McCrory preparing to take office

Governor-elect Pat McCrory says he's not decided if North Carolina should pursue a joint state-federal health exchange, and he says 2,000 mentally ill people should not lose their spots in group homes.

Posted 4:24 p.m. Nov 19, 2012 — Updated 5:11 p.m. Nov 20, 2012

Mark Binker

RALEIGH, N.C. — Governor-elect Pat McCrory sat down with anchor David Crabtree this weekend to talk about his upcoming administration. You can watch the full interview in the video attached to this post.

During the interview, Crabtree asked about a couple issues that have been in the news:

On outgoing Gov. Bev Perdue's decision to pursue a joint state-federal health exchange under the new federal health care law, McCrory said he wasn't sure that was the right approach. "I have a bias toward wanting to do it in the state, having a state-run program," McCrory said. "I'm not willing to accept a program that's state-run in name only and it's really being controlled by the federal government. If the federal government has got our hands tied on a state-run program, then we might as well hand it over to the federal government and not create our own bureaucracy in the state."
On the potential for roughly 2,000 mentally ill and other disabled people to lose their placement in group homes McCrory said that the Perdue administration made a mistake in signing a settlement agreement with the federal government. While McCrory says that settlement triggered the crisis, it is actually a state-funding issue that rests more with the legislature. "We've got to find a place (for them) to live," McCrory said, expressing confidence the state would not be put out on the street.

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