April 2013

Town Hall Meeting to Discuss the Future of the Whitted Building

Orange County will be hosting an informal town hall style meeting regarding potential uses of the 2nd floor Whitted "A" building located at 300 West Tryon Street, Hillsborough, on April 4, 2013 starting at 7:00 p.m.

The meeting is open to the public and anyone who wishes to speak may do so. Please come out and support the OCCC's proposal to share the Whitted Building space with the Orange County Board of County Commissioners! We will be making a presentation about our hopes to establish a cultural center for Hillsborough and northern Orange County in this historical building.

The intended outcome is to illustrate potential uses of this facility, provide a forum for public comment and discussion, and to provide the Orange County Board of County Commissioners information as they continue to evaluate uses of the facility.

The Rise and Fall of the North Carolina Speaker Ban Law

Student opposition to North Carolina’s 1963 Speaker Ban Law will be the subject of the annual Gladys Hall Coates University History Lecture Thursday, April 11, at the Wilson Special Collections Library.

Former UNC student body president Robert Spearman (’65) will discuss the controversial law that barred certain individuals from speaking on campus. Known members of the Communist Party, those who advocated the overthrow of the federal or state government, and those who pleaded the Fifth Amendment when questioned about communist or subversive activities were all prohibited from speaking at state-supported campuses.

The 5:30 p.m. lecture, sponsored by the North Carolina Collection and University Archives and Records Management Services, is free and open to the public.

The passage of the Speaker Ban Law fifty years ago drew almost immediate reaction from students and faculty, who protested that the law infringed on their rights to free speech. Students invited banned speakers to address their classmates from the sidewalk on Franklin Street and eventually initiated a lawsuit in federal court.

Spearman, now an attorney for a Raleigh law firm, testified before a state commission tasked with revising the law, which was eventually overturned in 1968.

Prior to the lecture, attendees can view the North Carolina Collection Gallery exhibition A Right to Speak and to Hear: Academic Freedom and Free Expression at UNC beginning at 5 p.m.

The exhibition uses original letters, documents, and photographs to examine the University’s long history of free speech controversies from the nineteenth century to the present.

The exhibition runs through June 2, 2013.

Date: 

Thursday, April 11, 2013 - 5:00pm

Location: 

Pleasants Family Assembly Room, Louis Round Wilson Library, UNC-Chapel Hill

Remembering Student Opposition to the Speaker Ban, 50 Years Later

The Rise and Fall of the North Carolina Speaker Ban Law
Gladys Hall Coates University History Lecture
Thursday, April 11, 2013
Wilson Special Collections Library
5 p.m. Exhibition Viewing | North Carolina Collection Gallery
5:30 p.m. Program | Pleasants Family Assembly Room
Free and open to the public
Information: Liza Terll, Friends of the Library, (919) 548-1203

Student opposition to North Carolina’s 1963 Speaker Ban Law will be the subject of the annual Gladys Hall Coates University History Lecture Thursday, April 11, at the Wilson Special Collections Library.

Intentionally disenfranchising students (and others)

It’s about to get a lot harder to vote in Orange County, at least for some of us.

The Republican majority in the General Assembly clearly feels that the racist, anti-woman, anti-urban, and very anti-liberal redistricting which took place last year didn’t do enough to solidify their entrenched majority. Now they’re hard at work systematically disenfranchising people who are unlikely to vote for them. Stringent voter identification requirements, shortened early voting, and other impediments to voting have been proposed in the General Assembly and are all likely to pass.

But of particular note to us in Orange County is the aptly-numbered Senate Bill 666. The most significant change in SB 666 isn’t in chapter 163 which governs elections; rather, it’s a change to the tax code:

Triangle Area Rural Planning Workshop and Survey

Orange County Public Transportation is inviting residents to attend a half-day workshop for the Triangle Area Rural Planning Organization (TARPO) Locally Coordinated Human Service Public Transportation Plan. The workshop will take place from 9:00 a.m. - 12:00 p.m. on Friday, April 26, at the County's Southern Human Services Center in Chapel Hill.

The workshop will focus on the needs of rural Chatham and Orange Counties as a part of the larger TARPO region, and will be facilitated by RPO staff with assistance from the North Carolina Department of Transportation (NCDOT) and the local transit service agencies. This plan will not focus on the urban transit services provided by Chapel Hill Transit or Triangle Transit, but will instead be focused on the more rural services provided by Chatham Transit Network and Orange Public Transportation.

The recommendations that come out of this workshop will be incorporated into the Locally Coordinated Human Service Public Transportation Plan for the region and will identify the specific areas of need for individuals with disabilities, older adults, and persons with low incomes; to propose strategies for meeting these needs; and to prioritize public transportation services to meet these needs.

The public is invited to complete a survey that will be used to provide information for the Locally Coordinated Plan. The survey is available online at http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/9N3SNYF or at http://www.tarpo.org/topics/lcp.shtml For more information, please call Matt Day, TARPO senior planner, at 919.558.9397 or send an e-mail to mday@tjcog.org

Date: 

Friday, April 26, 2013 - 9:00am to 12:00pm

Location: 

Southern Human Services Center, 2501 Homestead Road, Chapel Hill

Lavelle to make announcement tomorrow, other mayoral rumblings?

Carrboro Alderperson Lydia Lavelle is scheduled to make an announcement to the public and the press tomorrow in front of Town Hall. She has long been discussed as the successor to Mayor Mark Chilton who previously announced that he would not be running for re-election after this term.

Welcome to Chapel Hill, Dr. Carol Folt

As an alumn, I am pretty excited to have a woman chancellor at UNC. I also like that she's an environmental scientist. I'm always wary of folks without strong roots in the community, but Dr. Folt has a lot of potential.

What do y'all think?

Public Input Session on Carrboro Police Chief Search

Chief Carolyn Hutchison is retiring, and Carrboro is looking for input into their selection process for a replacement.

Official Notice - TOC-OFFICIAL-L

Town of Carrboro, NC - Official Announcements

Calling all Carrboro Residents- The Town of Carrboro and Developmental Associates are beginning the process to select Carrboro's new Chief of Police. As we kick things off, the community is invited to attend a Public Input Session on April 22, 2013 @ 6:00pm at Carrboro Town Hall. We want to hear your opinions on the challenges our new Chief might face, and what qualities and competencies you think are important to look for in the selection process.

 

Date: 

Monday, April 22, 2013 - 6:00pm

Location: 

Carrboto Town Hall

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