Robinson says state officials playing ‘dangerous games’ amid review of wife’s nonprofit

RALEIGH, N.C. (WNCN) – Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson (R) on Wednesday said the state Department of Health and Human Services is “being weaponized” and said the agency is playing a “dangerous game” in response to questions about the review of his wife’s nonprofit organization Balanced Nutrition.

Robinson made the comments in a radio interview with KC O’Dea. Last week, NCDHHS said Balanced Nutrition owes the state more than $130,000 following a compliance review.

“I’m gonna tell you something the people who are doing it number one should be ashamed of themselves, number two should realize the dangerous game that they’re playing. They are destroying the institutions that we are supposed to trust, and that we depend on to protect us. Those agencies are being weaponized,” Robinson said in the interview.

In a letter dated on July 24, NCDHHS wrote that Yolanda Hill’s nonprofit Balanced Nutrition is “seriously deficient” in operating the Federal Child and Adult Care Food Program. The issues cited related to things like record keeping, income eligibility, enrollment documentation, training, fiscal integrity and verification of valid claims.

Hill has until Aug. 7 to file an appeal, which Robinson’s campaign spokesman said this week she plans to do, adding that Balanced Nutrition “vehemently disagrees” with the state’s findings.

“She’s been through review after review with the state, never had any issues. She never had any issues until someone in that agency found out who I was and who she was married to and that’s when these issues started this entire thing,” Robinson said in Wednesday’s interview.

NCDHHS has pushed back on Robinson’s claims that the review was “politically motivated.”

In an email Tuesday, agency spokesperson Summer Tonizzo said, “The Compliance Review conducted by the State agency for Balanced Nutrition, Inc. was not a random review. Per federal regulations, reviews are conducted every two to three years at a minimum, depending on the size of an institution and previous findings. When there are findings from the review that do not rise to the level of Serious Deficiency, the institution must complete a corrective action plan to address the findings in order to avoid the issuance of a Notice of Serious Deficiency. The frequency of reviews increases for programs who have had findings in prior compliance reviews to ensure the sponsoring organization has corrected the findings and is complying with state and federal rules.”

Robinson claimed the review is tied to his race for governor. He faces Atty. Gen. Josh Stein (D) in November.

“There’s one thing to want to win an election, or see your guy or girl win an election. It’s another thing to take the office that you’ve been given by the trust of the people and use it to try to destroy someone for political purposes,” Robinson said.

He acknowledged in previous reviews there have been “small findings” but said a plan of correction was put together.

The lieutenant governor also said the latest claims NCDHHS made are “erroneous” but he declined to give any further details.

“They are alleging things that just simply are not true. It has been a drain on my wife. It has been a drain on my family. My wife was willing to simply just walk away from it and say, you know, if they’re going to continue to harass us politically because of this, I’ll just give this up,” Robinson said. “We’re not going to speak about in detail here. But we will speak about it in detail when we stage our fight against the state. Because right now, again, and I reiterate this fact, we have proof that this is politically motivated. And so we’re gonna stand up and we’re gonna fight it.”

Robinson also responded to an ad Stein’s campaign released Tuesday which accuses Robinson and his wife of “endangering children,” citing state inspection documents of a child care center they ran nearly 20 years ago.

“Those are fighting words and you best believe just like the president does, we’re going to stand up and we’re going to push back and we’re going to fight. We’re going to do it in a legal way. We’re going to get all of our ducks in a row. And when it’s time to go, and when our advisors and our attorneys tell us it’s time to go, we’re going to march forward and do the right thing because, you know, we want to fix this problem. Not only do we want to defend ourselves. We want to stop this unlawful, this immoral use of taxpayer dollars to try to strike at people over political means.”

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