UNC
In early 2015, UNC-Chapel Hill released an extensive report about the business startups and spinoffs that faculty, students, and alumni have created. This report quantifies the impact of these businesses: 150+ businesses, 8,000 jobs created, and $7 billion in annual revenue for the state of North Carolina.
But what this report doesn’t detail is the direct impact of these startups and spinoffs on our local economy here in Chapel Hill, Carrboro, and Orange County. There’s a pretty simple reason for that: Few startups coming out of UNC stay in our community. So why can’t Chapel Hill foster a local startup scene when other college towns, like Boulder and Cambridge, have gotten national attention for the startup economies they’ve developed in their own communities?
Until Yusor Abu-Salha, her husband Deah Barakat and her sister Razan Abu-Salha, three young people who practice the Muslim faith, were shot to death on February 10, 2015 in Chapel Hill, many of us likely had not thought much about Islamophobia or that our community, one of the most liberal in the state, might harbor such sentiments. But we are not immune, as a search for the hashtag #NotsafeUNC will bare out. For example, at the time of these murders, I was teaching a course at UNC that happened to have two Muslim students enrolled. They were both close friends of the young people who were murdered. As my TAs and I worked to accommodate our students’ need to grieve and deal with the fear brought on by these hate killings, we heard that not all Muslim students at UNC were met with compassion.
This past Friday, April 24th, marked the last day of classes at UNC-Chapel Hill for 2014-2015, and while many students fulfilled the campus tradition of relaxing on the quad, others chose to reclaim and “occupy” the space as a hub for an open dialogue about the university’s racial tensions over the past year.
The event was organized by The Real Silent Sam, which is a coalition of student, faculty, and community activists working to contextualize the university’s physical landscape and institutional history.
Most notably, the coalition’s efforts to rename Saunders Hall in favor of Hurston Hall have caused a buzz of controversy throughout the community, making local, state, and national headlines.
Saunders Hall is named after William Saunders, a UNC trustee, confederate colonel in the Civil War and a chief organizer for the Ku Klux Klan.
The Jackson Center’s Executive Director, Della Pollock said it better than I could in a recent letter to Northside neighbors and friends:
Kirk Ross posted some of his thoughts about the recent UNC system center closings. Here are some of his observations:
Although passed by consensus vote, during discussions Tuesday there was a split over the at least some recommendations including one tense exchange over the decision not to close Chapel Hill’s Center for Civil Rights, which is based at the law school.
BOG member Steven Long and Center for Civil Rights director Ted Shaw
BOG member Steven Long said the center was engaging in political activities and said the center’s engagement in school segregation cases in several North Carolina counties was wrong and damaging to the county budgets. Long said he did not think it was right for a part of the university to be engaged in legal actions against the state or local governments.
I'm sorry, but it is never too early to be discussing lessons. Especially not in the current world of ADD, where folks move on as soon as the headlines disappear. For me, the two primary lessons to learn are: own responsibility and get involved.
What. No rant about Muslim-haters, police cover-up, irresponsible media reporting? No. Well, some about the latter a bit later. But, no. Why? Because you can't change what you can't change. What you have to do is own responsibility for what you can change, and get involved to change it.
No-one has, or will ever have, the slightest notion of what goes on or was going on in the head of Craig Stephen Hicks. Almost nothing is served by trying to find out now. Of course it was a hate crime. The man hated. Does it really change one dot, tittle or iota of anything to have a long. unseemly, pointless debate about whether it was parking he hated, or Muslims?
You can not legislate the way people feel, including hatred. What you can do is legislate the way they demonstrate their feelings. And this man had been demonstrating feelings for yonks.
"The Chapel Hill-Carrboro and UNC-CH chapters of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) will sponsor its annual Martin L. King Jr. Day Rally, March, and Worship Service. Meet for the rally at 9:00 a.m. and then join our march down Franklin Street. The march will end at First Baptist Church. At 11:00, the church service at Historic First Baptist Church (106 North Roberson Street, Chapel Hill NC) will commence. There will also be choir performances and a brief ceremony honoring those who have served in the military."
Date:
Monday, January 19, 2015 - 9:00am
Location:
Chapel Hill Peace & Justice Plaza (Franklin Street)
I signed a new housing lease about a month ago in mid-October – a lease that won’t start until June of next year. This is how competitive student off-campus housing is in Chapel Hill, and the ever-high demand for student housing in Chapel Hill continues to negatively affect non-student renters.
Niche.com estimates that 90 percent of houses near campus fill up by October. From my experience, students looking to rent an affordable house (as opposed to a townhouse or apartment) begin the search as early as September. Every year this fight to find the closest, nicest and most affordable home puts additional stress on UNC students, and our desperation to sign a lease as soon as possible pits students against each other, increasing competition and driving prices up.
According to a 2010 report prepared by Development Concepts Inc., students make up about a third of all rented units in Chapel Hill (and rented housing comprises over half of all housing in Chapel Hill). We are a huge market for property owners and developers – on-campus housing can only accommodate 9,700 students, so the remaining 9,000 or so undergrads must find off-campus places.
We - I've lived in or near Chapel Hill, NC now for almost ten years, I can say 'We.' We are not some two-bit hokey college, out in the sticks. We are the oldest public university in the United States, and one of its largest. We have made great play of our focus on student-athletes. If our esteemed coaches did not know, they should have done. Period. But that, for me, is not the real issue.
Young people come to our university to train to be doctors. To train to be engineers. To train to be stockbrokers. Take a trip through the hallways of our business departments. Our medical facilities. There is no attempt to pretend that students are being made to study other than their chosen vocation. There is no attempt to hide the fact that the best are being recruited, even while at college, for professional berths after college.
Today, the State Board of Elections will be deciding whether or not to add another site in Orange County for early voting. Jamie Cox and I issued letters in support of an additional early vote site for Orange County on the UNC campus. Both of us stressed that this is what is better for the county, not for a particular party. However, Chair Kathy Knight struck a decidely partisan tone in her response.
But this isn't about partisanship or politics, it's about fairness, because I don't stand for or support partisanship for political gain. I have previously proposed and supported election sites that members of my own party disagreed with because they believed it could benefit the GOP, but I thought those sites were viable and fair for all of Orange County. What better way to show the legislature that folks of all political persuasions oppose their elections overhaul? What better way to show that local government still works?
Below are the two letters Jamie and I submitted to the State Board, along with BOE Chair Kathy Knight's letter.
OCDP Chair Matt Hughes' Letter
BOE Member Jamie Cox's Letter
BOE Chair Kathy Knight's Letter
Pages
Community Guidelines
By using this site, you agree to our community guidelines. Inappropriate or disruptive behavior will result in moderation or eviction.
Zircon - This is a contributing Drupal Theme
Design by
WeebPal.
