Tax proposals: Hillsborough up 8%, Carrboro up 4.9%

Those increases for Carrboro and Hillsborough seem quite modest. That is they seem quite reasonable until one compares them to what neighboring towns are able to do. Despite slowing revenue growth in Graham, and despite increased expenditures in both Graham and Mebane, both towns have been able to stay with current tax rates for the next budget cycle. And, Graham is doing this while increasing employee pay. Maybe there's a lesson in line by line budget trimming and fiscal responsibility for various Orange gov't in there somewhere.

http://tinyurl.com/5t7pzk 

There are so many variables that there could scarcely be any meaningful comparison between Graham and Carrboro.  But, as one example, we are building a new fire station and hiring additional firefighters to staff the new station - an essential service by anyone's standards;  I don't know whether Graham is doing anything similar.  Carrboro's only other new spending initiatives are 1) hiring two new cops and 2) putting in cost-saving flushless urinals in the Century Center (cost=$4,000 total with a quick payback in reduced water consumption).

Also, our budgetting process begins by looking at all of the town's functions and assesses opportunities to cut or to economize by consolidating services (eg we are reducing our xeroxing costs this coming year by consolidating various copiers onto one service contract).  Each department's budget is stripped back of any special project money they had for any previous year, so that no one can try incerementally increase their budget that way.

No doubt some folks like to believe that those libruls in Carrboro are profligate, but the facts are entirely the opposite.  I'd be glad to discuss the budget process with you in more detail if you are interested.  My cell phone number is 919-636-0371.

Carrboro could make a pretty penny collecting fines for basic traffic violations.  I took my radar gun to the stretch of Smith Level Road near Carrboro High, and in the space of just 20 minutes, found 21 vehicles travelling at speeds 12 MPH or more over the limit.  That's during a period when the limit is 35 MPH.

When the limit is 25 MPH, in the school zone, essentially 100% of vehicles are traveling over the limit, and many (more than 20%) at TWICE the limit.  This is the equivalent of driving 130 MPH on I-40.  Caught speeding were several vehicles owned by Chapel Hill and the State, and also more than one Chapel Hill Transit bus, plus numerous commercial vehicles, most notably many fully-loaded dump trucks.

Yet, I have **never** seen the Carrboro PD enforce the speed limit in this area, and further, when I asked (in person) for this to be looked at, I was told by the uniformed officer that "it's not a priority" to do so. (Don'tfeel too badly, I got the same brush-off from the County when I asked them as well.)

It's really a shame that a private citizen has to go to eBay and buy a radar gun to find out how flagrantly the traffic laws are being broken.  And it's sad that local government abdicates its responsibility towards basic public safety so easily.

Even if ticket revenue isn't the goal, slowing people down will help diminish our insane and reckless dependence on foreign oil.  Every drop counts.  Surely, that idea alone should motivate someone in authority to re-prioritize traffic law enforcement?

I saw you and your son standing out with the radar gun on Smith Level and almost stopped to come back and talk to you. The Carrboro-sponsored Smith Level Road task force has requested additional speed monitoring on Smith Level Road, but from where you were south, that responsibility falls to the sheriff's department rather than Carrboro. South of Ray Road is all extra-jurisdictional territory.

The sheriff's department has two patrol cars covering southern Orange County so using one to set up speed traps would take away significantly from other services those officers provide. It's really a catch 22. If we want more enforcement, we need more officers. Under current conditions, if we want more officers, we need to either request the BOCC reallocate funds away from the schools or we need to willingly pay higher property taxes. I'd prefer to look for long-term solutions and deal with what we have today.

It's kind of interesting to note that Raleigh may be the first area municipality to specifically cite rising fuel costs in it's budget proposal. They're citing a 44% increase in fuel costs. Don't know where they got that particular figure, but overall fuel costs have been rising about 20% per year for the past five years, and there's no indication of that trend ever slowing down in this post peak world.  I'm predicting that this is going to be a recurring theme for the foreseeable future with fuel costs playing a larger and larger role in all aspects of local, state and national governance. It's also noteworthy what a huge role debt service plays.

http://tinyurl.com/4z4k73