Month: February 2007

  • Community Networking: Profiting from Poor Leadership Clearwire Gains a Toe-hold

    Profiting from Council’s continued inability to craft effective technology policy, Clearwire, a wireless Internet service provider utilizing proprietary spectrum, has gained a toe-hold in our community. These days, it’s hard to imagine getting through high school without the Internet. However, there are at least 100 students at East Chapel Hill High School whose families cannot […]

  • News Wars

    No, I’m not talking about a face-off between the N&O and the Herald Sun. If you get PBS HD 4.2, Frontline is airing the episode, “What’s Happening to the News”, of their series News War Bergman traces the recent history of American journalism, from the Nixon administration’s attacks on the media and the post-Watergate popularity […]

  • The Other Citizen

    Looks like one of our community’s cooler cats is out of the bag. The Daily Tar Heel reports today on pioneering on-line journalist, State political analyst, former editor of the Indy Kirk Ross’ ( Exile On Jones Street) latest venture: The Carrboro Citizen. Why create a new media outlet for Carrboro? “It’s got 17,000 people, […]

  • Proprietary Public Policy: Chapel Hill Streaming Video Goes Live?

    In reviewing this evening’s notes on increasing the Town’s election contribution limits ($200 to $250) and lowering the standards of disclosure ($25 instead of $20), I noticed that Internet video is now available. The Town’s proprietary Windows Media-based solution from Granicus was opposed by a number of members of the since dissolved Town Technology Advisory […]

  • Parking Downtown: Water, Water Everywhere, Nary a Drop to Drink

    I served on Chapel Hill’s Downtown Parking Taskforce, which wrapped up its business two weeks ago and which will be presenting its findings formally on Feb. 26th [AGENDA]. I meant to comment more frequently on our work but circumstances and some cautionary notes from staff intervened. It’s an interesting issue – how much of the […]

  • Rogers Road, Trashed Again? Carrboro Board of Alderman Weigh In

    [UPDATE II:] Excellent write-up covering the history of the landfill by Aarne Vesilind in today’s Chapel Hill News. [UPDATE:] It appears some of the videos have synch issues introduced by the youTube post processor. They’re watchable. I’ll be reloading them once I’ve identified the problem. I was planning to speak at the Feb. 20th, 2007 […]

  • Treasonous Slime: I know how Howard feels…

    Used by Joe Killian’s kind permission. Automatic Writing’s Joe Killian caught NC’s Rep. Coble (R) returning to Greensboro after his finally joining in with the critics of Bush’s Iraq “surge” nuttiness. Howard, I’ve been part of the treasonous cabal protesting our actions in both Iraq and Afghanistan since the beginning – welcome to the our […]

  • University Station: “Absurd” and “Absolutely Ridiculous”

    The University Station project – a development hugging the South-side of I-40 on Chapel Hill’s North perimeter – is up for review tonight (Feb. 19th). Local resident John Doyle called Townhall to comment that the proposal was “absurd”, “absolutely ridiculous” and emphasizes that he’ll “make sure” any Council members approving the plan will not serve […]

  • Chapel Hill News: Crushed by Council’s Jagganath

    I commented Dec. 4th that the Lot #5 development juggernaut was powered by an all-consuming illogic I fully expected to crush rational opposition. I wasn’t disappointed [VIDEO]. Echoing that sentiment, today’s Chapel Hill News speaks of a “proposal…so big and had so much town involvement — Mayor Kevin Foy and council member Bill Strom have […]

  • Beverly McIver’s Journey

    [UPDATE:] N&O coverage, tip from enthusiastic fan Paul Jones’ post. Used with the kind permission ofBeverly McIverRenee Artist Beverly McIver will be speaking tomorrow (Feb. 18th) from 2-3pm at Tyndall Galleries in Chapel Hill’s University Mall [MAP]. Beverly has documented her personal trajectory through autobiographical portraiture using an authentic and stylized approach – an approach […]

  • Jon Wilner’s Shocking Culture

    From the Chapel Hill News ‘blog OrangeChat, a guest post by Jon Wilner, executive director of the Carrboro ArtsCenter: Culture Shock would be a vehicle for marketing the arts in our community in an attempt to create a destination for what the evening’s facilitator, Bill Flexner, called the “diamond in the rough.” The “diamond” refers […]

  • I’m just a Bill

    Former Council member, occasional OP poster and Director of Bill Drafting for the North Carolina General Assembly since 1981, Gerry Cohen has a new ‘blog, NC Bill Drafting: 30 Years on Jones St., capturing the tug-n-pull of NC’s legislative tides. What a great niche subject covered by a key player. For instance, he notes in […]

  • 2nd Annual PROM Dress Drive

    Via Terri Buckner (LocalEcology) at SqueezeThePulp PROM Night is coming up and we have had requests for help in getting prom dresses for some students who can not afford to buy a dress. We are asking anyone who has a dress or dresses that are collecting dust in the closet to donate them to our […]

  • Trashing the Rogers Road Community, Again

    [UPDATE: Response to davepr from Orange County BOCC member Moses Carey. The Rogers Road (MAP) community has long suffered from promises unkept. [UPDATE:] Embedded video: At Feb. 12th’s Chapel Hill Town Council meeting Sharon Cook and Jeanie Stroud defend their Rogers Road community. As you might remember from my recent posts, the area is coming […]

  • Downtown Development: Feb. 12th Council Debate

    [UPDATE:] The video below streams from my site – here’s the Google Video that streams faster. Here’s the complete “debate” Council held on the Lot #5. Note how quickly the expedited SUP application was approved.