Travis Crayton's blog

The Orange County Board of Elections met today to discuss early voting sites for the 2014 elections and beyond.

At the heart of the discussion today was what an on-campus voting site at UNC could be. In other parts of the state, such as Watauga and Pasquotank counties, students have seen their voting rights undermined through the loss of on-campus voting sites and challenges to student residency. While no such issues have emerged yet in Orange County, there has been some speculation that the Republican-majority Orange County Board of Elections might not maintain an on-campus voting site for UNC students for upcoming elections.

However, that speculation seems to have been brought to an end today, when Board Chair Kathy Knight said emphatically, "This board is not Watauga [County]." As the live tweets from today's meeting (below) show, it appears the Board of Elections is committed to having an early voting site on campus. The Board did not make any final decisions on voting sites today, but finalists for the on-campus site appear to include Cobb Residence Hall, Hillel, and the Stone Center.

The Obey Creek Compass Committee, a 17-member committee formed by the Chapel Hill Town Council to assist in identifying key issues to be considered in the development of a concept plan for the Obey Creek property, unanimously approved its final report to the Chapel Hill Town Council at its last meeting on Monday.

The report is now available online here (PDF). You can review all of the materials from the committee, as well as videos of all committee meetings, on the town website here.

The report will be received by the Town Council at their January 13th meeting, where the Council will then consider next steps for the development agreement process.

(Full disclosure: I was a member of the Obey Creek Compass Committee.)

With another Election Day behind them, our elected officials in Orange County are now tasked to turn their attention from the challenges of the campaign trail to the challenges of governing. But following a sleepy election cycle in which all mayoral candidates ran unopposed and election results show most races were uncompetitive across the county, what message should our electeds take with them as they prepare to take their seats at the dais for new sessions?

With just 11.72% of eligible voters casting ballots in 2013, it’s unclear what message voters are sending. Was municipal turnout its lowest in over 10 years because voters simply don’t see any local issues directly affecting their lives? If so, does that mean voters are content with the status quo of the towns, which is why they didn’t get to the polls in the first place? Or are voters simply apathetic and nothing more can be discerned from the low turnout figure?