By another split vote, Graham’s city council this week vetoed allowing the city’s new mayor, Chelsea Dickey, to take a trip to a conference in New Bern sponsored by the North Carolina Main Street program.
Last month, councilman Bobby Chin had struck a $1,500 budget allocation for Dickey’s trip from the “consent agenda,” a list of putatively non-controversial items. The motion to delete the funding passed 3-2, with Chin, Bonnie Whitaker, and Ricky Hall voting to delete the funding; Dickey and councilman Jim Young were opposed.
This month, the objections came from Whitaker to another “consent agenda” item that proposed the same allocation, $1,500, for Dickey’s trip, this time funded by a donation from a Graham business owner who wanted to allow Dickey to make the trip…