Dale Folwell discusses bid for state treasurer's seat
By Steve Herring
Published in News on November 3, 2016 11:05 AM
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Dale Folwell
Dale Folwell lugs around a bowling pin to illustrate his approach to problem solving.
Bowlers have two chances to knock down the 10 bowling pins, so the goal is to take down as many pins as possible with each throw, he said.
The same is true in solving problems where the goal is that solving one problem also resolved several others at the same time, Folwell said.
And it is his experience in using that approach to problem solving that makes him the best choice to serve as the state's next treasurer, Folwell said.
A Republican, Folwell and Democrat Dan Blue III are seeking the state treasurer's seat now held by Democrat Janet Cowell who is not seeking re-election in the Nov. 8 general election.
The office oversees the state employees' pension and health plans and houses the Local Government Commission.
The treasurer also sits on the state board of education.
As a former state House speaker pro tempore and N.C. assistant secretary of commerce, Folwell said that he has experience in solving problems for the citizens of the state.
"My track record over the past 12 years is that I have saved North Carolinians billions of dollars, all documented, and thousands of minds and thousands of lives," he said. "That is through my work on government efficiency and in education and crime.
"For the past three years I have had the responsibility of paying off North Carolina's $2.7 billion in unemployment debt and building a $1 billion surplus. I was the N.C. assistant secretary of commerce in charge of that. I was brought in specifically to fix the unemployment system. I was brought in after the laws were passed to implement the laws."
Folwell, 57, a Winston-Salem native, worked his way through school as an adult student, receiving his bachelor's of science and master's degrees in accounting from UNC-Greensboro.
He is a former vice-president and registered investment advisor for DB/Alex Brown. A certified public accountant, Folwell served for eight years on the Forsyth Board of Education.
Married for 28 years, he and his wife, Synthia, have three children and live in Winston-Salem.
Folwell said he passed 29 major pieces of legislation, with no vetoes, during his eight years in the General Assembly.
"Any time that you do something to benefit business, the biggest beneficiary is the state because it is the biggest business in North Carolina," Folwell said. "The second biggest beneficiaries are the counties. The third is the school districts and the fourth is the cities.
"What I am trying to relay is that all of this stuff is connected."
Folwell said he worked to support teachers and the kindergarten cutoff date in North Carolina -- something that was needed for about 35 years.
It made it so that children had to be a little older before they enter kindergarten, and it highly impacts boys, he said.
"I guess the work that I did on organ donations, blood donations which has resulted in tens of thousands of more pints of blood being collected in North Carolina," he said. Organ transplants went up 58 percent from that first year that legislation was in effect.
"In terms of government efficiency, the one I am most proud of is the tax and (vehicle) tag program," Folwell said. "It is the efficiency program that puts the renewal of your tag in one envelope with your property tax. That is saving $200 million a year. I was the author of that. I was the one who shepherded it through. It took six years to bring it into effect."
Folwell said that while campaigning he points out the $40 billion shortfall in the state pension and health care plans.
Those two items are going to cost the state more than $4 billion annually for the next 15 years, he said.
"That is 20 percent of the state budget," Folwell said.
People don't wake up thinking about worker's compensation reform, but it is a big deal" to large companies and the state, he said. Nor do they wake up thinking about the AAA bond ratings or $40 billion of unfunded liabilities, Folwell said.
"They wake up thinking about courts and roads and schools and universities and community colleges," he said. "I am telling you as a CPA that things that your readers care about as a core function of state government, that money is going to be taken from each one of those things every year for the next 15 years if somebody does not solve these two problems and they are the unfunded health and pension liability.
"Let me tell you how that manifests itself in the lives of your readers. A beginning school teacher, a beginning state trooper, if they choose the family coverage, they have to work five days per month to pay the family premium on the state health plan that has 750,000 people on it. That means they cannot afford it. So here you have people educating our children, protecting us from crime, policing our roads, part of a health plan with 750,000 people on it, and the family premium is unaffordable."
That, he said, is why he is applying for the job of state treasurer.
His approach to finding a solution to the pension issue is to first be honest with state residents that the plan is not going to earn 7.25 percent annually non in a zero-interest rate environment, he said.
The plan earned less than one percent last year, but paid out $600 million in fees, Folwell said.
"I am going to reduce those fees by at least $100 million," he said.
As for the health plan, the initial goal is to freeze the cost of family premiums without reducing benefits, he said. That will provide families with a certainty of what the insurance will cost, he said.
"Just because I freeze something doesn't mean it is more affordable," Folwell said. "It is just a start. Then we are going to be driving down family premiums. The state health plan is made up of old people like me. We have got to have young people in there."