Equality NC Action Fund Endorses in Chapel Hill Races

I'm just reading CHALT"s own platform docments and editorials.  Here's the official platform:

http://ourtownchapelhill.org/2015/01/24/4726/

"Require new development to pay its own way. Favor development that strengthens town finances by generating more tax revenues than taxpayer costs. Use an economic model to estimate the costs new development will impose on the town and the new tax revenues it will generate."

What does "pay its own way" mean?   In this editorial  it explains everything:  

"They say that providing services (fire, police, schools, trash) to new residents costs more money than towns can collect from them. Sure, theoretically, there’s a break-even point: If your house or apartment is valued at, say, $650,000, you might pay enough property tax to cover the cost of basic town services and infrastructure upgrades. But what about the property-tax shortfall caused by your less affluent neighbors? Who’s going to pay extra to make up for that?"

On CHALT's website it says "A myth persists that approving a lot of high density developments composed of residential units will help the town to charge lower taxes.  Citizens have conducted their own cost benefit analyses and found that the costs greatly outweigh the revenues for all but commercial development. ". 

So, according to CHALT's own calculations new houses must cost at least $650,000 to be break even in terms of taxes vs. the cost of providing services, to the point where all development "but commercial development" shouldn't be allowed.  CHALT is obviously against building any new residences of any sort regardless of price or affordability.

You also write that "CHALT is in favor of more commercial development", but the official platform says "Ensure that new development does not worsen traffic congestion".  From my conversations with CHALT supporters, they've made i abundantly clear that any new retail or commercial buildings will increase traffic, which is unacceptable, even if its only a 1% increase.  Unless you know of some magic businesses that don't have anyone driving to them, this means any actual new developments would be opposed.

The CHALT supporters I've read all seem to think that the recent increase in development is some sort of nefarious plot by the current town council, not realizing that the pace of development is a factor of the economy.  When the economy is down, especially after the unprecedented crash in 2008, development grinds to a halt.  When the economy is strong, demand increases, and thus development starts up again. Instead, the current council gets accused of being in the pocket of developers and somehow orchestrating a development boom for personal gain.

The thing is nothing is ever good enough for CHALT, thus they are the special interest group of NO.  

The objections to height are a key example of this.  The simple fact is in the 1980s Chapel Hill, Carrboro and Orange county agreed on a rural buffer which neccessitates more density and height in certain areas to accomplish the dual goals of preserving the surrounding rural areas and allowing for growth.  Ephesus Forham as it is laid out now is for the most part car centric shoping centers from the 1950s-1980.  As such it makes sense to have height and density here especially to create a critical mass for improving transit availiblity and having walkable retail as opposed to most other places in Chapel Hill particularly areas that are more single family residential e.g. Northside which is facing some legitimately terrible development plans.  Form based code is basically from my understanding a set of guidelines for development to provide predictability in development.  Thus in and of it self arguing against form based code is silly unless you really do oppose pretty much all development, arguing for a better form based code however, I would say is entirely reasonable.

As to stormwater I feel like CHALT is trying to argue both sides against the middle here.  The simple fact is that when much of Ephesus Fordham was developed in the 1950s-1980s era a terrible job was done on stormwater management.  Pretty much everyone agrees on this.  The issue is that various people purporting to represent or agree with CHALT have both argued against redevoloping the area because of stormwater concerns and indirectly against capital improvements for stormwater when they argue about the costs of redeveloping Ephesus Fordham.  This doesn't make much sense if you think about it because what they are arguing is that the stormwater situation is bad, while also arguing that we should do nothing about the stormwater situation.  This is yet another example of saying NO to everything.  Part of the reason for the costs associated with Ephesus Fordham is to improve storm water managment by water retention and flood mitigation upstream so as to improve the situation as opposed to just leaving it as is.

In regards to affordable housing being ignored all I have to say is checkout Greenfield Place and Greenfield Commons which is probably one of the more ambitious affordable housing projects Chapel Hill has undertaken.

Finally in regards to commercial development being ignored, you cannot force developers to build things.  If you could this place wouldn't have been a vacant lot next to a liquor store for the better part of a decade.  On top of this I think its an entirely reasonable and positive strategy to put a mix of commerical and residential together to allow not only for commerical to have a nearby customer base, but also to allow people to walk to the businesses they patronize.  I am not an enviromental expert by any means, but I tend to think its generally a positive thing to replace auto-centric development with more walkable development which I think this does.

This is not to say the way Ephesus Fordham is being handled is 100% perfectly or that there is no room for improvement, but I tend to think generally the town is on the right track with it.

TBlake--Thank you for these thoughts. Speaking personally, here is my most fundamental problem with CHALT. I do not disagre with 100% of the issues that they raise. However, I think that if you look at the various iterations that CHALT has taken since the mid-80s you see a history of concern trolling. Paul Krughman wrote a great analysis of 'concern trolling' when used by 'reasonable' conservatives on issues of climate change:
 

"A brief thought, linking two people: Robert Samuelson and Greg Mankiw.

Both enjoy lecturing us on the need to take strong action — Samuelson demanding that we do something about rising health care spending, Mankiw that we join the “Pigou club” by taxing oil consumption.

But both can reliably be counted on to reject any actual proposal along these lines that either (a) has any chance whatsoever of becoming legislation or (b) is proposed by Democrats.

Just saying"

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/08/12/concern-trolls/

I think it's the same situation with CHALT and development. It's not that CHALT will just say 'we oppose all development.' Instead, they claim to be on board with 'good development'. Just like 'reasoable' conservatives claim to be absolutely on board with the fact that climate change is a big problem. But when you try to nail CHALT down on what 'good development' looks like you get parameters that preclude any development that might occur in the real world, despite the token statements to the contrary.