Wake County
Monday, November 14, 2011
State considers five new Triangle charter schools
- Matty Symons/ Dreamstime.com
State education officials are reviewing 27 applications for new charter schools across the state, including two in Durham County, two in Wake County and one in the Chapel Hill-Carrboro school district.
A new state law passed this year raised the limit on charter schools in North Carolina, which previously had been capped at 100. The applications were due last Thursday, and will be reviewed by the N.C. Public Charter School Advisory Council (CSAC) before being submitted to the State Board of Education.
The applicants are aiming to have their schools up and running in August 2012. This first group of applicants is a special, "fast-tracked," pool because they have a previous relationship or record with the state, according to the N.C. Department of Public Instruction website. For instance, several of the applicants had been interviewed by the state before, but were not granted a charter because of the previous statewide cap.
The state will hold a separate, regular application process later this fall for other charter schools. Those applications will be due in April 2012. (More information on the application process)
The applicants in Triangle school districts are:
Chapel Hill-Carrboro
The Howard & Lillian Lee Scholars Charter School, Angela Lee
Durham County
Research Triangle High School, Pamela Blizzard
Quality Education Academy of Durham, Alethea Bell
Wake County
Widsom Academy, Craig James
Triangle Math and Science Academy, Kenan Gundogdu
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
Senate bill to allow digital billboards remains in committee after Wednesday talks
- file photo by D.L. Anderson
- This billboard advertising the Dixie Gun & Knife from summer 2010 on the Durham Freeway sparked controversy over its placement.
Several state senators expressed concern Wednesday over a bill that would allow digital billboards across the state’s interstates and highways, regardless of local rules that might prohibit them. The bill’s sponsor, Senate Majority Leader Harry Brown of Jacksonville, said he just wanted feedback Wednesday, and no vote was taken. He is expected to revise the bill and bring it back to the Senate Transportation Committee.
Several senators said their major issue was the idea of taking away a community’s control of its own appearance from highways and interstates.
“I don’t think we ought to take the control away from our local governments,” said Sen. Richard Stevens, R-Wake, who noted his district is home to a large billboard company. “We do too much micromanaging up here as it is.”
The bill (SB183) would override local rules on signage, even those banning digital billboards, and would allow broader cutting of trees and other vegetation in front of the signs to increase visibility. The signs and tree-cutting would disregard local ordinances governing those very issues.
If passed, the bill wouldn’t allow any new billboards to be put up, but would allow old billboards on interstates and major highways to be replaced with signs that have changing images, whether through digital screens or rotating parts. As it’s currently written, the law would be effective Oct. 1.
Just last year, Durham City Council unanimously shot down a request from Fairway Outdoor Advertising to change its sign ordinances to allow for digital billboards, in part due to overwhelming opposition from residents who launched a campaign against the local issue. Several other municipalities, including each of the state’s largest cities, have spoken out against the bill, said Paul Meyer, chief legislative counsel for the N.C. League of Municipalities. Several other groups, including the North Carolina chapters of the Sierra Club and the American Planning Association, the N.C. Association of County Commissioners, the N.C. Metropolitan Mayors Coalition and Preservation North Carolina have also announced their opposition to the bill.
“We need to have the ability with each local government to decide what they want and what they will permit in their communities,” said Sen. Floyd McKissick, D-Durham. “There are different local norms. I think enhancing the beauty of our communities and the uniqueness of our communities is something we should respect.”
Tuesday, February 8, 2011
Chatham residents, Wake mayors, business leaders debate pipeline
(This story was updated Feb. 9 at 5:30 p.m.)
MONCURE—More than two dozen people spoke before the Chatham Board of County Commissioners Monday night at a public hearing a plan to run an 8.1-mile underground pipeline from Western Wake County through Southeastern Chatham County.
Western Wake Partners—the towns of Apex, Cary, Morrisville and Research Triangle Park-South—are constructing a $327 million wastewater treatment plant in unincorporated New Hill, but they need to build the pipeline to funnel treated wastewater to the Cape Fear River. About a dozen landowners would need to give up 40-foot-wide easements to bury the pipes, which are 5 feet in diameter.
- The proposed pipeline route runs from New Hill to the Cape Fear River along roads and through the yards of a dozen Chatham property owners.
- Courtesy of Western Wake Partners
Chatham County Commission Chairman Brian Bock says the board will vote on the pipeline at its next meeting, Feb. 21.
Chatham Commissioner Sally Kost says she plan to vote against the pipeline unless the only way "we were able to develop a list of concession from the partners that benefited Chatham, but as it's currently proposed I just don’t see what's in it for Chatham County." She is concerned that business expansion that occurs as a result of the wastewater treatment plant could be limited to Wake County, while Chatham County could experience largely residential growth that would worsen the area's problems with sprawl.
Many Chatham County residents were vigorously opposed over concerns about pipeline leaks, uncontrolled growth, the possibility of future annexation by Cary and decreasing property values.
However, representatives of RTP businesses supported the pipeline because they say the additional infrastructure is necessary to sustain and grow the local economy.
Sunday, January 30, 2011
New Hill Community Association settles with Western Wake Partners
The New Hill Community Association announced this morning it has dropped its lawsuit against Western Wake Partners in exchange for amenities including a $500,000 New Hill community center.
For the past five years the association has fought the Western Wake Partners' plan to build a $327 million wastewater treatment plant in New Hill’s historical and predominantly African-American neighborhood.
The settlement agreement (newhill_settlement.pdf) comes after the two court-ordered mediation sessions with the association, the N.C. Department of Environmental and Natural Resources and the partners—the towns of Cary, Apex, Morrisville and RTP South.
The agreement states, “the parties recognize that [the] Project will impact the New Hill Community, and Partners have minimized and mitigated potential negative impacts.”
Terms of the agreement include the partners constructing two 4-foot-by-8-foot glass-and-steel bus shelters for the community's school children, and placing $500,000 in an escrow fund for the construction of a community center.
If the community center is built close to the wastewater treatment plant, the partners will provide water and sewer lines and other infrastructure. The agreement also stipulates that the partners will run water and sewer to 36 homes near the plant.
But the agreement has a hitch: The association must not make any negative comments about the project or openly oppose it. If the association violates this or other terms of the agreement, the escrow fund for the community center will be revoked and disbursed to the Town of Cary, the lead agency for the partners.
“This has been a vigorous, robust debate in which the parties made a concerted effort to mitigate impacts to New Hill,” New Hill Community Association President Paul Barth said in a press release. “We, the officers of the NHCA, encourage all of our association’s members and community’s advocates to accept the Western Wake Regional Wastewater Management Facilities. We end all protests to the project. In addition, we will not oppose the Chatham County pipeline and will not encourage other groups to use NHCA’s name in opposing it.”
The partners want to build an 8.1-mile pipeline from the plant to the Haw Cape Fear River through parts of Chatham County. A public hearing is scheduled for Feb. 7. at at 6 p.m., at Moncure School, 600 Moncure School Road in Chatham County.
Apex Mayor Kevin Weatherly released the following statement, “The New Hill Community Association has been a strong advocate for the interests of their community. We are pleased that our negotiations have reached a successful conclusion and that the New Hill Community Center will serve New Hill residents well for many years. Because of this agreement, we can now be assured that one of the most important projects of its kind in the state is able to proceed in an efficient and economical manner.”
Weatherly said the treatment plant project is crucial to economic growth in Western Wake County. “Continued economic vitality is necessary to provide jobs for families in our region,” he said.
Last September, the association and the Southern Coalition for Social Justice, a nonprofit advocacy group, filed a petition for contested jearing, in an attempt to stop the partners from receiving preliminary permits from DENR to begin construction of the plant.
The petition contended that the site “has larger human and environmental justice impacts than other, more suitable alternatives, including land previously condemned by Progress Energy in the same general vicinity. Noise, odor, traffic, and light spill from the sewage treatment plant will impact the New Hill Historic District, including the predominantly African-American First Baptist Church and cemetery.”
The plant, which was scheduled to begin construction this year, will not be built in Apex or Cary or any of the partners' towns. Instead it will loom across the street from the New Hill Baptist Church and playground, and a half-mile from the First Baptist Church of New Hill. The plant will sit within 1,000 feet of 23 homes. But who lives in those homes is as important: 87 percent of those approximately 230 residents immediately affected by the sewage treatment plant are African-American, on fixed incomes, elderly or retired.
Chris Brook, attorney with the Southern Coalition for Social Justice, says the settlement could ultimately benefit New Hill.
“Over the last five years, the New Hill community has come together as never before,” said Barth. “The bus shelters, community center, and extension of services to those closest to the plant will help to mitigate the impacts to our community and will go a long way in moving our community forward.”
Wednesday, January 19, 2011
Hundreds dress in red to oppose Crabtree Quarry expansion
RALEIGH—Passionate neighbors dressed in red and overflowed from the Raleigh City Council chambers Tuesday night to urge the council and planning commission to deny a rezoning request that would allow Hanson Aggregates to expand its Crabtree Quarry operation.
- Photo by Jeremy Lange
- The current Crabtree Quarry operation has been operating in Raleigh for 60 years.
But the message was clear to Mayor Charles Meeker, who, in an unusual move, asked supporters and opponents to raise their hands and be counted. Meeker, council and planning members even walked into the hallway, where 150 people were watching the proceedings on a television feed.
The official tally: 20 people in support of the rezoning and 400 against it, Meeker noted.
“This is certainly the biggest crowd I’ve seen in my 10 years here,” the mayor said.
Monday, January 10, 2011
The U.S. Department of Justice settled a lawsuit with the Town of Garner today that alleges that the town violated the Fair Housing act by refusing to allow eight recovering drug and alcohol addicts to live together and receive treatment.
Federal investigators filed the discrimination suit in May 2009 after Oxford House, a nonprofit Maryland-based group that runs more than 1,200 rehabilitation centers nationwide, claimed the town and its Board of Adjustment violated the Fair Housing Act by refusing to listen to their requests to increase the number of residents from six to eight. People with disabilities including drug addiction must be granted equal opportunity to housing.
Under the settlement, the town must also submit periodic reports and train their staff on the requirements of the Fair Housing Act.
“The Fair Housing Act requires equal access to housing for persons with disabilities,” Thomas E. Perez, assistant attorney general for the Civil Rights Division, stated in a press release.
“The Justice Department will continue to ensure the right of people with disabilities to live in housing appropriate for their needs.”
Tuesday, November 16, 2010
Chatham Commissioners opt out of permit extension, Western Wake Partners easement request
Outgoing Chatham County commissioners voted 5-0 to opt out of the state's one-year extension for all development permits. By doing so, the commission is requiring commercial and residential developers to reapply and submit to newer environmental regulations. In response to the housing market crash, the legislature passed the 2009 Permit Extension Act, which gave developers an extra year to comply with those laws.
Planning Board chairman Jim Elza clarified the meaning of the one-year extension act, noting that the 2010 extension would have allowed some developments to avoid the more stringent regulations for six years.
“I'm uncomfortable granting another year,” said Commissioner Sally Kost, “and some of these probably do need to expire.”
Janet Butcher, a developer representing builders in Wake and Chatham counties, asked the commissioners to allow the extension. “We're putting infrastructure and dollars into land and their won't be builders to build the developments if we don't extend these permits,” she said.
Elaine Chiosso, executive director of the Haw River Assembly, supported the commissioners' vote. “During the housing boom and growth era of 2004-07 there were tremendous violations of sedimentation and erosion control,” she said, “and we now have some of the best ordinances in the state.”
Commissioner George Lucier pointed out that permit extensions could be granted on an individual basis, and that the board has done so in the past.
Equally important was the last item on the agenda regarding the Western Wake Partners request to acquire easements for a eight-mile pipeline from their controversial wastewater treatment plant in New Hill to the Cape Fear River. Many Moncure residents who will lose property to the easement oppose the plan.
The Town of Cary, which, with Morrisville and Apex, is part of Western Wake Partners, could annex significant acreage east of Jordan Lake in Chatham County if commissioners don't grant the easement.
Lucier spoke out strongly on the issue saying, “We believe that the treated wastewater discharge line poses significant risks with little or no discernible benefits for our county and its residents. For these reasons, we recommend that Chatham County deny the WWP’s request to locate a discharge line through a section of the county until the Town of Cary agrees not to annex into the county without the county’s approval and this agreement is embodied in a local bill approved by the General Assembly.”
Lucier mentioned only Cary, but not Wake County, the bigger annexation threat. Kost added that the mayors of the towns making up the partnership have not responded to her numerous requests to schedule a meeting to discuss the matter.
Incoming commissioners Brian Bock, Pamela Stewart and Walter Petty ran platforms on protecting private property rights, and constituents in Moncure worry about the partners' previous handing of eminent domain and its implications for their property values and rights.
Outgoing commissioners made recommendations for the new Republican majority that will take office next month, but left the final decision to them.
This was the final meeting for incumbent Chatham County Commissioners Lucier, Tom Vanderbeck, and Carl Thompson, whose term ends Dec. 6, when Bock, Stewart and Petty will be sworn in.
Thursday, October 28, 2010
Election 2010: Who are the poll observers? Ask for them by name.
In Wake, both Democrats and Republicans have poll observers, although the complaints have been about the GOP.
So who are the poll observers? The Indy requested the lists of all approved poll observers from Wake, Durham, Orange and Chatham counties.
Wake: Wake_GOP_Poll_Observers_earlyvoting_GOP_Poll_Observer.pdf
Wake_GOP_observers-runners_electionday.pdf
Durham: Durham_observers.pdf
Orange: orangecountypollobserver.pdf
Chatham: Chathampollobservers.pdf
In Durham, only Republicans are on the list of poll observers. They include Frank Hurley, who ran for Congress in the 13th District, which covers part of Wake County, and lost in the primary to Bill Randall. He spoke at a Tax Day Tea Party event.
Laura Cox is the president of Triangle Republican Women. Carol King is the vice-chair of the North Durham Republicans. Marilyn Flanary is a member of Women for Burr Coalition.
Thursday, October 21, 2010
- Jeremy M. Lange
- The Rev. James Clanton
All struggles have their costs, and leaders and activists often go unacknowledged for the work they do. That is why one local activist, who has received recognition for his leadership and dedication to his community, hopes that others will be inspired to remain steadfast to their causes.
The Rev. James Clanton, pastor of the First Baptist Church of New Hill, was selected by the North Carolina Environmental Justice Network (NCEJN) as the recipient of the network's 2010 Florenza Moore Grant Community Environmental Justice Award.
Clanton received the prestigious award at the NCEJN's 12th annual summit in Whitakers this past weekend.
Clanton has led the community and his congregation at New Hill in its ongoing fight against the siting of a $327 million wastewater treatment plant in the center of the historical, unincorporated community. The five-year struggle has pitted the primarily African-American community against the predominantly white towns of Cary, Apex and Morrisville. The towns have formed the Western Wake Partnership, which is responsible for the wastewater treatment plant.
“Recently our surrounding municipalities have begun identifying us as this group that is holding back economic development or holding up progress,” said Clanton, “and it means a lot to receive this award and realize others are supporting and recognizing our hard work — and that we are not alone.”
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
The town of Holly Springs has withdrawn from the Western Wake Partners, a multi-town alliance that is building a controversial sewage treatment plant in New Hill.
The town officially announced its decision Sept. 23, leaving Cary, Apex and Morrisville as the remaining partners.
But Holly Springs was never a major player in the partnership, and had planned to use only the pipes outside the treatment facility.
“This is pretty much a business decision,” said Holly Springs Mayor Dick Sears, who indicated to the Indy in August that he hoped to withdraw from the contract. “Five years ago, the plant seemed to be the only viable alternative for our town, but we are seeking other options, and those will certainly save more than the $30 to $40 million needed for the New Hill plant hook-up.”
For example, Holly Springs is researching the possibility of releasing more of their effluent—treated wastewater—into Harris Lake.
Sears said the town's decision has nothing to do with the New Hill Community Association's recent filing for a contested case hearing to stop the partners from building the $327 million plant. However, it does appear that now is the best time to get out of the partnership before litigation begins.
Holly Springs will be responsible for a portion of their financial responsibility as detailed in the contract, Sears does not have a figure of what the town will owe the partners at this time.
Farm and Garden now has Full Steam Growlers...yeee haww
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Michael Pollan,
Amen, Amen, Amen!! Your comment was excellently put. Thanks so much for writing in! …
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