Statement from Commissioner Bill James regarding 'homo' comment

The following is a statement from Mecklenburg County Commissioner Bill James regarding his comments to Commissioner Vilma Leake at Tuesday night's meeting: Vilma is a religious hypocrite. She was married to a Bishop in the AME Zion church. A church that has historically opposed homosexuality. She used her son's 'lifestyle' and his death from HIV-AIDS to justify in public voting for benefits to allow more individuals to use tax dollars to engage in the very behavior that resulted in her son's death. It is akin to someone whose son is an alcoholic and died from the disease, using his death from drinking as justification to have the taxpayers pay for more booze. Her position was that her 'faith' demanded that she do this to support her son and his 'lifestyle' which she acknowledges killed him. Since she didn't define what 'lifestyle' she was referring to, so I asked her. Asking the question is completely legitimate since she used him as the basis for explaining her public vote. Her response to me was threaten violence. This is also nothing new for Vilma as she did that on the School Board as well. Leake: "Don't make me hurt you. Don't do that to me. Don't talk to me about my son." Well, with all due respect to Ms. Leake - if she didn't want to talk about her son then why did she use his death from his 'lifestyle' contracting HIV/AIDS as the public justification for spending tax dollars to support the very behavior that killed her son.