2003
I wanted to take some time to update the OP community on the status of Early Voting for the 2012 General Election.
At its June meeting, the OC BOE approved the usage of four sites: Rams Head, Seymour Center, Carrboro Town Hall, the OC BOE office, and a nothern Orange location to be determined (not unanimous). They also established early voting times for Seymour, BOE and Carrboro Town Hall (unanimous). However, the motion for Saturday voting for 9am to 3pm was not unanimous.
At its July meeting, the OC BOE approved the times for Rams Head and signaled that it was still interested in a fifth northern Orange site, but that it was increasingly difficult to find such a location since there were concerns about Mt. Zion (the early vote site during the primary).
At its meeting today, the BOE has now approved a total five sites: Rams Head, Seymour Center, Carrboro Town Hall, the OC BOE office, and Mt. Zion AME Church. These were the five sites for the primary. The motion to approve Mt. Zion as well as its times was unanimous.
Just in from Carrboro --
Someone is running around town defacing Joal Broun's (incumbent candidate for Alderman) signs claiming she is, among other things, for high-rises, high-taxes, and against affordable housing and is a friend of developers.
Can someone explain this? Who would do this? Putting the merits aside, Broun is likely to be #1 in the vote tally. If a challenger is responsible, one would expect them to go after a weaker candidate.
On to the merits…Broun has been Carrboro’s most outspoken advocate for affordable housing . . . one of the most outspoken officials in the county! And as for building heights and taxes – they all voted for new heights (except for Gist) and Broun is one of Carrboro’s biggest tax impact sticklers during the annual budget process.
I predict these tactics backfire and Broun is the #1 in Carrboro.
Yesterday's Chapel Hill Herald gave us a preview of the "Friends of Sunrise" forum. Excuse me, but who the hell holds their candidate forum on the same night as a Town Council meeting? Doesn't that sort of indicate that you are more interested in making your own points than hearing other people's?
They also gave the candidates questions in advance:
One of the submitted questions reads in part, "Do you think that the town should continue its current policy of ignoring I-40 noise?" Another question asks, "Do you think nonprofits should be allowed to build large-scale, low-income housing projects with public funds and with no public accountability?"
The question on the bonds reads, "Keeping in mind that property taxes have increased steadily over the past 15 years and many Chapel Hill residents have lost their jobs in the economic downturn, how would you justify that this is the time to initiate the largest bond package in Chapel Hill history? Are there other ways to accomplish the intended goals?"
It's that time of year, and the "vote for me" signs are sprouting like weeds. (Very much like, and in close proximity to, the weeds that have taken over the flowerbeds on the bypass, those desperate looking things planted a few years ago for the Special Olympics and abandoned since. Ah, when we were pretty.)Our own batty uncle Lee Pavão recently got on WCHL to propose a conspiracy theory involving the strategic placement of certain people's signs next to one another and how this plot reveals the stink of brimstone in the dark heart of certain local politicians and on and on etc etc. I'll let Pavão search out the political meaning revealed in the proximity of inanimate bodies in space. I'm more interested in the vocabulary of our local signage.You can't begin to get into the question, at least not these days, without acknowledging that Council Member Jim Ward is the undisputed and reigning champion in the battle of the election signs.
(From 'Friends of Affordable Housing' press release.)
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
September 23, 2003
Affordable Housing Group Endorses Strom, Ward and Greene
The affordable housing advocacy group Friends of Affordable Housing announced their endorsement of three candidates for the Chapel Hill Town Council Tuesday morning. The group based its decisions on voting records, questionnaires and responses to questions at the Northside neighborhood forum. Incumbent Council Members Bill Strom and Jim Ward were endorsed, as well as challenger Sally Greene.
The organization's spokesperson Rich Leber said, "Bill Strom has been one of North Carolina's leading lights in the realm of affordable housing." The group recognized his leadership on requiring affordable housing in new real estate developments in Chapel Hill and held his work out as a model for other elected officials in North Carolina.
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