so, and all eyes remain on the start of the early voting period on October the 15th. And then, of course, Election Day rolling around on November the 3rd. We'll be keeping a very close eye on that race and many others that we talked about on the program today over on our website, CarolinaJournal.com. That's going to do it for a Friday edition. WBT News is next, followed by Good Morning BT.
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