Charlotte Mayoral candidate Rob Yates (10-17-2025--Hour1)

What's going on? Thank you so much for listening to this podcast. It is heard live every day from noon to three on WBT Radio in Charlotte. And if you want exclusive content like invitations to events, the weekly live stream, my daily show prep with all the links, become a patron, go to vpeteclendershow dot com. Make sure you hit the subscribe button. Get every episode for free right to your smartphone or tablet, And again, thank you so much for your support. Yesterday we spoke with Terry Donovan, the Republican nominee for the mayor of Charlotte. Today we are chatting with Rob Yates. He is a Libertarian nominee for mayor of Charlotte. Early voting began yesterday. Rob, Welcome to the program. How are you not too bad? How's it going? Oh, you know, not too bad. It's a Friday, that's half the battle. So it's a beautiful friday, though. I'll take it. It is, it absolutely is. I think this is second fall, second autumn, I believe is what they call it here in Charlotte. All right, so first, tell us a little little bit about your bio, like who are you? If people don't know who you are? Your background, why you are running for this position. Yeah, so it's my second time running for MARIV Charlotte. I ran for General Assembly in between. I am a Libertarian, which I'm finding a lot of people are unaware of what that means, but I'm happy that I've been able to provide some of that information. I'm the communications director for the Libertarian Party of North Carolina. I've been in Charlotte for almost twenty years now, and I'm running because I've just watched things in the city decline that don't need to be declining. Definitely not the Charlotte I've moved into. We're losing some of the things that give the city charm and make it unique and special. And I really think I have some ideas and some policy suggestions that I have to put out there and help turn things around. You said things that are declining that should not be declining. So do you have any examples of what those things might be? Yeah, I mean, I think we all know what the answers are going to be. It's we certainly have a public safety issue, and it is much more significant than it was ten and fifteen years ago. We are housing costs that are really prohibitive to growth in generational wealth and sort of starting to create a wealth gap, some class separation that we don't need to see. Food, transportation and infrastructure issues. They're perhaps not as bad as people would like to say during an election season, sure, but they're getting worse. They're continually getting worse. And then we have, I think a burgeoning issue with just overall economics. Things are getting really expensive and job growth is not keeping up with the clots of people. All right, So you also mentioned a moment ago that things are changing and not for the better, and you know, sort of hearkening back to this period ten fifteen years ago. And I have to ask as a libertarian, generally libertarians oppose the kinds of things that the city of Charlotte would, you know, promote and do building arenas for example, right, all sorts of these types of shiny projects and such. And they say, they would say that those are like that's the reason why Charlotte became this destination for so many people and why it was booming, you know, ten fifteen, twenty years ago. So do you consider that to be part of the thing that has been diminished? So I love questions like this because because we can really sort of break down what's actually happening versus what the people who make these deals and benefit from these deals, which is why I would argue they make them what they say is happening. Charlotte's been attractive to people because we have a business friendly environment. We are a fairly young and high tech city. Historically we've been a pretty safe city. Big businesses have come here, they've attracted jobs. Other jobs have come up around those jobs. People can start a small business or traditionally could start their own business here fairly successfully. And that's the kind of city that attracts a sports team. I certainly don't buy into the idea that we need to give a billionaire one hundred and fifty million dollar handout to fix his little pet project playground while our citizens are struggling to put food on the table. What about the light rail system, all of the parks right, all of the school construction. These were all of the things that taxpayers have been asked to fund, or been forced to fund through taxpayer dollars off viously over the last you know, fifty years. And then those are the things that are cited as the things that help attract those very businesses. So sure. I mean, obviously, when you pour money into something and there's an expectation of a return on that, you're going to have to have some sort of tangible product. To what degree that's attracting business versus business coming in and that driving growth. I mean, I would argue it's the latter pretty substantially. We do have public money coming in, and libertarian perspective is always going to be a more decentralized governance. So the idea that at a high level, what's right for say the outer banks North Carolina is certainly not what's right for New York City or San Francisco. And when you get into Charlotte, what's right for Charlotte might not even be what's right for Raleigh. And what's right for district Sick might not be what's right for District three. The more you can localize things, the more you can specialize the response. If the compromise that we ended up with was we're going to have a really nice greenway system and people are going to not pay a whole bunch of property taxes, like I could probably be pretty happy with that. You mentioned public safety in your at your website. By the way, I should tell people where to find information about you and your campaign. It is at prosper Charlotte dot com. Correct prosper Charlotte, prosper Charlotte dot com. So when the public safety plank of the platform, you say funds are wasted on unnecessary military equipment, but the police union insists cops are not paid enough. So do you disagree that police are not paid enough or do you do you think they are? And then what do you think is the solution to improving public safety? So again another good question, but I actually have to reject the premise of the question. And here's why I think we need to complete we think our approach to public safety. So, first of all, we spent something like a million dollars a couple of years ago on a military truck for bomb threats that could break through walls of buildings. And the average person is more likely to die from a coconut falling on your head than you are from a bomb explosion in the United States, But there is a million dollars. Whether or not an individual officer is paid enough or not should really be based on the merit of that officer's performance. So then we get into an incentive structure, and you have to look at what sort of outcome are you incentivizing. I want to really push a true community policing initiative where cops are embedded in the communities where they're serving, They're expected to be there for a long time, They're rewarded based on crime reduction in the community, their incentives sort of get involved in the community. There are a few things out there that I think we could give cops more of and better. Certainly, if they need body armor, like protection of law enforcement is not something you're gonna finally pushing back on. Another thing I would like to see is really try to give every single cop a cruiser and have him or her keep it at home. Just the presence of the police cruiser is going to deter people that maybe don't have a natural criminal event, but are sort of, you know, push to the break and commit some sort of violent act. This is just a start a true public safety reform initiative that drives better outcomes. Again, you have to look at everything. You have to reduce housing costs at the low end so people can afford place to live. You have to give opportunities so people have jobs. You have to ensure that police are in the place where violent crimes are being committed. And you have to stop asking police to play babysitter for some of these silly, victimless crimes right now. And you have to stop the sensationalism too. Charlotte being in the national spotlight. Granted, the arena stabbing was horrific, and I think it triggered a lot of people's emotions because the video was out there. I was unhappy I saw it. Sometimes that's a difficult image to get out of your head. But there are a couple things going on right now. One, we as a city are at a baseline that I would argue is unacceptable in terms of public safety, because there is a real, if very small chance for anyone going out in most parts of Charlotte that you could be a victim of violent crime. But on the other hand, we have seen some initiatives and acted that appear to be paying dividends. We're in the third year of a decline in violent crime, particularly violent crime. It's very hard to say over the last five years how much the COVID bump has affected where we were and where we're going. But the fact is we're in a place. Again, that is just not acceptable and we have to address it from there because people should be able to feel safe when they walk up. Wait, hang on second. You called it the COVID bump. You think COVID drove up crime? Yeah, I mean I think that we saw a spike around twenty twenty, twenty twenty one. Yeah, was there something else going on? There were potentially lots of things going on. Not potentially there were. There was an entire movement around defunding the police, right, so. Interesting, So you think it was directly related to that. Yeah, I'd say the social justice protesting cops, calling them, you know, pigs and killers and wanting to defund law enforcement and making them take a knee in order to prove that, you know, they they're sorry for systemic injustice and all of that. Yeah. Absolutely, I'd say that that had a more of a direct impact than COVID. So yeah, that's actually a good point. So we see an extreme position on either side and a pen and swinging back and forth. That doesn't serve anyone. We could in fact eliminate violent crime tomorrow. If we went into a police state, we could have you know, they talk about the National Guard. We could have the army come through and patrol the streets, and instantly you see violent crime almost disappear. But I don't think that's the country we live in or the country we. Want to live in, right then. I don't know anybody that's advocating for a police. Exactly one hundred percent. I'm just that's an example for contrast. So when you swing the entire other way and it's defund the police and anyone who's in law enforcement you know, is automatically a Nazi, well then you're going to get that sort of encouragement that leads to a bump of criminal behavior. I do think that the sort of the relicship of purpose that the lockdown lockdown brought. I mean, we we sort of set the whole world into an existential crisis. So I think that played into it psychologically. See of this confluence of events that's very, very bad for people looking to lower crime. Now, yeah, well, I would say my guess is that locking people down allowed for the explosion during the summer of fiery but mostly peaceful riots. I think you would not have seen the kind of explosion had people not been locked down and driven to the point of insanity. Just prior. But yeah, but I don't think that's the cause of the you know, the crime, the crime increase. I think it has a lot to do with, you know, telling people that join law enforcement because they want to, they want to help people, they want to protect people, and then being told that that makes them nazis. You know, they don't want to do the job. Then a lot of a lot of good people don't want to do the job, and yet a lot of and we still don't have all of the ranks full. And I do think that that's where a properly designed community policing initiative works, is that the again, the incentive structure for the officers involved is to truly get to know the people in their community. So it's like the example, I like to say, and you know this, but so Johnny and Billy get in a fight on the street corner and the cops break it up, but they know Johnny and Billy's parents where they're locked in with Johnny and Billy's school, so they're able to intervene. And instead of putting a fourteen year old in the system and creating all these barriers to true rehabilitation and coming out of it, and just two kids getting in a fight. You have right Now Again, the kids get put in a system. There are now criminals they have to go up against all these things. A lot of the kids that are engaged in this behavior are already facing some difficulties where they are in life. With the community Policing initiative, the incentive is to fix everything from the baseline, and it could. I mean some of the things sound sort of trite, like you could have barbecues or basketball games or whatever it may be, go door to door, give out cards, but that builds trust back in the police, and then the community engages. So when we say community policing, it's not this sort of I think it gets a very like this must be like some new wave leftist nonsense mumbo jumbo, and it's not. It is engaging everyone in the act of taking care of their communities. My guest is Rob Yates. We gotta pull up there for a second. So when I was a kid, my grandpa died with Alzheimer's, and before he died, my mom and my dad took care of him as he got worse. Forty years ago, there were no treatments and not much support for caregivers and family. Things are different today because of the work of so many people, including the Alzheimer's Association of Western Carolina. It's a great organization with awesome people with huge hearts. I've been a supporter for twenty five years. This cause means a lot to me. I participate in the annual Walk to end Alzheimer's and I'm leading a Charlotte team again this year, and it's called once again Pete's Pack. You can sign up and you can join the team and walk with us. It's on October eighteenth, that truest field. Sign up at alz dot org slash Walk and then you could search for my team name Pete's Peck. There's also a link at thepetepod dot com. There's also a link in the description of this podcast. Also, I'll be am seeing the Gastonia Walk on October eleventh, and so you can make a team and join that one too, or make a donation and help me hit my goal of five thousand dollars. If you do, I really appreciate it. There are a bunch of other walks all over the Carolinas. You can go to alz dot org slash Walk for all the dates and locations. We're closer than ever to stopping Alzheimer's. Can you help us get there? Will you walk with me? For a different future, for families, for more time for treatments. This is why we walk. Chatting with Rob Yates, he is the Libertarian candidate for mayor of Charlotte and Rob before the break, we were talking about public safety, one of the biggest issues. If not, I would submit it is the biggest issue that's driving the problems with crime in Charlotte and in Mecklenburg. You know, at a larger level is the judicial system. And if you were to win, obviously the mayor is not in charge of the judicial system. But I mean yesterday or a couple days ago, we had the Charlotte Mecklinburg Police released their data and they were pointing out the challenge they've got with repeat, repeat offenders that keep getting turned loose. I think they cited some fifteen year old who's got like one hundred. And twelve more than one a day. Yeah, it's insane. And how can you, if mayor, apply pressure to the judicial system or would you even do that? So I would absolutely do that. You know, I can sit here and I can talk about community policing, example statistics, we can look at other ways of policing the community. We can talk about social change and underlying issues. But the fact is, if violent people are on the streets, they're going to do violent things. And it is it is unreal the number. And you know, it hasn't been some swell of people that are getting out on these these full cashlests bills or violent criminals being released, but it's way more than it should be. I mean, I would argue should probably be zero. But I think that the mayor and Charlotte, at least on paper, is not particularly powerful. There are sort of delineated responsibilities bully pop it and bully pulpit abilities, and then behind the scenes capabilities, and I think that with the judicial system there's real opportunity to really push on some of the DA's on I mean, even the judges and the magistrates in line with law enforcement and other people that agree like, hey, we need to stop letting these people out. And that's something that I would make a very high priority. If someone has stabbed someone before and is on trial or is a waiting trial or for multiple stabbings, that person probably shouldn't be walking around, especially the previous previous guilty verdicts. Yeah, all right, I want to hit on transportation as well and a couple other topics here Robyates. You can, by the way, find more of his information and his positions at prosper Charlotte dot com. More with Robbyates in a moment you know. Stories are powerful. They help us make sense of things, to understand experiences. 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They are your life told through the eyes of everyone around you and all who came before you, and they will tell others to come who you are. Visit creative video dot com. We're chatting with Rob Yates. He's the libertarian candidate for mayor of Charlotte. His website prosper Charlotte dot com. All right, Rob, let's talk a little bit about transportation. Do you support do you endorse the one cent sales tax increase for the transit system and roads as the mailers keep reinforcing it's all about the roads in the mailers. So I want to say this like as crystal player as possible, because mar Lyles has come out in favor of it. Terry Donovan was in favor of it. Now she's saying not now. I am adamantly opposed to the fourteen percent one point sales tax increase to the entire referendum. And if you're listening to this, I encourage you to vote no. Okay? And why where to start first? If you ever want to go down sort of a descent into the mailstream rabbit hole, go look at the structure of just how CATS is run. Just to start with, who reports to who. There's two different boards, some people sit on different ones. One executive reports to the city council, but they can't actually make changes to CATS. It's the most convoluted thing I've seen, so difficult to get anything done there. Then you sort of look at how well CATS is doing, and this is just the public transportation side, and it doesn't seem to be you know, getting the people to the places they need. It seems very arbitrary where it's laid half the people on there, I read, I can't confirm the statistic. I should clarify that. I don't want to speculate. I don't like the hyperfectly. But I read that half the people riding caps are not paying their fares. Oh yeah, well, we don't know that data because they don't collect it. They make no effort to collect it. Yeah, I mean even it's like ten percent, that seems pretty wild to me. Second, we have poured so much money into quote unquote infrastructure development or transportation however they want to frame it, and if we end up completing the project, it's delayed by years. It goes way over cost. You know, the red line they're still dangling that carrot. And to do this they want to charge you fourteen percent more. It's going to start with two hundred and forty dollars a year and probably in and based on promises. If you read the plan, if you read the proposals, there's really nothing concrete in there. They don't know how it's going to be administered. In particular, the oversight board is supposed to be independent. It's being chosen right now before the initiative would even pass. And you know, someone who didn't win the primary and city council is applying to be on there says she's independent. I mean, the whole thing is this giant insider deal. And then again I'm against taxes and spending in general. But if you're going to do it, if we must do it, I would like to see it go to help people. But instead this seems to be a big give out giveaway to developers. The yes for met crowd. I mean they have three point three million upfront and spending for this. They're not spending three point three million because they want to see people helped. They're spending three point three million because they stand a profit a whole lot from this deal. Well, I mean, and the whole benefit of and this was explain the argument when the Blue Line was built was that it does serve as an economic development generator along the fixed rail corridor in a way that bus rapid transit, for example, does not. Bus stops are not permanent. You could just pick them up and move them, and so they don't generate economic development around them. But a train station does, you know, putting more high density housing along the corridor. And look, it did work according to their projections, right that that was what they said was going to you look at South End. That was what was predicted and that was promised. So that's what and they were right about that. No to an extent. I mean, it's very hard to point to a singular cause of economic development, Charlotte. I mean, we've been doing well as a city overall for the last thirty years. Just building a train and putting high density housing around it does not necessarily mean you're going to see corresponding development. And I mean I have libertarian reasons for this. I would argue that sort of centralized, top down planning never works, and you're setting yourself up for failure. But this proposal is particularly agreed just one. I mean, prices are high, people are hurting, and it doesn't look like it's going to be getting better, and they're taking that money away. It's going to affect me, but I'll be okay. It's the people who really can't afford it that are going to, i mean, feel it the most, and it's not going to help them. We're talking even if every single projection the guests from met crowd is making comes true, which I suspect none of them are. But we're years away from seeing benefits on this. We have problems right now. And then on the backdrop of all that, like you mentioned the stadium deals earlier, you know, we're throwing money away for billionaires little pet projects. We've seen money squandered and wasted in lots of places. We have behind the door deals to retiring sheriffs for a city council that has really become sort of insular. If their first premise for promoting this as as a positive thing is trust us, that alone should be enough for everyone to vote. Now you mentioned housing there. This is also a big issue, the affordable housing situation. I talked with Terry Donovan about this yesterday. How do you get more starter homes in Charlotte, how do you and you say in your at your website prosper Charlotte dot com that you'll ensure that housing prices adjust at a reasonable rate relative to the market and affordable housing exists for everyone in all income brackets. How does a mayor do that? How would you do that? So this is uh, you know, you mentioned something I think on the people texting you after yesterday where someone said, why isn't there a debate? Yeah, there actually was a debate Mary Lyles and I debated a few weeks ago the Stevenson Tuesday forum. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. I thought Harry was going to show up, but it was just the two of us. But I mentioned that because I had discussed some of these plans in terms of affordable housing on there in detail and just bringing it back up trying to stay consistent. But there are some places where I've really looked into the codes, the rules, the restrictions and what the state says, what Raley says, and talk to council, and I think there are places that we could really push some boundaries on restrictions and open up the market. So what we have right now is this City Council Approval Model UDO. What's allowed, what isn't. It's incentivizing some high density stuff, but that's not bringing value anywhere. It's not enticing people to move up, opening up places that turn into starter homes. It's just creating high density housing that's way more expensive. I want to open up the market. I want to so how how do you do that? I want to remove the owning restriction. I really want to remove z owning restrictions. I don't want people to have to ask permission to build on their properties. Isn't that what the UDO is testing now? That the UDO, and that's why you're seeing all of these large tracts that were you know, one home on five six seven acres or so, that are now getting torn down, sold off, torn down and replaced with don't call them duplexes, their duets or duets or whatever they are, right, But that's Isn't that what we are seeing right now? And people aren't happy about it. I think that the way the UDO is structured and it is it is. I mean, if you want to disagree with me, you know, I respect you on all ears, but I would argue there's a very restrictive document overall, and that's why we're getting instead of expansion, instead of the market driving true market needs drive the homes that are being built, you're just getting what the UDO seems to tell people is what we should have. And that's why you're seeing a lot of new apartment complexes, a lot of stuff being crammed in. You know, values are appearing to go up, but it's really just prices going up. So people are trying to milk that for what it's worth, but nothing's getting cheaper. Right, Well, I guess I tie that back to the cost of building, right the reason why big. Part of it, without doubt, without a doubt. Yeah, And like a builder is not going to build starter homes for you know, one percent profit because if anything goes wrong, they have a string of bad weather or something, they're bankrupt, they're done, and so they're Yeah, so they've got to have a they've got to have a cushion of a profit margin in there. And so that's why you don't see a lot of that entry level housing anymore. Whereas you can build high density, you can get the density bonuses and such, you also have to include you know, affordable housing components and that sort of stuff for more, for more bonuses. And you know, given that we are so short on housing, it seems like you would want as much housing as possible to be built as quickly as possible, which would then create more supply. Yeah, I mean, I think it's better than nothing, obviously. Sure, So I read a report last week that the US is now in the worst housing cost relative to income situation it's ever been in. I believe that. I verified that. I just saw that going around. But there are two cities that have managed to avoid this problem, and it's Austin and Minneapolis. And the reason they did that is they never stopped building houses, right, and they didn't ask what kind of houses they needed to build. They just let the market beside. When you build high end homes, then wealthy people move into those homes, leaving their homes behind, and it resets the market ceiling. And I hate It's not trickle down, it's just market development. Sure, it's like the early adopters of like any technology, they're going to spend the most money upfront, and then you know, it drives the prices down for everybody else exactly. But what happens is people move up to the next tier of homes. That opens up real starter homes and people can buy things that they can afford and you have pride of home ownership. A lot of this high density housing that we're being told is being built out, A lot of it is rental, which is fine. I mean, people need to rent too, but when they're just cramming as many rental places into an area that's not able to absorb it, especially in terms of infrastructure, roads, hospitals, police schools. These things are all being tested, Traffics getting worse, and it's from huge amounts of rental places being put in and then it's not even so I hate the term affordable housing. All housing is affordable to someone. What we're talking about is housing that meets different income tiers, and it's not even meeting that need because the market is so just desperate for you know, literally places that people can go live that prices are going way up. Yeah, so you know, you could rent an apartment in the outskirts of Charlotte for under one thousand dollars pretty easily. It's ten years ago, and now I think I've read that seventeen hundred is like the median apartment price in Charlotte proper. Oh gosh, I would say it's probably more over two grand that we haven't been able to find anything under two thousand. For a two dollars. Yeah, it's crazy. Yeah, Rob, I appreciate the time. A reminder that early voting is underway. Rob Yates is the Libertarian candidate for mayor. His website prosper Charlotte dot com. Good luck on the campaign trail, Rob, and thanks for your time. I appreciate it. Thank you so much, but it always a pleasure. Yes, sir, take care. That's Rob Yate. Here's a great idea. How about making an escape to a really special and secluded getaway in western North Carolina. Just a quick drive up the mountain and Cabins of Ashville is your connection. 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Call or text eight two eight three six seven seventy sixty eight or check out all there is to offer at Cabins Offashville dot com and make memories that'll last a lifetime on the text line. Alan says Rob is far and away the best choice for mayor. Second is the Republican, and very distant third is the current mayor. Violis Yeah, and look. I asked Terry Donovan, the Republican, yesterday, about this. I am fully aware, and Rob is fully aware. He's a Libertarian. He has run for office before. He knows the demographics, you know, the voter registration challenges. Shall we say that a libertarian has in basically every race, but also the Republicans have in any race really in Charlotte, particularly an at large race as the mayor's race is, So we shall see. But you know a third of the voters are unaffiliated, so there's no party loyalty required there. I'm not in city limits, so I can't even vote for any of these mayoral candidates. So good luck to all Right, that'll do it for this episode. Thank you so much for listening. I could not do the show without your support and the support of the businesses that advertise on the podcast, so if you'd like, please support them too and tell them you heard it here. You can also become a patron at my patreon page or go to dpetecleanershow dot com. Again, thank you so much for listening, and don't break anything while I'm gone.