Creditors say transit-tax foe behind scheme

[Jane Eyre]

Source: The Charlotte Observer

Jay Morrison, a key figure behind a November referendum to repeal Mecklenburg County's transit tax, had a "scheme to extort" money from a debt collector and bragged about his methods online, defendants say in court documents.

Morrison, now a candidate for the Charlotte-Mecklenburg school board, filed 16 similar lawsuits in 2004 seeking more than $320,000.

In one of his dismissed lawsuits against a firm collecting debts for credit card company MBNA, federal Judge Graham Mullen ordered Morrison to pay the company's attorney fees. Mullen said the suit was brought in "bad faith or for the purposes of harassment."
An attorney working on behalf of MBNA said Morrison created documents and used them to accuse creditors of harassment.

"It was a con," said Ronald Canter, the lawyer. "And we caught him."



Read more: http://www.charlotte.com/109/story/213252.html

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There is much, much more to this story. And that is because it is part of a larger story which is happening under the radar in cities and towns across the country.

You see, Jay Morrison is a fairly recent transplant to Charlotte from Florida. He has become a major Republican donor to local, state and national candidates during his few short years here, yet his financial background is murky at best. And now he is a candidate for the county school board.

But the real story here is how he is using a national right-wing organization, National Voter Outreach, to undermine local efforts to improve public transportation efforts. You see, National Voter Outreach (www.directdemocracy.com) specializes in getting right-wing initiatives on local ballots by hiring "circulators" who are paid by the signature to promote petitions. Morrison reportedly paid for at least half of the $60,000 cost to pay NVO to get the referendum on the ballot this year. He won't say who paid for the rest of the contract. Yet while he and unknown conspirators are hiring national right-wing organizations to undermine the work of our elected officials, he is also using "sunshine laws" to force our city/county government to provide him with all emails sent between city/county employees regarding the transit tax. This is a major waste of time and taxpayers' money.

There is bi-partisan support for keeping the transit tax, part of which is paying for a new over-due light-rail system which should relieve our major traffic congestion and save gasoline costs in the long-run. While it is pretty interesting to watch our local country-club elected Republicans go up against their wingnut brethren, the implications of these shady democracy-for-hire tactics is chilling.