Election Results

But local government officials said yesterday that they would be selective in how they would use the controversial bonds.

North Carolinians approved the use of self-financing bonds by passing Amendment One on Tuesday by a margin of 51 percent to 49 percent in which more than 2.8 million votes were cast. Similar referendums were defeated in 1982 and 1993 when the bonds were identified as tax-increment financing.

Voters in the metropolitan Triad passed the amendment by a margin of 53 percent to 47 percent, although it was defeated in Alamance and Stokes counties. About 55 percent of Forsyth County voters supported the amendment.

"The passage of Amendment One gives us another tool to put in our tool box," said Derwick Paige, the assistant manager for economic development for the city of Winston-Salem.

"But we don't have any projects lined up that we're anxious to use self-financing bonds with," Paige said.

Self-financing bonds give local governments another way of paying for projects that spur local development by dedicating the increase in property value from the development to paying off the bonds over 15 to 30 years. They don't require taxpayer approval.

Opponents said that this method of financing removes a layer of taxpayer oversight from municipal finance and could force local governments to take a hit if a project fails.

The bonds particularly could help such large developments as the Piedmont Triad Research Park, said Richard Dean, the president of Wake Forest Uni-versity Health Sciences, which oversees the park.

The park, in downtown Winston-Sa-lem, is undergoing a 30-year expansion plan and could grow to about 200 acres.

Dean said that the park ordinarily would struggle to find enough mo-ney to pay for such expensive infrastructure projects as road improvements, building upgrades or moving railroad lines to make land parcels more attractive.

Gayle Anderson, the president of the Greater Winston-Salem Chamber of Commerce, and Paige said that other potential applications of the bonds include a proposed business park at Smith Reynolds Airport, Union Cross Business Park, the Unity Place project along Fourth and Broad streets and the Liberty Street corridor.

The N.C. Local Government Commission, which is nonpartisan, would have final approval on whether to issue the bonds.

"You have the issue of needing a guaranteed-revenue stream, so you still have to have a viable economic-development project for these bonds to even be issued," Paige said.

Don Kirkman, the president of the Piedmont Triad Partnership, said he doesn't think that self-financing bonds will be used frequently in the Triad.

"But they can be applied in a variety of settings," Kirkman said. "The bonds will not only be attractive to outside companies considering the Triad, but it also will enable local governments to be more creative in economic development."

Michael Joyce, a member of the Cary Town Council and an outspoken opponent of Amendment One, said he plans to create www.nctifuse.org as an Internet watchdog for how the bonds are applied.

"The data placed on this site will be an asset for local governments to provide the checks and balances in their decision-making process to protect school funding and taxpayers from spillovers from poor revenue projections," Joyce said.

North Carolinians overwhelmingly passed two other constitutional amendments.

Amendment Two clarified how civil fines and forfeitures are distributed to public schools. Amendment Three expanded magistrates' terms to four years after an initial two-year appointment.

• Richard Craver can be reached at 727-7376 or at rcraver@wsjournal.com