Commissioner, Mecklenburg Board of County Commissioners, District 3
George Dunlap represents District 3 on the Mecklenburg Board of County Commissioners (Democrat). First elected in 2008.
District 3 · 9th Term
George Dunlap
District 3 · Chairman Emeritus · NACo President · 9th Term
George Dunlap represents District 3 on the Mecklenburg Board of County Commissioners. He has served for 17 consecutive years across nine terms, making him the board’s chairman emeritus and one of its longest-serving members alongside Vilma D. Leake.
Dunlap was sworn in as president of the National Association of Counties on July 20, 2026, at the association’s annual conference in New Orleans, the first Mecklenburg commissioner to lead it. He was elected NACo second vice president in 2024 and first vice president on July 14, 2025. NACo supports 3,069 counties, parishes and boroughs and represents more than 40,000 locally elected officials and 3.6 million county employees. As president he presides over the NACo board and executive committees and serves as the association’s chief spokesperson, and his term initiative, “Building Better Futures,” focuses on youth programs. Chair Jerrell said this is “bigger than Commissioner Dunlap because this will yield much greater visibility and a louder voice to some of the challenges and opportunities we face as a county, region, and state.”
Dunlap’s NACo role is already producing for Mecklenburg: the large urban county conference will be held in Charlotte in December 2026, bringing county leaders from across the country. He has more than 30 years of total public service, has served as board chair, and has chaired multiple committees. During the FY27 budget cycle he was a central voice through the public hearing, the MEDIC wage-floor debate, and the final adoption vote.
A federal penalty tied to North Carolina's food-assistance error rate could take $30 million to $42 million a year out of Mecklenburg County's budget, and the county will owe a share of it even if its own error rate stays under the federal limit. The county's budget director called it a shift of federal costs onto local residents, from a program funded by income tax onto a county whose revenue levers are "really limited to property tax." Whether the General Assembly must cap property tax is the question on the November 3 ballot.
George Dunlap, the District 3 member of the Mecklenburg Board of County Commissioners, was sworn in Monday as president of the National Association of Counties. The county says he is its first commissioner to hold the office. Dunlap arrives after 18 years on the county board, six as chair, and will lead an organization representing more than 3,000 U.S. counties.
Mecklenburg County's new budget raised 721 county workers to a living wage but left MEDIC's paramedics and EMTs out — their raise sits in restricted contingency, pending two studies and a second vote. Three commissioners who lost the fight to fund it now used the adoption to signal they aren't done.
Mecklenburg County's 2026-27 budget was a foregone conclusion — but adopting it still took the board most of an hour, through nine contract recusals, a failed park-appointment slate, three motions to reconsider, and a candidate name nobody could keep straight. Chair Mark Jerrell narrated the mess himself: "It was clunky."
A late substitute motion placed $2,293,759 in restricted contingency rather than fund a same-day move of MEDIC's EMT minimum wage to the new $25.53 county floor. Three commissioners stayed certain and lost. Two outside studies — by July and November — will inform the next decision.
County Manager Michael Bryant's recommended FY2027 budget holds Mecklenburg's property tax rate flat and fully funds Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools. At a three-and-a-half-hour public hearing, about sixty residents and nonprofit leaders told the Board of County Commissioners what that budget still leaves out — while a few urged them to pass it as written. No vote was taken; the board is set to adopt the budget June 2.
At Mecklenburg County's May 20 budget overview, Budget Director Adrian Cox put a number on what the county spends covering the state's share of CMS: more than $400 million — about sixteen cents of the property-tax rate. The recommended FY27 budget holds the rate flat by shifting a penny between funds, but the structural gap remains.
Mecklenburg commissioners got a deliberately neutral briefing on data centers at their May 19 meeting and signaled they want a position on the fast-growing industry. The catch: under North Carolina law, nearly all the zoning power belongs to the cities, not the county.
Chief Estella Patterson reported violent crime down 21 percent and overall crime down 9 percent across Charlotte-Mecklenburg in 2025, but warned that roughly 270 CMPD vacancies and an unfunded ETJ mandate covering 86 square miles threaten to undo the gains. The BOCC also heard its third update on converting the former Bates 4th Row Library at 2324 LaSalle Street into a community center.
Mecklenburg County voted unanimously to spend $4.5 million on the former Smith School at 1600 Tyvola Road — a site CMS vacated five years ago over a cancer cluster investigation — for future housing. A second vote authorized $7.5 million for 39 acres to replace Berryhill K-8. The biggest debate of the night was over parking.
Mecklenburg County Commission Chair Mark Jerrell directed staff to explore litigation options against the state of North Carolina after a briefing on four property tax bills advancing through the General Assembly. The board's sharpest target: a proposed constitutional amendment that would cap annual property tax increases, threatening the county's ability to fund $484 million in state-mandated costs.
A Mecklenburg County employee told the board that more than 45 people a day are still coming to the closed Catherine M. Wilson Center on Billingsley Road. He asked why the county cannot spend $40,000 on postcards when it is projecting a $60 million surplus.
George Dunlap, who has represented District 3 on the Mecklenburg BOCC for 17 consecutive years, was elected NACo First Vice President in July 2025 and is ascending to the presidency. The large urban county conference comes to Charlotte in December 2026.
Commission Chair Mark Jerrell delivered his 2026 State of the County address, covering $390 million in new economic development projects, $334.6 million in housing investments since 2018, a record MECK Pre-K enrollment year, and a pointed message to the General Assembly about unfunded mandates — all while recounting how the county fed 140,000 residents during the federal government shutdown.
Mecklenburg County's CFO recommended shifting one cent of the property tax rate — roughly $30 million per year — from the capital improvement plan to operating, triggering a full pause on the five-year rolling CIP. Most commissioners supported the review, though one called it "an expedient way" to avoid harder spending decisions.
A holiday meeting turns serious fast: homelessness strategy shifts, Atrium's housing claims, board appointments, and a divided vote on a SoFi incentive package.