Ruby Sinreich's blog

No discussion of UNC's role in our community is complete without addressing the topic of fiscal equity. There are many way in which the University affects us financially, both positive and negative, and the town's provision of fire services to the campus is just one of the most obvious examples.

So it's pretty disappointing to hear that the NC House budget fails to fund the municipalities that provide fire fighting to state institutions!

While funding for fire protection for state-owned properties - a request that was included in Chapel Hill's legislative agenda - made it into the governor's budget and N.C. Senate's proposed budget for 2005-06, it was left out of the House budget...

"In Chapel Hill, our fire chief said that we need 18 new firefighters in order to be able to provide the level of service that is necessary," [Mayor Kevin Foy] said.

Foy noted that though the University is putting millions of dollars into construction projects, no extra funds are being allotted to support fire protection.
- Daily Tarheel, 7/7/05

The closest you can get to Chapel Hill and Carrboro while still being in Chatham County is Starpoint. The intersection of Smith Level Road and 15-501 is at the county line. Starpoint is also the proposed location of a new Wal-Mart.

Elected officials in Chapel Hill and Carrboro have already asked Chatham County to allow them to conduct a courtesy review. This would allow them to formally have input, although it is not binding. According to the News & Observer "This is the first I've heard about that," Morgan said when asked about Chapel Hill's plans to request a review. "I didn't know they did that type of stuff."

Which is exactly why we should be very worried.

I am happy to inform you (before the papers do) that Mark Chilton is officially a candidate for Mayor of Carrboro!

Here is his statement posted here on OP earlier today:

With Mike Nelson stepping down, I am officially running for Mayor of Carrboro this fall. I held a short press conference this morning at Carrboro Town Hall about this and I am sure the papers will report the details tomorrow, but here is a short synopsis of what I said this morning.

1) The Northern Small Area Plan needs to be completely re-worked. 2) We should take up the Friends of Bolin Creek's challenge to create a Bolin Creek Preserve. 3) We must take a number of steps to strike a balance between increasing our commercial tax base and protecting existing neighborhoods. And 4) we need to rewrite a number of rules related to affordable housing including the Density Bonus, downtown performance standards, and voluntary annexation standards in order to increase affordable housing development in Carrboro.

I also talked some about my view of the role of the Mayor. In short I believe that I will play three roles as a Mayor - a listener, a mediator and a leader.