What is the most important thing, if elected, you’ll accomplish over the next 8 years?
Adam Stein talks about how he can only serve about 1/3rd of a term (about 2 years).
Category Archives: ChapelHill
Here comes the judge: The Forum – Question #2
What role should political parties play in judge elections?
Here comes the judge: The Forum – Question #1
Importance of community? Your role in the community?
Here comes the judge: The Forum – Openings
Oct. 16th’s UNC Young Democrat Superior Court 15B forum. Candidate openings.
In an effort to clean up the original post and make the page load faster, here’s a playlist version.
Madison: Some Smoozing, No Snoozing.
At least, not much snoozing as participants have reported on local ‘blog OrangePolitics.org.
I appreciate the time and effort Mark Chilton, Gene Pease, Fred Black and Dan Coleman put into real-time reviews.
I hope some of our other “known” blog commenters (Anita, Linda, Aaron, Andrea, Diane ?) get in to the act.
[UPDATE:] Anita and Frances Henderson joined in.
UNC’s Board of Trustee Roger Perry: You’re Insulted?
UNC trustee and local developer Roger Perry said his sense was that UW-Madison officials essentially tell the community that the university’s mission requires it to do a certain project, and then everyone goes to work on preventing negative impacts, without trying to stop the project in general.
He said he’d like to get to that point in Chapel Hill, and that it can be somewhat “insulting” when someone not connected to UNC says they really aren’t convinced the university needs to do what it says it needs to do.
Perry is insulted when someone outside of UNC questions the whys-and-wherefores of campus development?
What the hell? Near quoting from the authoritarianism playbook, Perry says he likes a community that doesn’t question the diktat of the university – a community that just “deals” with the university’s negative impacts.
Perry appears to long for the day when citizens “shut up” and STOP SAYING they aren’t really convinced about what the university needs to do. My guess? It isn’t the citizen taxpayer questioning the “needs” as much as the citizen taxpayer that questions the “hows” that really inflames his ire.
The obvious sub-text is Carolina North.
The fine residents of our community, the hard-working taxpaying citizens of our State, deserve more than the University’s current flimsy assertions of positive financial, economic and social impacts. From a straight business perspective, for the investment demanded of our community and State, the return is hardly clear.
While I believe the University needs to expand, I have been quite clear that the justifications UNC, to-date, have offered up for Carolina North are, at best, fundamentally weak, at worse, downright disingenuous.
Roger Perry and the rest of UNC’s Board of Trustees absolutely must address the glaring absence of any reasonable, documented, calculable return on investment before I, a single North Carolina citizen taxpayer, will be convinced of the soundness of their plans.
Of course, this is the board Carolina North’s designated quarterback Jack Evans claims can’t handle reading a 15 page list of development principles for Carolina North.
What a trip for the Carolina North boys. Perry’s “shut up” is a fine bookend to Moeser’s reaction to “freelance dissent”.
Chancellor Moeser’s “Freelance dissenters”
Freelance dissenters?
What an odd turn of phrase, Chancellor Moeser.
From today’s soon to evaporate HeraldSun, a story from the Madison smoozefest.
Alan Fish, University of Wisconsin-Madison’s (UWM) associate vice chancellor for facilities planning and management, describing UWM’s “Good Neighbor” policy:
In many instances, the university now goes to residents to talk before it even begins to design a project, Fish said. It sometimes negotiates detailed “memorandums of understanding” with the joint committees, so that the neighbors have spelled out critical concerns before the elected board votes on the project.
“These things are very difficult to do, and everybody has to engage in the process,” Fish noted.
Eleven years ago, UWM was the 1,000 pound badger arrogantly siting new development over existing neighborhoods. Sound familiar? That’s what UNC’s current administration has done, for instance, to the Mason Farm Rd. neighborhoods. Unlike the Moeser administrations historical track-record of creating faux community outreach groups, Madison’s community-university committees sound quite democratic.
Participant Gene Pease reports over on OrangePolitics that “the committees have town appointed neighborhood representatives, city council members, and university representitives. Once it passes this committee, it appears most projects get approved rather smoothly.”
The HeraldSun’s Rob Shapard reports Moeser liked what he heard:
The committees caught the ear of UNC Chancellor James Moeser, who said it sounded to him like a way to get key issues and possible solutions on the table early, so that “freelance dissenters” couldn’t derail a project late in the process. Therefore, he said, “The person with the loudest voice who complains isn’t able to override a constituted process that’s really representative.”
How could honest dissent be anything but freelance?
Historically UNC’s Board of Trustee’s (BOT) have derailed more university-community commitments on development than any other local entity.
I wonder if Moeser thinks “appointed” (UNC’s Board of Trustees) or “salaried” (UNC’s administrators) dissent is qualitatively better?
Madison Smoozefest: The Cost of Aaron Nelson’s Brickless Breakfast
The Chapel Hill News (CHN) just posted Lisa Hoppenjans’ initial article on the Madison trip (Lisa is one of three reporters bird-dogging the event).
Aaron Nelson once again weighs in on the importance of building personal relationships amongst the delegation:
“There’s certainly room to improve the quality and tenor of communication when we are in disagreement. When you have breakfast with somebody, it changes the nature of the relationship,” Nelson said. “It doesn’t change your disagreement. It just means you’re more likely to talk about it before you throw a brick.”
How much will that brickless breakfast cost?
With a few more details and “facts” than the HeraldSun article, the CHN provides the following nice breakdown of governmental expenditures:
Money spent so far by local governments to send public employees and elected officials to Madison, including airfare, ground transportation, hotel rooms and most meals.
Carrboro………………………….$6,920
Chapel Hill…………………….. $11,805
Hillsborough………………………$2,490
Orange County…………………..$5,588
The $26,803 doesn’t account for the nearly 20 UNC employees (at $1100-$1300 a pop). While the CHN mentions the $26,803 is the cost after the organizers “scholarship award” reductions, it doesn’t list who got the discounts. I’m interested. Maybe the organizers, in the spirit of transparency, will publish the complete breakdown of who paid out-of-pocket, who used institutional funds and who surfed on the public’s largesse.
Included is a funny recollection by former Chapel Hill Mayor (and my neighbor) Jonathon Howes’ of the power of a similar trip:
Former Chapel Hill Mayor Jonathan Howes went on several of the Public-Private Partnership trips. Howes, now at UNC as special assistant to the chancellor for local government relations, said things residents see now in Chapel Hill were specifically influenced by those trips.
The idea for the Downtown Commission, which has evolved into the Chapel Hill Downtown Partnership, came from what a similar group of participants learned about in Boulder, he said.
Well, that trip to Boulder was over 25 years ago and not all the folks on 1991’s Council were happy about it.
Council Member Andresen inquired about the Town’s annual membership dues to the Public-Private Partnership. Council Member Werner said approximately $1,200. Mayor Howes stated that the Public-Private Partnership was an organization composed of community leaders, serving as a forum for discussion of ideas of mutual interest. Council Member Werner expressed concern that it was not a Council-wide decision to join the Public-Private Partnership. Mayor Howes said that specific information on memberships was outlined in budget detail information. Council Member Andresen suggested that Council Members provide reports on the out-of-town public official trips in the future. Council Member Herzenberg noted that a full report had been made on the PPP’s trip to Boulder, Colorado. Council Member Andresen said that decisions concerning memberships such as the PPP should be made in a more open manner. Mayor Howes said that if the PPP took any future trips, the Council might wish to consider a resolution on funding and related matters.
The actual evolution was: Downtown Commission (strangled by Mayor Foy’s lead to defund), the unfortunately acronymed Downtown Economic Development Corporation (DEDC/”dead sea”) and, now, the Downtown Partnership (DPC).
Though quite effective sponsoring downtown events, handling recycling, sprucing up Franklin St. the Downtown Commission hit a bump when they endorsed a draconian panhandling ordinance (and produced the interesting 2002 Kaufman report on downtown’s homeless “feeding frenzy of bars, casual restaurants and tourist/university gifts”).
The DEDC, much more University oriented, hit a major bump, including the principled resignation of their chairman – attorney and former officeholder – Bob Epting, when they insisted on carrying out the public’s business behind closed doors.
The DPC, under Liz Parham, has done a much better job. Excepting some inherited issues with 501c3 status/conflict of interest, the DPC, more than a couple decades after the Boulder trip, is living up to its promise.
May the flowers of Madison bloom somewhat more quickly.
Madison Smoozefest: Aaron Nelson’s “Phone Call”
Fred, one of the Madison attendees, over on OrangePolitics said he didn’t like my suggestion, given the organizer’s professed desire to “build relationships” – establish “synergies” amongst the group, that, for a few folks, there was a bit more to the Madison trip than simple learning or altruistic desire.
Chamber of Commerce director and trip sponsor Aaron Nelson pegs it pretty well: “”You get to spend a lot more time with each other,” Nelson said. “And there’s something really important about the shared experience.”
“The second reason is to build relationships among our community leaders,” Nelson added. “The hope is that when you get back, and you have an issue you need help with, you can pick up the phone and call the guy you sat next to on the plane for four hours.”
Once again, as we see from today’s soon to evaporate HeraldSun, the “shared experience” (smoozing) was of driving importance to the organizers of this event.
Now, of course, other attendees have different primary goals: inclusionary zoning, how a university building a research park deals fairly and honestly with neighborhoods, downtown economic development – even panhandling.
Again, we have a great crew attending. I fully expect the time, effort and more than $100,000 spent on this trip to yield benefits for our community.
But let us not pretend that Aaron Nelson’s “phone call” isn’t part of the calculus of the Madison event.
Whether that “phone call” benefits the community, as I imagine one between Mike Collins of Neighborhoods for Responsible Growth (NRG) and UNC’s Chancellor Moeser might, or not, will be measured in time.
Sally, Kirk and Shearon-Harris
Following up on my post Shearon-Harris Offline: Who Tripped Over the Wire?, I’d like to direct your attention to two of our wonderful local ‘bloggers.
Sally Greene has two great posts on the Shearon-Harris nuke plant safety issues and the resulting spin.
First, FAIRWarning
Tonight I went to the briefing in Pittsboro on the Shearon Harris nuclear power plant, its serious and repeated fire safety violations, and the legal action that was taken today by NC WARN, the Nuclear Information and Resource Service, and the Union of Concerned Scientists to seek an emergency enforcement action from the NRC.
Second, today’s absolutely wonderful deconstruction of Progress Energy’s spin, in Shearon Harris: beneath the spin
In response to this week’s events, the community relations manager of Progress Energy was kind enough to write yesterday in an effort to persuade me that the Shearon Harris plant is safe and law-abiding. But I am sorry: this version doesn’t fit the facts. Here is Mr. Clayton’s memo, annotated by Pete MacDowell of NC WARN.
The sharply observant Kirk Ross (Exile, Cape Fear Mercury) follows the money in his post from Exile on Jones Street (why “on”?) titled Duke wants you to pay for a plant they may never build
Duke Energy and Southern are working on a new Nuke project in Cherokee County S.C. No permits have been issued, no construction work on the plant has started. They won’t even submit a request to the NRC for another year at the earliest. In fact, the plan is for the plant not to be online until 2016. Then, there’s the whole idea that a new nuke is really going to happen. Some folks like ‘em. Some folks don’t. Some folks really, really don’t.
Next Stop, NextBus.
According to the following Sept. 22nd Town news release, the NextBus system is nearly ready for its trial run.
Suggested online access is through Chapel Hill Transit’s www.chtransit.org site, the blue “Real Time Transit” link.
I suggest by-passing the lame Java-applet and go straight to the vastly simpler and more forward thinking Google Maps interface.
Click Map
I like the idea of a real-time passenger information system [dynamic updates and reports of bus positions within their routes] but I opposed using NextBus for several reasons.
NextBus uses proprietary technology instead of open standards alternatives that could have served both the needs of transit-tracking and blanketed large swaths of town with wireless Internet coverage. NextBus is also charging us more than other communities. NextBus uses cell-phone technology, uses increasingly wretched Cingular for coverage, has caps on cell data transfer [unlike Jane Doe Cingular Cingular customer, they don’t have unlimited plans] and will probably require additional financial outlays to remedy coverage problems. NextBus signage, because of the proprietary lock-in, can not be replaced with cheaper off-the-shelf versions.
The PR folks continue to emphasize that the majority of the $950K in tax monies spent came from a federal earmark [the hallmark of many a pork project] as if that means it’s free money – that it’s alright to make a poor deployment decision.
Most Chapel Hillian’s pay federal taxes and even if we didn’t that is no excuse for not really trying to do double duty with the same bucket of funds.
And, as before, Rep. Price is credited for his help though the campaign contributions received by Price from a NextBus executive and NextBus’ lobbyist remains unreported in the MSM.
Transit Ready for Real-Time
Chapel Hill Transit continues to move forward. This time, the local public transportation provider announces that the “real-time” passenger information system is up and running. Five bus stop locations in the community have electronic signage that allows passengers to observe the timing of the next scheduled bus arrival and departures.
“This is an exciting time for us,” commented Chapel Hill Transit Director Steve Spade. “We have been looking forward to implementing this technology. Along with providing convenience for our riders, the system is also a management tool. It will allow us to better manage the timing of our buses and significantly improve the delivery of our transit service.”
Chapel Hill Transit contracted with NextBus Inc. to procure and install an automatic vehicle location and passenger information system. The new signs are currently operating at the following park and ride lot locations: Eubanks Road, Southern Village, Jones Ferry and Highway 54. The stop on Franklin Street in front of the Caribou Coffee Shop also has an electronic arrival time sign. Plans are under way to equip nine additional stop locations with display signs, Spade said.
The “real-time” technology uses global positioning satellites to track buses on their routes. The system estimates the bus arrival and departure times. The information is available through the internet by going to www.chtransit.org, then clicking on the blue “Real Time Transit” link.
The majority of the funding for the system was obtained through a federal earmark requested by Congressman David Price. The total project cost is about $950,000.
I’ll be giving NextBus a month to hammer out the bugs in their system before reporting on its efficacy.
I’ll also keep an eye on service levels, additional costs and any other supposedly unanticipated problems that crop up over the next year.
Hillsborough425: Yes, it is interactive!
One of my readers was slightly confused about whether the fly-by of Hillsborough425 documented in my post Hillsborough425: Google Earth Fly-By, Alpha Quality was live or not.
Yes it is!
If you have the proper version of GoogleEarth installed ( GoogleEarth v4.0291.beta ), then opening this link will crank up the application and display the maps.
Alternatively, you can download the KMZ file and open it in GoogleEarth.
In either case, once the fly-over/fly-by is open, you can play around with the map views by toggling Hillsborough425: Existing Town House, Hillsborough425ConceptPlanSept17th and Hillsborough425 GoogleEarth under GoogleEarth’s Hillsborough425 folder.
You can also start with a long view oriented from the North of the site by clicking on North Entrance Chapel Hill.
Any questions? Please post a comment, I’ll be happy to help.
DTH on WIFI: They have a point…
From Sept. 18th’s Daily Tar Heel by kind permission of Mason Phillips.
Nice to see a shout-out to my series on the poor decision to go with the proprietary lock-in NextBus system over an open-standards system. An alternative standards-based system could’ve delivered Internet access along all 23 transit routes – an alternative providing excellent penetration of free communication services into the most under-served of our neighborhoods.
Madison Smoozefest or Chapel Hill’s Sleazefest?
Smoozefest or snoozefest, either way this weekend’s (Sept. 24th-26th [correction]) trip to Madison by our local “usual suspects” appears to be more about building relationships at home than abroad.
Most of all, this trip is about building relationships. Not only will participants gain knowledge of what has worked and what has not worked in Madison, but a synergy will be created by our trip attendees working, traveling and discussing issues together.
This trip is not a place for any decisions to be made about our future, but rather a place to make connections and gather valuable information. Learning from the perspectives and ideas of other leaders in the community will help to ensure that our community grows and sustains itself.
Maybe joyous, interesting and possibly rewarding (or not), I hope folks aren’t going expecting to later trade upon the stronger bonds Smoozefest is supposed to engender.
Even as national scenes of “Ney Money Go” spawned by Abramoff’s scandalous behavior continue, the lure of the private/public “business” junket cannot be diminished.
And “business”, local business, forms the continuous sub-text of this jaunt.
The purpose of the Intercity Visit and Leadership Conference is to convene leaders of the Chapel Hill and Carrboro community to learn from the experiences of another successful community and to build relationships among participants that will help us successfully address our community’s challenges and opportunities.
Continue reading Madison Smoozefest or Chapel Hill’s Sleazefest?
Hillsborough425: Google Earth Fly-By, Alpha Quality
Alpha quality?
This is my first release of a “fly-by” created with Google’s mapping tool Google Earth [v4.0291.beta], drawing tool SketchUp and published concept plans to model new development in our community. In this case, modeling RAM Development’s 322 luxury condos visual impact.
The large McMansion-like teardown, unfortunately, is displacing Hillsborough Street’s affordable 111 unit Town House apartments. Town House has been a low cost haven for students for years.
Hillsborough425 aka “The Residences at the Grove” (again, what grove?) will be the largest development of its kind to bless (?) Chapel Hill. Given that and RAM Developments close relationship with Council in the ongoing $100M deconstruction of downtown, the Mayor’s brush-off of greater transparency is troubling.
How did I do it?
Tools:
Input:
- Hillsborough425: Current Town House Apt. layout [GIF]
- Hillsborough425: Sept. 2006 Site Plan [JPG]
- Hillsborough425: Concept Plan Application [PDF]
- Other supporting documents.
![Hillsborough425: Sept. 2006 Site Plan [JPG]](http://townhall.townofchapelhill.org/agendas/2006/09/18/5/5-8-5_site_plan.gif){kind=link}
![Hillsborough425: Concept Plan Application [PDF]](http://townhall.townofchapelhill.org/agendas/2006/09/18/5/5-8-5_site_plan.gif/5-6_concept_plan_application.pdf){kind=link}
Output:
Using Google Earth:
- 1) “Flew” to the general location of Hillsborough425.
- 2) Added Hillsborough425: Current Town House Apt. layout [JPG] as an overlay, changed its opacity to %50, then stretched and rotated it until the roads and features matched up.
- 3) Set the overlay to be drawing priority #1.
- 4) Added Hillsborough425: Sept. 2006 Concept Plan [GIF] also as an overlay and adjusted it in a similar manner using both the underlying GoogleEarth features and the current layout overlay.
- 5) Toggled off the Town House Apt. overlay leaving just the concept plan.
- 6) Saved the result safely to disk.
![Hillsborough425: Current Town House Apt. layout [JPG]](http://citizenwill.org/hillsborough425/maps/Hillsborough425Existing.jpg){kind=link}
![Hillsborough425: Sept. 2006 Concept Plan [GIF]](http://citizenwill.org/hillsborough425/maps/HillsboroughConcept_5-8-5_site_plan.gif){kind=link}
Using Google Sketchup:
- 1) Imported the current view from GoogleEarth (the Hillsborough425 concept plan overlaid on the current topography)
- 2) Toggled Google->Terrain OFF
- 3) Outlined the buildings using the flattened concept plan imported from Google Earth and tracing with the LINE tool.
- 4) Using the Hillsborough425: Concept plan descriptions and other documents as references for each buildings height, used the PUSH/PULL tool to extrude a volume roughly the same height.
- 5) Toggled Google->Terrain ON
- 6) Using the SELECTION tool to select an element in one building, right clicked and selected all connected components. Once selected, used the MOVE tool to place the building roughly at grade.
- 7) Exported the finished product to GoogleEarth.
Once exported to GoogleEarth, I finished by exporting my alpha-quality project as a KML suitable for GoogleEarth v4.0291.beta.
If I get some time this weekend (ha!), I’ll add in the existing two and four story apartments for scale.
Here’s the Sketchup files ( [1] and [2]) of the Hillsborough425 buildings, please feel free to build upon my initial effort.
My only request is you publish the results for the wider community.