In the midst of the panic over a collapsing municipal bond market during the financial credit crisis, the Obama administration passed a new bond program called “Build America Bonds” (BABs). As with most federal stimulus programs, its effects don’t kick in until the crisis is over, and the costs way exceed the benefits.

Sounds like BABs are perfect fit for the Chapel Hill government!

The Chapel Hill governance board agrees. In September 2010, they approved the use of BABs for future town indebtedness. Mayor Mark Kleinschmidt forgot to tell residents that the town will be charged larger commissions for selling BABs than the normal municipal bonds. Weighted by size, municipal issuers paid $6.55 per $1,000 of Build America Bonds sold in June, compared with $6.08 for traditional municipal bonds. More than $109 billion in Build America Bonds has been sold, according to Thomson Reuters, a news and financial data company.

As if this memory lapse isn’t enough, the Mayor also forgot to tell residents that Wall Street banks — which have pocketed over $700,000,000 dollars in fees from the program — are now releasing research reports warning that issuer’s financial woes may make the bonds less attractive. Some banks are even telling investors how to bet against BABs. You can use derivatives and other financial mechanisms to sell BABs short.

Mayor Kleinschmidt also failed to tell residents that BABs will be counted against the town’s creditworthiness as if they were normal municipal bonds without benefit of the federal subsidy on payment. Why? The bonds must be evaluated as not having a subsidy because the federal government can suspend the subsidy.

Guess who will be paying the bill for BABs? You will, of course. Mr. Thomas Doe, chief executive of research firm Municipal Market Advisors, a research company has said, “What’s clear is that the federal government, over the life of the Build America Bond issues, will be writing checks in excess of $50 billion to cover the interest.” he said.

How did the Chapel Hill governance board discuss this important financial issue? It didn’t. It passed on the consent agenda.

Pulpsters would think that local Progressives would be in favor of open, transparent government, particularly at the local level. You would think that local Progressives wouldn't want a repeat of the closed, back door, unfair process used by the Commishes to propose siting the trash transfer station on Eubanks Road. You would think that local Progressives would be in the forefront of questioning the closed, back door, unfair process used by the Chapel Hill Town Council to site the IFC men's shelter. You would be wrong.

None other than anarchist, censored-blog fascista Ms. Ruby Sinreich spoke out against those trying to disinfect the Chapel Hill government with sunshine. Ms. Sinreich singled out local school activist Mr. Mark Peters for daring to ask the Chapel Hill government for all emails relating to the shelter siting.

Ms. Sinreich's words do not need analysis. In a thread entitled ”Mark Peters is watching you”, Ms. Sinreich said, ”I understand you've also asked the Town of Chapel Hill to share all official e-mail regarding relocating the homeless shelter. I can kind of imagine what you're trying to get at there, but I doubt you'll find anything useful. So maybe Mayor Foy and the Chancellor Moeser made some kind of arrangement to transfer this land, that's already publicly apparent. What does that prove? How will that help your neighbors' cause to keep the Interfaith Council's Community House out of the neighborhood? It almost seems like you want to intimidate public officials, Mark. I'm not sure why.”

Mr. Peters responded to Ms. Sinreich in his usual open and respectful manner. ”It's really quite simple. There is no directory of local email addresses which we can use to find the email addresses of our neighbors. I was hoping that we could find some of our neighbor's email addresses in the list. I suspect that if you 'really' wanted to know why, then you would have emailed me or called me rather than blindsiding me on the front page of OP. Had you asked, then you could have at least added that to the initial article. Clearly this post is meant to intimidate me.”

Nothing brings home the naivete' of local progressive leadership when it comes to for-profit business dealings than the recent statement by Mayor Mark Kleinschmidt in referring to the 140 West Franklin deal. “The town can’t back out. It’s not a matter of money; once the town agrees to a development deal, it can’t simply change its mind.”

Pulpsters will recall that The Town owns the land to be developed at 140 West Franklin, is an investor in the development with cash, is a financial stakeholder in the outcome, and is the regulatory authority controlling the development. The Town’s business partner is Ram Development Inc. of Florida (Ram).

Does Ram management share Mr. Kleinschmidt’s dogged devotion to deals?

In October 2006, about one year after getting into bed with Chapel Hill on 140 West Franklin, Ram was courting the city council of Tampa, Florida. The prize? How about 38 acres of land in downtown Tampa.

The blighted area was called Temple Terrace, located roughly at the intersection of North 56th Street and Bullard Parkway. Ram. in association with Pinnacle Realty Advisors of Tampa and Cooper Carry of Atlanta. told the Tampa council that if the city forked over money ($6,700,000) for city-financed parks mixed in with privately-funded retail and residential components, everything would work out fine. The Ram group got picked by the Tampa council for the $45,000,000 mixed use revitalization of a depressed urban site.

Sound familiar?

Fast forward to October 2008. Ram and its Pinnacle Group partner back out of the Tampa Temple Terrace project.

Apparently, one can back out of a deal with a municipality. You can simply change your mind.

So much for a dogged devotion to deals.

Time is of the essence for every purely private commercial real estate or mixed use real estate development. Time is the enemy. Time means cash outflow (interest and capital payments) long before cash inflow (rents and sales revenues).

Hence the important contractual phrase “time is of the essence”. In plain English, it means that meeting timelines is of the very essence of the contractual obligations.

A curious thing happens when a public entity is brought into the mix, particularly where that public entity owns the land to be developed, is an investor in the development with cash, is a financial stakeholder in the outcome, and is the regulatory authority controlling the development. Such is the case with the tortuous development of 140 West Franklin Street in Chapel Hill, otherwise known in an earlier life as “Lot 5”.

Recently, the Chapel Hill Watch watchdog site asked the question, can the Town of Chapel Hill back out of its development agreement with Ram Development on 140 West Franklin? That question arose, in part, from the patience of Job wearing thin, waiting for something, anything, to rise out of the ground at 140 West Franklin.

Here’s the Town’s version of the timeline for 140 West Franklin:

That’s nine years from first announcement, four years since Ram was selected, and still no digging.

Here’s a more rigorous Pulp timeline from 2007 forward, also taking into account the Development Agreement (DA) milestones:

The curious thing is that SL2009-406 says absolutely nothing about changing existing contractual dates for completing construction projects. The law only says that local government regulatory building permits are extended for three years. It says nothing about extending the contractual time period for building a project. One can extend the permit beyond a contractual date for completion, but it doesn't change the completion date. The two are legally separate. The permit date comes from the town's regulatory authority. The completion date is a matter of pure, non-regulatory contract law between a property owner and a developer.

Incredibly, as the owner of the land, the Town has given Ram three more years under its contract to complete 140 West Franklin. Under its contract, the Town did NOT have to let Ram off the hook for completing the building by January 2011.

What did the Town get for this three year extension of a non-regulatory, purely contractual, “time is of the essence” contractual obligation on the part of Ram? Nothing. Absolutely nothing.

It should come as no surprise to Pulpsters that Chapel Hill’s town staff lawyer doesn’t want to talk to Chapel Hill Watch’s watchdogs. In the words of Mayor Mark Kleinschmidt, a lawyer living in another developer's luxury townhome. “The town can’t back out. It’s not a matter of money; once the town agrees to a development deal, it can’t simply change its mind.”

Of course, that doesn’t include the Town changing its mind about the Scheduled Completion Date for 140 West Franklin. Mayor Kleinschmidt doesn't say what happened to “time is of the essence”.

No word on when Ram will start paying taxes on the 140 West Franklin development, as it continues to enjoy tax-free status on the land, courtesy of its business partner, the Town of Chapel Hill. Selling units without paying taxes, how progressive!

In most of North Carolina, library systems are countywide, paid for by all county residents, open to all county residents.

However, things aren’t usually normal in Orange County. Here we have little political fiefdoms, each intent on spending your money like drunken sailors on shore leave.

Currently there are two separate library systems in Orange County. One is a county system (OCPL) that is available to all county residents. The main OCPL facility is a brand spanking new, 23,500 square feet, two story building at 137 W. Margaret Lane in Hillsborough with a small branch in Carrboro.

The new $8,000,000 facility was built at a time of great economic hardship. Official policy is to excuse the timing of such expenditures as being beneficial to economically stressed taxpayers. In the words of the North Carolina’s state librarian, Ms. Mary Boone, “We're all worried about the economy and our future well-being. During economic downturns, usage of public libraries always increases. That is very much the case this time; we're seeing a dramatic increase, and nationally library usage is at an all-time high.” (See CHN Hillsborough Library Story.)

The other system is the Chapel Hill public library (CHPL), the most per capita used library in the state. However, only 60% of the CHPL service is by Chapel Hill Residents. A large percentage of the CHPL service goes to benefit adjacent Carrboro residents. That burden is forcing Chapel Hill government to consider raising taxes by about $30.00 annually in order to pay for operating costs. Although Orange County provides money to Chapel Hill for the CHPL operations, it’s only about 11% of the CHPL operating budget while the outside Chapel HIll demand is 40% of the services.

Carrboro Mayor Mark Chilton doesn't like being asked to pay for services used by his residents. When asked about meeting with Chapel Hill Mayor Mark Kleinschmidt, Mr. Chilton said, “I suppose we have to, although I do not look forward to it. I am no way – no how – never going to vote to put Carrboro into the same dysfunctional relationsip with either the County or Chapel Hill that the two of them already have with each other.” Mayor Chilton, an expert in dysfunctional relationships, prefers to create his own.

According to Mr. Chilton, Carrboro can't afford to pay for using Chapel Hill's library. Acording to Mr. Chilton, Chapel Hill and Orange County should open a branch on Franklin Street, “putting library services in walking distance of much of the population, including low-income people of color who might have difficulty getting to libraries farther out.” (See CHN Library Story.) Curiously, Mr. Chilton is unaware that low income people of color can take a free bus ride from their neighborhoods to the library which is a distance of about two miles. Apparently, the race card is still a trump card in Chapelboro.

Mr. Chilton conveniently forgets to mention that he has been seeking a $2,700,000 OCPL branch in Carrboro, to be located all of about two miles away from the CHPL facility. (See Chilton Coleman Guest Column.) This branch palace will bear additional operating costs to the county.

Meanwhile, Chapel Hill Councilor Lauren Easthom isn't happy. “I suppose it is dysfunctional that we’ve been paying for Carrboro’s use of the library all these years. Where’s Carrboro in the picture? Why is it always our burden?” (See Herald Sun CHPL Story.)

No word on whether or not Alderman Dan Coleman will offer to screen Carrboro residents using the CHPL facility - ”Are you from Carrboro?”

In most of North Carolina, elected officials will avoid siting a homeless shelter next to their neighborhood. They will tend to put it as far away as possible.

Turns out, southern Orange is just like the rest of the North Carolina when it comes to homeless shelters. The veneer of Orange Progressivism is very fine indeed.

As the Chapel Hill Town Council tries to convince residents that the decision to place the new IFC homeless shelter at the corner of Homestead Road and MLK Boulevard isn’t a “done deal”, perhaps it’s time to step back and look at the authority the council seeks for homeless shelter siting.

Currently, town laws (the LUMO) restrict homeless shelters to less than 20,000 square feet and disturbing less than 40,000 square feet of land, with a capacity of up to 25 people. Moreover, only certain areas are considered suitable, i.e., the town center, neighborhood commercial zoned areas and office/institutional zoned areas.

Freshman Mayor Mark Kleinschmidt (elected by less than a majority of the votes cast in November 2009) isn’t happy with the law. He wants absolute authority to put as big a homeless shelter as he wants, wherever he wants in the town. Pulpsters should note that this craving for absolute power comes from a mayor who does NOT own his listed Chapel Hill residence.

Of course, the new IFC shelter will be approved at the pre-selected site given to the town by Duke Power. The issue in question is, can Mr. Kleinschmidt and his cronies give IFC permission to build as big as facility as IFC wants? Under current town law they can’t. Under the new town law Mr. Kleinschmidt craves, they can. You just have to trust the council to do what's best for you.

In the words of Ms. Nancy Oates, of Chapel Hill Watch, “Many members of this council seem bent on making Homestead Road Chapel Hill’s equivalent of New York’s Bowery. By grouping all social services together, we can keep all the undesirables in one small area, which coincidentally is away from where Town Council members live.

By segregating and ghettoizing some members of our community — and, like it or not, the homeless are part of our community — Kleinschmidt works against the climate of diversity he used as a defense when he voted against seating the fifth-place finisher for the vacant council seat. Kleinschmidt forgets that more people voted against him than for him. Ironic that to create his fantasy of Chapel Hill as a liberal, inclusive town, he adopts an I-know-best-for-the-people attitude, a style used by Iranian ayatollahs.” (SeeChapel Hill Watch Ayatollah Kleinschmidt Story.)

To show the penchant the town council has for sharing the love of the homeless shelter, here’s a table listing the residence address of each council member.

Please note that Mr. Kleinschmidt lists 208 Village Gate Drive as his legal residence. This townhome is owned by none other than convicted felon, convicted drug dealer, and preferred local developer, Mr. Scott Kovens. Pulpsters will remember that Mr. Kovens showed up to buy the Winmore development permit package after it was maneuvered through approval by town manager-for-Winmore-permit-only/non-staff town attorney Mr. Mike Brough.

Here’s a map showing those Council members homes with regards to the IFC site.

A picture truly is worth a thousand words.

The hallmark of 21st Century fiscal conservatism is the practice of government living within its citizens' means. Revenues are projected. Sustainable debt loads and taxation loads are calculated. The basic premise is that wealth generated predominately among the common folk can be tapped by taxation to support government programs. Overtapping that wealth disincentivizes the creation of future wealth.

The hallmark of 21st Century progressivism is the practice of fiscal profligateness, the opposite of fiscal conservatism. Expenditures are projected. Confiscatory debt loads and taxation loads are calculated. The basic premise is that the populous must hand over enough wealth to cover the costs of what government wants to do. If the government service or benefit is “progressive”, then it must be funded no matter what the fiscal consequences, no matter what the true benefit of a metricless “social good”. Human nature and motivations are dismissed as being of little importance, suitable only for government re-education efforts.

Progressives love to layer on to fiscal conservatism a smokescreen of social conservatism. For example, one could propose every local government program advocated by an Orange Progressive with one difference. Fiscal conservatist principles may make one delay or not fund some of the proposed programs because of a lack of financial resources. The failure to fund the desired programs produces a kneejerk labeling of that person as a “social conservative” despite the person being in favor of every program.

No more clear demonstration of such obfuscation can be seen than in the recent Chapel Hill mayoral election. The fiscal conservative mayoral candidate was Councilor Matt Czajkowski. The fiscal profligateness mayoral candidate was Councilor Mark Kleinschmidt.

Mr. Czajkowski would be viewed in most of North Carolina as a “liberal”. However, during the 2009 Chapel Hill mayoral election, he was branded a “conservative” by the pandering pundits, press, and radio. A local radio news director was stunned to consider the concept of a progressive government living within its means. Mr. Czajkowski’s political crime was to propose public policy based on reality. He recognized that the state, Orange County, and Chapelboro are dealing with enormous financial problems. Perhaps that’s because he has professionally handled money for for-profit businesses.

Mr. Kleinschmidt, on the other hand, never considered how much his proposed programs would cost. If the programs are socially worthy, then Chapel Hill citizens must pay the price and bear the burden.

Here’s the reality Mr. Kleinschmidt ignored.

According to the North Carolina State Fiscal Research Division (SFRD), “[e]ven with the economic recovery underway, economy-based taxes remain weak and general fund collections are below the forecast target. They remain at 1.5% below target through November.
• Sales Tax collections are by far the weakest component of the economy-based taxes.
• A national recession persisting for at least 20 months has significantly impacted the State’s employment conditions and we are not out of the woods yet.
• Budget pressures mount as the prolonged economic downturn increases demand for those government services related to an economic downturn.”

Mr. Kleinschmidt didn’t consider in his campaign that state income tax withholding on wages and salaries was down 3.8% through November 2009. Monthly and quarterly withholding payments were hit the hardest (Y/Y 12.4% decline). Sales tax collections reflect consumer financial problems. State baseline collections were down in November 2009 almost 12% from 2008.

The SFRD further warns as of November 2009 that: 1) It is clear from looking at economy-based taxes that the recession is still impacting consumers;
2) Housing market problems are still unwinding;
3) Employment woes will continue at least into the spring of 2010;
4) Consumers continue to cut back on most spending;
5) Credit market constraints could slowdown or derail the recovery;
6) The Feds most recent comments suggest a long slow recovery;
7) Weak employment outlook expected through all of 2009 and into first quarter of 2010;
8) Inflation-adjusted salary & wages are lower than before the start of the recession;
9) Household wealth suffered tremendous losses from housing recession and equity market losses;
10) Very tight credit conditions continue;
11) Highest household debt burden on record at the start of the Great Recession;
12) Positive employment growth is not expected until the second-half of 2010;
13) The State will have a long way to go to reach pre-recession levels given the 6% decline that occurred since the start of the recession; and
14) Moody’s economy.com forecasters envision only 3.1% growth in the State’s personal income for 2009 and 3.8% in 2010. This is far less than the 6.0% to 7.0% annual growth from 2004 to 2007.

The future? SFRD says there will be mounting pressures for remainder of FY 2009-10 and beyond:
1) The Unemployment Insurance Fund has borrowed $1.4 billion from the Feds (projected to reach $2 billion) by the end of calendar year 2010; and
2) A looming issue on the horizon will be the FY 2011-12 revenue picture. Temporary taxes are set to expire, fiscal stimulus money dries up, and early projections indicate revenue growth will not be sufficient to close the gap.

The North Carolina state budget has an FY 2009-2010 budget gap of $4,600,000,000. That’s about a 22% shortfall of the entire budget. The projected budget gap for FY 2010-2011 remains a problematic $4,400,000,000. (See Center For Budget And Public Policy.)

Mr. Kleinschmidt’s appreciation of these facts is best demonstrated by his stated campaign concern. He couldn’t add a cost of living increase this fiscal year for town employees who already have salaries AND retirement benefits far exceeding, on average, those offered in private employment.

In most of North Carolina (and the East Cost for that matter), people recognize that the natural ecological balance is way out of whack with regards to deer populations. The removal of predators has been met with increased suburban vegetation as a food source and decreased hunting pressures. Deer populations must be controlled to re-establish forest ecosystems. One method in the “eco-quiver” is controlled bow hunting in urban areas.

However, southern Orange County isn’t like the rest of North Carolina. Here it’s all about what makes you feel good. Killing Bambi's doe mother doesn’t feel good. Just because you’re a self-acclaimed “environmentalist” doesn’t mean you care about things like forest ecosystems more than saving Bambi's mother. In the world of Orange Progressive politics, science is the handmaiden of feel good environmental public policy, not the other way around.

Back in the real world, Dr. Emile DeVito, a conservation ecologist and Manager of Science and Stewardship for the New Jersey Conservation Foundation, states we are facing an ecological disaster from the deer overbrowsing. “Land managers are aware of the catastrophic impact of super-abundant deer on tree regeneration and the loss of biodiversity in the metropolitan New York region’s herbaceous forest wildflowers. Now another phenomenon, the loss of the woody shrub layer, has reached a critical stage across most of the region (outside the New Jersey Pine Barrens).”

The good news is that the damage is repairable. “In the Watchung Reservation, a parkland area in Union County, N.J., fencing that has kept deer out for 13 years has helped promote the regrowth of native woody trees and shrubs and perennial herbaceous plants in spots that had absolutely zero visible native plants in the understory when the fences — called exclosures — were erected in 1995.

These new areas of forest understory are dense and shade the ground, and they are suppressing invasive alien species that were abundant at the time of fencing. There is variation between plots; in some locations alien species are still common. But in every plot native species are now the dominant vegetation. In fact, in some locations — in the deep shade cast by native, regenerating trees — shrubs and wildflowers are outcompeting alien weeds!

It is clear that the only way to give our forests a chance to recover from both overbrowsing by deer and alien plant invasions is a two-step approach: 1. a drastic reduction in the deer herd, to a level so low as to achieve the functional equivalent of an exclosure (winter deer populations must be about 5 per square mile for a drastically damaged forest to begin to recover), and 2. the collection of local native seeds by local master gardeners or other volunteers, with associated gardening programs to re-introduce the native shrub layer where it cannot return on its own.”

How overcrowded are local woods with deer?

According to Duke University professor Norm Christensen, there wasn't a deer in sight 38 years ago when he began a long career studying the ecosystem of Duke Forest. Now, deer are so abundant they've inserted themselves into his research. (North Carolina's deer population has increased from about 670,000 in 1984 to more than 1.25 million in 2007, according to the N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission.)

In the 7000 acre Duke Forest just north of Chapelboro, it was estimated in 2009 that about 900 “Deermowers” munch their way through the understory. Duke held a hunt to remove about 100 deer. However, even at 800 deer, that equates to about 70 deer per square mile, 14 times the optimal goal of 5 for restoring an ecosystem, as advocated by Dr. DeVito.

Local “Bambicologists” decry even these modest attempts. According to Ms. Jane Norton, a sustainability educator, who moved to be near Duke Forest 22 years ago, there aren’t too many deer. ”I care about all of nature and think it's imperative…to live in harmony with the natural world. I think our purpose on this earth is to learn from nature. I don't believe in playing God.”

Chapel Hill is overpopulated with Bambicologists eating the understory from your fiscal house as well. So it should come as no surprise to Pulpsters that the town council stands ready to shoot down a proposal for an urban deer hunt within city limits. Councilor Sally Greene said, “I cannot support an urban archery program, no way, no how.” Councilor Lauren Easthom said, ”I'm sensitive to this issue, but I can't support anything in town that involves archery and residents.” (See Chapel Hill Herald Bambicology Story.)

Of course, it's too much to expect Councilors Easthom and Greene to overcome their ignorance and biases against an urban archery hunt. Apparently, it never occurred to them that the hunt is conducted from an elevated tree stand, and that the arrow shot is made at usually about 20 yards, in a decidedly downward trajectory. It's not like archery practice at the local Girl Scout camp.

Back in the real world, Dr. DeVito suggest the following steps be taken when confronted with deer overpopulation. “Deer reduction can only occur with drastic changes to deer management, such as:
1. tax credits or other monetary incentives for every female deer (doe) harvested by an individual.
2. doe harvest requirements for landowners who receive a preferential, lowered property tax assessment for engaging in forestry programs that protect natural resources. Without aggressive management to reduce doe abundance, forestry programs have little chance of success in regenerating trees and other forest components. Deer fences may be substituted for hunting programs, where surrounding lands are not accessible to hunters.
3. economic incentives for municipalities and counties to initiate doe control programs.
4. legalizing the sale of local venison for food and hides for small manufacturing enterprises.
5. free butchering of deer for venison donations to homeless shelters.
6. other changes and innovations that represent thinking 'out of the box.' ”

As pointed out by Dr, DeVito, not only does restoring the deer population balance increase biodiversity, it also increases the absorption of storm runoff and decreases erosion and siltation of water courses.

Bambi and his kind needn’t worry about destroying Orange County ecosystems as long as they remain cute and don't bite. Public policy will be bent towards feelings over facts.

Oh, they should also keep a Democratic Party affiliation.

To those who don’t have intolerant ideology and blind partisanship coursing through their veins, the moral and ethical way to fill a panel elective seat that's vacated before the election, but vacated after the filing period for that election, is to have the highest vote getter not elected to the panel to receive the vacant seat.

However, Orange County is all about intolerant ideology and blind partisanship.

Back in 2005, Carrboro had an alderman seat vacated by the election of the new mayor. The fourth highest vote getter for the three open alderman seats was Ms. Katrina Ryan. She didn’t receive the open seat. Instead, Mr. Dan Coleman moved from Chapel Hill into Carrboro and didn’t bother to file to run for alderman office. Instead he just had to lobby a handful of elected officials to be awarded the seat. How progressive!

In 2009 history has repeated the Orange Progressive tradition. Mr. Bill Strom went RVing, leaving his Chapel Hill town council seat vacant after the move permanently out of state one month BEFORE the filing period for an election that could have filled his seat. Six votes decided who would get Mr. Strom’s seat. How progressive!

The Chapel Hill Town Council gave the seat to Ms. Donna Bell, the latest political anointee. Ms. Bell, like Mr. Coleman, didn’t bother to run for office in November. Like Mr. Coleman, she and her husband, euro-Causcasian Mr. Jason James, only had to lobby the council to win. She didn’t have to campaign for months. She didn’t have to participate in any political election forum. She didn’t have to raise money. She didn’t have to write up any position statements.

She did have to write her good buddy, new Mayor Mark Kleinschmidt a one page letter asking for the seat. Why was Ms. Bell so much better qualified than Mr. Matt Pohlman, the highest vote getter (about 3400) not winning a council seat?

Race, the answer boils down to race. Ms. Bell is African-American. Mr. Pohlman is not. With the council’s only African American member (Mr. Thorpe) retiring, and with no African-American candidates bothering to run for office, the answer is clear to progressives. Racism is best fought by being racist.

Councilor Laurin Easthom displayed her famous insightful powers. She said her vote as a council member was more important than the about 3400 Chapel Hill voters voting for Mr. Pohlman. It must be a diifficult burden to live with so much self-importance.

Ms. Bell’s support of Mr. Kleinschmidt’s mayoral run had nothing to do with her appointment. Her contributions of time and money to Mayor Kleinschmidt, her name endorsement in ads, her distribution of campaign literature had nothing to do with her appointment. It's about race. You either are of the right race for maintaining cosmetic diversity, or you aren't.

Showing great fairness, every town council member personally called and “interviewed” Ms. Bell, while only four contacted Mr. Pohlman, none in earnest.

Showing his great wisdom, Mr. Kleinschmidt said, ”This is not a decision that is going to make everyone happy in the moment we make it. We just have to hope that once we make a decision that the service the person provides will be able to dissipate that anger.” It's like executing the wrong person for the right reason.

Whereas, a rose by any other name shall smell as sweet, can the same be said of the homeless? Chapelboro is proud to open its arms to illegal immigrants (as long as they live in the Carrboro barrio). Who doesn’t welcome low cost, low skill talents to sweep one’s floors, groom one’s garden and clean one’s bidets?

So, it’s just a little embarrassing when that same warm and fuzzy embrace doesn’t extend to Chapel Hill’s homeless, the more permanent of whom combine low cost and low skill with the extra advantage of low productivity.

Outgoing mayor Kevin Foy and Councilor Laurin Easthom were not happy when Chapel Hill citizens dared to make it “personal” when discussing housing 52 homeless people in a shelter to be built at the corner of Homestead Road and MLK Boulevard.

A video of the too personal festivities can be seen at the town website.

According to long-time Chapel Hill homeless resident Mr. Michael Davis, ”Someone needs to come in and take it from them and redistribute it. You may not want us in downtown Chapel Hill, but we need to be somewhere so that we can access the services we need.”

Dr. Bhupendra Sen was not impressed. He believes that homeless men loitering around Homestead Park would compromise safety for retirees and young families nearby. ”Many of them are criminals, including rapists. There are also drug addicts and alcoholics.”

Mr. Ken Brown seemed to be troubled by having grown men hanging around children. ”That is asking for double the trouble. Loitering by grown men in a public park and near preschool and after-school programs … is not a good idea, whether you're talking about homeless men or not.”

Perhaps if the Chapel Hill town council referred to the “homeless” as “illegal [domestic] immigrants”, then the cumbayah circle can close and the tingling can begin.

No word on when Ms. Easthom will invite some of the homeless to join her in her hirsute pursuits.

In the rest of North Carolina, when towns physically grow together, the respective municipal governments look at ways to share municipal services and, perhaps, even to merge. Witness Winston-Salem (formerly the towns of Winston and Salem), Fuquay-Varina (formerly the town of Fuquay and Varina), or Jonesville (formerly the towns of Jonesville and Arlington).

But Orange County isn't like the rest of North Carolina. Here town governance boards decide what they want, and residents must pay for it. No one looks at the effect on the incomes of town residents. If the “pony” wanted by town boards is “good”, then the boards get the pony, regardless of cost, regardless of what's happening to the income of town residents.

It should come as no surprise to Pulpsters that the net effect of duplicating redundant bureaucratic empires for delivering similar services in adjacent areas comes at a price. One of the elements inflating that price is the continuous growth in the number of municipal employees.

In the contest between the towns of Carrboro and Chapel Hill, which have a commmon border of several miles, Carrboro is by far the winner in expanding its municipal employee base. In the past six years Carrboro has increased its number of FTEs (full time employee equivalents) about 15%, from 141 to 162. Meanwhile, Chapel Hill has only been able to increase its base only about 8%, from a little over 459 to a little over 497. Together, these two, intertwined towns (with a population less than 100,000) have about 660 FTEs.

US Senate races are expensive. In defeating Ms. Elizabeth Dole, Ms. Kay Hagan spent over $8,500,000 in 2008. Unless you are Mr. John Edwards, that money comes from contributions. What better way for Senate hopeful, and current Chapel Hill Mayor, Kevin Foy to start the contributions running than to bail out a group of big pocket Chapel Hill real estate investors.

Lame duck Mayor Foy held a special closed meeting to buy a white elephant that’s draining the coffers of Developer Dream Team member D.R. Bryan, developer of Southern Village. This company is filled with campaign contributors who dutifully give local campaign contributions in response to their favored real estate development treatment, people such as the former mayor of Chapel Hill, Ms. Rosemary Waldorf. (It's all perfectly legal mind you.)

Hopeful Foy Senate campaign contributors have been sucking air on an unoccupied, spanking new 70,000-square-foot office building for sale off Weaver Dairy Road in the Vilcom Center area. Over 18 months of interest payments on a commercial loan and no occupants in sight (until now), another example of the commercial and retail real estate bubble collapsing around you.

To the rescue comes Mayor Foy, who just happens to need oodles of boodle if his dream of a US Senate run is to come to pass. Foy and his fellow Councilors approved negotiations between The Town Council, in a closed meeting, directing Town Manager Roger Stancil to continue negotiating with Red Wing Land, a D.R. Bryan affiliate. It's marketing “Dawson Hall” as separate office condos for about $150 per square foot, a steal at only $10,000,000!

Why should Chapel Hill buy a building convenient to nowhere after having just spent $25,000,000 on a new town operations center? The excuse given is that the town needs a temporary home for the library while the old one is being rebuilt and needs a permanent home for the police department on the northernmost edge of the town.

Which begs the question, why was the Chapel Hill library built not to be expanded while maintaining current operations? Which begs the question why can't the police department facility be expanded in place? Which begs the question is any municipal act done competently in southern Orange?

That’s right, Mayor Foy appears to be unaware of the concept of leasing temporary space. Pulpsters, needn’t ask why the police need a new permanent home on the northernmost edge of the town when they already have one centrally located on Airport Drive (MLK Boulevard) that could be expanded.

Mayor Foy pulled the old “we don’t have to time to think” ploy for his fellow Councilors. After months of sitting vacant, the keen negotitor Mayor Foy believes that listing agent Gary Hill with Grubb & Ellis/Thomas really is negotiating with two real future tenants and a real condo buyer for parts of Dawson Hall. What timing!

In an apparent attempt at humor, town manager Roger Stancil said, ”Any decisions have to be made in public. The town always operates with a lot of transparency.” (See N&O Campaign Contribution Story.)

In most of North Carolina, state employees are holding on to their job at any cost. Times are tough. Private jobs are being shed, not added. That attitude would be particularly true for a land use planner being paid about $74,000 a year.

But Orange County isn’t like most of North Carolina. Here a land use planner can slide from gown to town and back to gown, if the need is there for UNC. The factory university town of “Chapelboro” specializes in having local residents pay for university costs or expenses. From subsidizing free student transportation to lowered municipal water and sewage costs to revitalizing UNC-owned Franklin Street properties, it’s all about feeding the big blue academic smokestacks.

As reported in the Chapel Hill News, Ms. Mary Jane Nirdlinger resigned her $74,000-a-year job at UNC earlier this summer, allegedly without having another job lined up. (There aren’t too many of those jobs lying around on campus at that salary.) In the past few years, she has concentrated on the development of Carolina North and the ancillary public-private development of univeristy housing called Carolina Commons.

Ms. Nirdlinger is most famous among the adjacent Carolina Commons neighborhoods for pulling a bait-and-switch on the public-private D.R. Bryan-UNC partnership. She saw no need to inform neighborhoods about the particulars as to how seven high-end executive homes built individually transformed into a non-publicly bid UNC partnership deal of 19 homes built by D.R. Bryan, and how the land would be sold by UNC. She is remembered for her indignance at neighborhoood informational public meetings for being questioned about her lack of openness.

Now, Pulpsters are supposed to believe that Ms. Nirdlinger decided to cast off from the moorings of a well-paid state planning job with no job in hand, and no intention of landing a job with the town of Chapel Hill. Reportedly, she just happened to be hired by Chapel Hill Town manager Roger Stancil as a “special projects manager” after letting Mr. Stancil know she was leaving her UNC job. According to Mr. Stancil, “I wasn’t recruiting people who work for the university to come work for the town. She was leaving, and I diverted her path.”

Ms. Nirdlinger certainly was in luck. Mr. Stancil was willing to pay her even more than she made at UNC - $78,000 a year. Such managment skills by the town manager, offering someone without a job more taxpayer's money in the midst of the “Great Recession”.

What will Ms. Nirdlinger do? How about laying the regulatory foundation for Carolina North over the next few years while the state waits for the economy to recover before funding the next mega-round of capital investment in UNC? Much work must be done to align town regulations with UNC desires for Carolina North.

With the pressure on the UNC budget, and the high visibility of a UNC planner making $74,000, what better solution than to have the town pay for the planner doing the work needed by UNC? In the words of Ms. Nirdlinger, “I care about what happens in my community, and I care about what happens at the university.”

No word from Mr. Stancil as to why Ms. Nirdlinger needs to be hired in the midst of a commercial and residential building meltdown.

In most places in North Carolina, a sitting, politically progressive, elected official who sells their home to move permanently out of state one month BEFORE the filing period for an election that could fill their soon-to-be vacant seat would declare their intent and allow voters to decide their replacement.

But Orange County isn’t like most of North Carolina. Here, “progressive” political thinkers realize that the choice of municipal officials is a task best done by appointment of the anointed, by the anointed, for the anointed.

Despite every effort to strip real choice from the voters, elections might mistakenly allow diversity in representation. (As Pulpsters know diversity should be retricted to cosmetic purposes only.) Your betters know that having gained the power of incumbency, it’s much harder to unseat an anointed appointee. Look at how appointed Carrboro Alderman Dan Coleman in 2007 was able to ride out vehicular assault charges as an incumbent, with the cooperation of his fellow board members and the “ever vigilant” local media, which happens to include Mr. Strom's spouse.

Pulpsters shouldn’t be surprised to learn Chapel Hill Councilor Bill Strom has “gone RVing” after selling his 714 Greenwood Road home, all to deprive Chapel Hill voters from voting on filling his vacancy. Mr. Strom sold his Chapel Hill home in early June. (He’s leaving for New York for unknown reasons.) But he didn’t announce his resignation until after July 14th, after the deadline passed for filling his remaining two year term by an election.

Retiring Mayor Kevin Foy knew about Mr. Strom leaving, as did most of his fellow councilors and the local media. (You didn’t know because the public isn’t deemed important enough to be told until its too late.) No one asked Mr. Strom to resign openly before July 14th. Apparently, no one “in the know” wanted his vacancy filled by an election.

Perhaps that special feeling comes from Chapel Hill having a special 1995 town ordinance exempting it from normal state law. Elsewhere in North Carolina, any vacancy occurring more than 90 days before an election (August 4th in this election) can be filled by that election. However, in Chapel Hill any vacancy coming later than three days before the candidate filing period ends (July 14th in this election) is filled by appointment of the Town Council. How progressive.

Unfortunately, some local residents are still deluded, thinking that elections are preferable to appointments. Ms. Teressa Jimenez has urged Councilors to amend the 1995 town ordinance so that the eight filed candidates for council can now run for Mr. Strom's seat, along with those of incumbents Ms. Easthom, Mr. Harrison. Mr. Kleinschmidt, and Mr. Merritt. ”The timing of [Mr. Strom's] announcement comes across as sneaky and perhaps circumspect.” Apparently, she doesn't know that in southern Orange the person reporting the sneakiness is the problem, not the sneakiness.

Chapel Hill Councilor and mayoral candidate Mark Kleinschmidt admitted he had heard “speculation” regarding Mr. Strom, but he denied any conspiracy. ”People are going to infer crazy theories. Maybe he wanted the council to appoint his replacement. People are going to assume that it's a bad thing. We don't know that to be true.”

Perhaps conspiracy theories swirl because Mr. Strom reportedly lived in a Winnebago after selling his home and before selling out representative democracy in Chapel Hill.

See the Carrboro Citizen Fond Farewell Story.)

Does a living wage require more taxes by the town of Chapel Hill or merely a redistribution of the current wages being paid municipal employees? That’s the one question not raised by a group trying to get the town of Chapel Hill to adopt a living wage policy.

According to the Orange County Organizing Committee (OCOC), a “living wage“ means earning at least $15.31 per hour. At that compensation, one can afford a fair market rent of $796 for a two-bedroom apartment in Orange County. (“Affordable” means that no more than 30% of one’s gross income is spent on housing, as recommended by the U.S. Housing and Urban Development agency.)

The lowest paid Chapel Hill municipal worker earns $11.79 per hour. The OCOC wants the Chapel Hill Councilors to commit to a minimum base wage of $13.00 per hour, or 15% less than a living wage. According to the OCOC, the town could meet this “less than living wage” by paying 49 employees (about 7% of the present employee base) about $88,108 more in total personnel expenditures. (See Chapel Hill Herald Living Wage Story.)

Let’s look at the facts.

First, there's no requirement in the OCOC proposal for those receiving a living wage increase actually to have to live in southern Orange County, much less the town of Chapel Hill, the area for which the living wage has been computed. Those employees choosing to live ten miles away in a county with a lower cost of housing are still eligible.

Second, the table below shows the personnel expenditures for the Town of Chapel Hill over the past three budget cycles. One can see that the average expenditure per person for compensation is presently at $46,230, or about $23.00 per hour. In the context of the total personnel expenditures, $100,000 is about 0.3% of the budgeted amount.

(FTE – Full Time Employees) See ( Chapel Hill Budget Details.)

So the big question is, should the town redistribute 0.3% of the existing compensation spent on the highest quartile of municipal employees to the less than the bottom 10% of municipal employees making less than a living wage? Or is the principle of income redistribution not meant for municipal employees, and thus, should the town simply raise property taxes yet again?

Shades of the 605 West Main development debacle in Carrboro have come to Chapel Hill, but, of course, on a much grander scale. Not quite two years ago, the Chapel Hill governance board approved a mixed use village type project called East 54. Now that the “cruise ship” buildings have docked, rising six stories from the ground, in their permanent berths alongside NC 54, those same enthusiastic approvers of East 54 are hedging their bets.

What Is East 54?
East 54 is a new “luxury urban village” built on NC 54 at the old site of the University Inn. Developer dream team pal East West Partners (Mr. Roger Perry, Meadowmont developer and UNC trustee) is the lead group building another Chapel Hill mixed use village having 113,000 square feet of class-A office space and 60,000 square feet of retail space. These spaces support about 400,000 square feet of residences. At an average of 1300 square feet per residence, that’s over 300 residences.

Pulpsters can take a virtual tour of the coming 580,000 square foot luxury urban village that’s about half the area size of the Durham SouthPoint mall.

It’s SO Big!
That anyone who approved the project is now surprised by what’s being built is a condemnation of the town of Chapel Hill’s land development approval process. The sketches glibly tossed around at the East 54 approval are not binding on what the developer builds. What you see at a development approval public hearing has nothing to do with what you will get. (The Carrboro Board of Alderman found that out when 605 West Main was built and roundly condemned for its appearance.)

Developers don’t have to get approval for the style, elevations aesthetics, or facades of what they build.

According to Town Councilor Mark Kleinschmidt, a dense devotee, ”It's challenging for me when I see these buildings going up because they are so large. Just seeing something of that size go up, I think it's emotionally evocative because the change on its face seems so great. … My emotional response is, 'Wow, that's so big.'.”

Mr. Kleinschmidt offers no explanation why he or anyone else didn't know how “big”, big really was.

Fellow Town Councilor and dense devotee Laurin Easthom said people “did not realize how big and how dense and how much that has changed that particular area. I'm hearing that a lot. When I drive down that road, it's just a total change visually to the skyline.”

Ms. Easthom offers no explanation why she or anyone else should be surprised.

Faith In The Catechism of Density
Dense is as dense does. Chapel Hill Mayor Foy wants people to know, the town governance board really knows what it’s doing.

”Is that going to line 54 in and out of Chapel Hill? Are those the kinds of projects that are going to line Martin Luther King from downtown to 40? Is that what our future looks like? No, it doesn't have buildings lining all of those corridors. It's much more focused than that. I think people need the assurance that we've thought this through. The council has not just plopped down density just in a random fashion. [East 54] has been approved because it was within walking distance of a proposed transit stop.”

Mr. Perry, who is being rewarded handsomely by the approval of East 54 by Mr. Foy and company, believes that a dense future is the only option. ”I think the vast majority of the people in this community recognize that this is the kind of development that needs to occur on transit corridors. … This town's drawn an urban growth boundary around itself. The only way it's going to be able to survive as an economically sustainable community is with dense development.”

Mr. Perry doesn’t explain how Chapelboro will ever be able to get beyond being a factory town beholding to UNC. As such, Chapelboro can never be economically sustainable. UNC draws its economic marrow from the bones of 99 other counties in the state. By definition, can't be a sustainable economy except by the legislative fiat of state taxation.

Faith In The Catechism of Light Rail
Although there is no funded light rail transit system for the Chapelboro area and there's no rail at all along NC 54 in Chapelboro, the town of Chapel Hill has faith that it's coming. According to Town Councilor Bill Strom said projects like East 54 can pave the way for a “more robust” mass transit system. ”It's a change in the development pattern, but the guiding principle there is that it is at a regional rail stop. In order to get federal and state support for these projects, you have to have density organized in a way that promotes ridership.”

Mr. Perry's town governance pals are working diligently towards getting a commuter rail station built behind East 54 at taxpayer expense.

Infiltration Of The Heretics
But hereteical winds of change are blowing. For the first time in a very long time, not all members of the Chapel Hill governance board are true believers in dense growth for growth sakes. Town Councilor Matt Czajkowski, who wasn’t a board member at the time of the East 54 approval said “Virtually all the reaction I get to East 54 is negative. Clearly, that tract was going to get redeveloped, but developed with these monoliths right along the highway? That block the view of the hill, of Chapel Hill? That cast a shadow on the road? Is that what we want?”

Newest Town Councilor Jim Merritt, appointed to replace the late Bill Thorpe in October, and thus, not a board member at the time of the East 54 approval, has also heard complaints. He attended a forum last weekend for Glen Lennox residents, another community under dense growth assault. In his words, ”I'm not sure that was the appropriate place to put something that large. It's quite a bit of development there, just coming into the town of Chapel Hill.”

(See Chapel Hill News East 54 Story.)

As posted in the Pulp last September 2008, Developer Dream Team members D. R. Bryan, John Fugo, and Rosemary Waldorf proposed a six-story building in the middle of the village center. Back in September Developer Dream Team member, local political incumbent campaign contributor, and former Chapel Hill mayor Rosemary Waldorf,said ”[a] hotel or new residential condominium building could be a third 'anchor' in the Village Center, along with Weaver Street and the Lumina Theatre.” Ms. Waldrop and associates D.R. Bryan and John Fugo are all members of the team that won approval for a 1,000,000 square foot project at Buckhorn Village from the Orange County commishes.

Local citizen response was overall less than enthusiastic to the plans for a 90,000 hotel with 58,000 sq feet of parking.

Less than six months later, the Southern Village developers show their concern and respect for those citizens by revealing a plan that’s 33% bigger, one that encompasses over 120,000 square feet.

Here’s a table showing hotel project differences introduced since September's showing:

Lost recreational credits from the original zoning approval in paving over the open space and parking have not been discussed by the developers or town staff, an oversight of substance.

Showing just how clueless Southern Village residents are, Ms. Haleigh Cole told the Chapel Hill town planners that she doesn't want density in her community. ”Southern Village's appeal is in its small, suburban community environment,” she wrote. “However, over time that community is being invaded by unecessarily huge, city-like buildings. It's destroying our airspace. If this hotel is built … we'd be living in the shadow of city-like consumerism.”

No word on when the local media will inform its public that Chapelboro is engaged in small town urbanism, not small town suburbanism.

In the continuing saga which is the battle royale between the right for people to be free from abusive public behavior of others versus the right for beggars to ask for free money from others (an ability most highly developed in local politicians), the town of Chapel Hill is coming firmly down in the corner of panhandlers. Despite the efforts of that loveable, but wayward thinker, Councilor Matt Czjakowski, the right to beg for money is too precious to the social well-being of Chapel Hill society to restrict any further.

Mr. Czjakowski made the silly mistake of believing that he could look to town governments like Burlington, Vermont, i.e., towns with socialist leaning public policy, to find panhandling control laws that would meet the acceptable rigors required by Orange Progressives. He was wrong.

On 14 January 2009, Mr. Czjakowski proposed adopting the Burlington ordinances which would have increased panhandling free zones around bus stops from six feet to fifteen feet and increased fines from a maximum of $50 to a maximum of $500. In his words, ““The reason that I petitioned for this, obviously, is that there is sentiment within Chapel Hill and amongst other people who are familiar with Chapel Hill that Franklin Street is not a place necessarily that you always want to go. Not just because of panhandling, but because of loitering and aggressive behavior, use of loud obscenities and things of that nature.”

A fifteen foot beggar-free zone is just too much for solicitous Chapel Hill Councilors. Councilor Sally Greene, “friend of her backyard” neighborhood conservation district advocate, crack Lot 5 town negotiator, and a member of the Orange County Partnership to End Homelessness executive board, said Mr. Czajkowski is “asking the wrong question. I think the right question is the right balance for our community given some competing interests, and one interest that our citizens have is the right to panhandling and the right to be on the street as long as they're not being aggressive. I think we have an ordinance that goes far enough. I don't think we need to look into making the ordinance stricter than it is. I think we can look at enforcement and think about whether our existing ordinances are being enforced enough.”

Councilor Mark Kleinschmidt joined in on the “Mad Matt” bashing by saying the town has done a good job of responding to specific issues. Demonstrating his keen grasp of human dynamics, Mr. Kleinschmidt apparently believes that his private warnings to the Chapel Hill Police Department last year to back off panhandling law enforcement solved the panhandling problem. (In Orange Progressive logic, if you declare a problem not to exist, it does not exist.) Mr. Kleinschmidt is silent about the embarrassment caused by “Mad Matt’s” persistent public elevation of the non-enforcement of local panhandling laws. (To an Orange Progressive, if you remain silent about an embarassing situation, then the embarassment never occurred.)

(See the Herald Sun Soliciting Story.)

Imagine having to meet a deadline for introducing a new product to consumers. Imagine that your product development and commercialization staff is already overloaded with a big “must-do” product introduction. What would you do? Would you employ an outside, collective of pro bono (read “free”) people to get the job done? Or would you contract for for-profit professionals that must perform or lose future business?

If you’re the town of Chapel Hill, and your product is high denisty infill approval for your developer pals, then you opt for the pro bono non-profit people. Fortunately, when the job doesn’t get done, you shrug your shoulders and act chagrined. Even better, you use pro bono people with ties to the client (UNC) that’s got the rest of your town staff tied up. Failure is an option.

Over a year ago Mayor Foy sought to divert public concern over relentless dense infilling by creating a committee to rubberstamp the densification policy, the Strategic Planning Committee” (SPC). Unfortunately, Mr. Foy starts this year off by announcing on 7 January 2009 that the SPC can’t find a plan to move forward with its planning. In Mr. Foy’s words, town leader ”have not been successful”. Mr. Foy offered up the Durham Area Designers (DAD) as the sacrificial lamb. DAD didn’t facilitate the strategic planning process for the SPC in the Fall of 2008.

Who is DAD? DAD is a pro bono collective of planners centered about the UNC sphere of influence. They have done work not only for Chapel Hill (guidance on the Rogers Road Small Area Plan), but also work for the city of Durham. While a laudable collective, it’s not an operating enterprise with accountable staff and deliverable capacities.

With Mr. Foy being ”concerned that we've got Carolina North jamming us up”, the obvious question is, why then did you engage DAD, a non-accountable enterprise? If Chapel Hill and UNC are negotiating at long-term development of the university's Carolina North research campus, the next obvious question is, why did you engage DAD, a UNC-centered collective?

After piddling away a year, Chapel Hill town manager Roger Stancil offers the brilliant idea of hiring an outside, high density, planning professional to manage the project, at no cost to UNC of course. The town planning staff is ”really strained” from the combination of normal town business and the tight Carolina North timeline.

Is Mr. Stancil concerned about ordinary Chapel Hill citizens and what they want for their future? Not really. Mr. Stancil is concerned over the frustration of developers in interpreting the town’s drive for densification. According to Mr. Stancil, some developers interpret density as four-story buildings while others think it's 10 floors. Citizen concern over densification is planned to be strategically overlooked.

(See Herald Sun Straining Staff Story.)

In a fitting ending for a year of abysmally irresponsible government financial regulation, followed by panic federal government spending, Chapelboro governance boards want to join in. Wanting to chow down on the government “stimulus” spending being slopped into the federal government feed trough, the towns of Chapel Hill and Carrboro are milking their wish list of important infrastructure pork projects.

Here are some of the vital infrastructure ($47,000,000+) projects that will save the USA economy by adding their fair portion, nationwide, of a $1,000,000,000,000 in national debt.

No word on how much debt will be created for the firstborn child of 2009 in the UNC hospital.

(See Herald Sun Feed Trough Story.)

A local Herald Sun guest columnist revealed the first cracks in the Orange Progressive/Anarchist (see Ruby Sinreich) façade. Ms. Michelle Lewis dared to suggest that “… one day the luxury of feeling different may have to succumb to the reality that boutique governments are just too expensive. If that day has come, then Carrboro citizens should petition the town to study the cost savings a merger would produce. I expect the savings would be considerable.” (See Herald Sun Chapelboro Editorial.)

Ms. Lewis dared to point out that “Despite its small size, Carrboro has its own government and all the fixed and variable costs that go along with it…. Carrboro's town officials have been trying to reduce the residential property tax burden by increasing the commercial tax base. Yet when you have only 6.4 square miles within which to work, it's hard to accomplish without creating intense commercial development and very tall buildings.”

As a palliative to local progressives, Ms. Lewis blamed the reluctance of one neighborhood, The Highlands, to be forced into Carrboro through a coercive involuntary annexation seizure as being due to a paltry couple of hundred dollars a year difference in Chapel Hill versus Carrboro town taxes. (Pulpsters should note how those more overtly concerned with promoting social equity over monetary considerations always manage to refer back justifying the actions of those with whom they disagree in terms of money, ignoring opposing social equity considerations.)

Ms. Lewis ignores the fact that the neighborhood in question was not part of the Carrboro social fabric, and some four years later, still isn’t part of that fabric. Likewise, she ignores that the BOA for four years has broken its promise to provide the annexed areas with promised enhanced fire protection. Pulpsters can note that the roads in that annexed neighborhood haven’t even been annexed, despite repeated assurances to the contrary by Alderman Jacquie Gist.

In typical local progressive fashion, Ms. Lewis offers no practical plan as to how the local Carrboro “boutique government” leaders and town staff will be paid off to accept a loss in money and power.

In the words of that great progressive reformer, Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich, “[powerful political office] is a f@#$ing valuable thing, you just don’t give it away for nothing.”

Right before Chapel Hillians carved their Thanksgiving Turkey, the Chapel Hill Councilors, absent Councilor Matt Czjakowski, unanimously amended the special R-SS-C zoning district, almost tripling the existing density limits (floor ratio) from 0.4 to 1.1.

The density increase is in direct response to two new proposed residential dense developments being plopped in the middle of existing low density Chapel Hill residential neighborhoods. Profits will increase dramatically for the Ayden Court development proposed by Ms. Carol Zinn, and the Grove Park development proposed by the Rams Group of Lot 5 fame.

In the case of the Ayden Court development, Ms. Zinn can go from building 102,000 square feet of housing on 5.8 acres of land to her desired 180,000 square feet, the new limt being as much as 280,500 square feet. In plain English, if the average apartment/condo for Ayden Court is 1800 square feet, then under the new density limits, Ms. Zinn can build, not just her desired 100 units, but as many as 155 units. That density translates to building between 17 housing units and 26 housing units per acre in the midst of low density residential neighborhoods.

In true Orange Progressive fashion, when local developers need, the Councilors delivers, a special turkey treat just in time for the holidays.

Ms. Julie McClintock speaking for the Neighbors for Responsible Growth group and Ms. Dell Snow speaking for the Citizens United for Responsible Growth group, each asked the council to limit the R-SS-C amendment to the TC zones, the existing Chapel Hill downtown. Such a request would have not helped the Councilors pals, and thus, was dismissed after much individual councilor handwringing about needing citizen input for where to density infill the town . In the words of Councilor Bill Strom, “redevelopment [to high density] is good for the environment.”

The Councilors appeared to be confused by the following map produced by the town staff to identify activity centers within Chapel Hill.(See Town Council Meeting Video.)

Focusing on the pretty “walkability” rings, Mayor Kevin Foy said he wanted to see the tripled density apply only to the downtown, where everyone was in agreement about wanting heavy density.

In response, the town attorney proposed amending the R-SS-C ordinance to eliminate the phrase “and/or neighborhood commercial/ employment centers”, seemingly eliminating the R-SS-C district from being placed outside the downtown. As amended and adopted, a developer seeking R-SS-C consideration has to show “support of a healthy downtown district by identifying or providing reasonably accessible pedestrian/bicycle and non-vehicular access to such downtown district.”

An undefined requirement to “show support for the downtown” does not legally limit the R-SS-C zone to the downtown. Who makes that determination? The council. Is the decision quasi-judicial requiring “substantial evidence”? No. Can it be applied at a whim of the council? Yes.

As adopted, the R-SS-C zoning is NOT limited to the downtown, but can be applied anywhere there is one of the following districts - TC-1, TC-2, TC-3, CC, NC, 0I-1, I, R-6, R-5, R-4, R-3, R-2, R-2A, R-1, R-1A, R-LD1, or R-LD5 zoning.

Councilor Jim Ward spoke about reducing the pretty ring radius distance. Apparently, he wasn’t aware that the ordinance didn’t include any distance standard. Why not? The town staff didn’t want a distance standard. It would have eliminated the Grove Park and Ayden Court redevelopments.

The local media completely miscovered this event. According to the real estate advertisers, the council decided “not to allow the new denser zoning near ‘neighborhood commercial/employment centers’ such as Meadowmont, Southern Village, Eastgate, University Mall and Timberlyne.” (See Chapel Hill News Dense Coverage.)

Unfortunately that local media description is inaccurate. Upzoning the proposed Ayden Court and Grove Park developments to these newly tripled densities IS allowed by the approved R-SS-C LUO amendment vote of 24 November 2008.

On 27 October 2008, Chapel Hill Transit (CHT) driver Mr. James Willie Orr (age 65) struck Ms. Valerie Hughes (age 33), a radiology imaging specialist for UNC Health Care. Ms. Hughes had a “walk” signal to use the crosswalk at the intersection of Mason Farm Road and South Columbia Street, near UNC Hospitals where Ms. Hughes worked.

The bus was traveling about 15 miles per hour and making a left turn onto South Columbia Street and into the crosswalk. October's fatal accident was the third collision this year between a pedestrian and a Chapel Hill Transit bus on the UNC campus.

Mr. Orr, 65, was fired after the death of Ms. Hughes. However, the Hughes incident was hardly the first bus driving accident for Mr. Orr.

Mr. Orr had worked for CHT for eight years. During that time, the Chapel Hill Police Department investigated 10 wrecks (not including the Hughes accident) in which Mr. Orr was involved. Mr. Orr was at fault in most of the wrecks. In eight of the ten accidents Mr. Orr was in a town bus.

Mr. Orr has compiled the following accident record. In December 2007, Mr. Orr clipped a utility pole on East Franklin Street, damaging the bus's side-view mirror. In 2004, he rear-ended a vehicle that “stopped suddenly for a bicycle” on West Franklin Street. On two separate occasions (2005 and 2002), he backed into a car causing minor damage. In 2001 clipped his first utility pole on Pittsboro Street. Also in 2001, his bus collided with a car near University Mall when he failed to yield the right of way as the car stopped to make a turn.

Chapel Hill Transit's personnel policy states that when a driver has had two “preventable rear-end accidents,” the driver may be terminated. Mr. Orr wasn’t.

Town officials refuse to discuss why they allowed Mr. Orr to remain on the job, citing personnel privacy rules. In a “take charge” fashion, Town Manager Roger Stancil referred questions to public information officer Ms. Catherine Lazorko. In keeping with Chapel Hill bureauccratic tradition, Mr. Stancil has also hired yet another consultant to the town staff instead of requiring the staff to handle the problem.(See the Daily Tar Heel Bus Accident Story.)

No word on how much town transit insurance has risen due to the management decisions of town staff.

No word on how much the town of Chapel Hill will have to pay in settlement for this wrongful death.

No word on whether or not Mr. Orr will move to Carrboro to run for town alderman, following in the footsteps of recently elected Alderman Dan Coleman.

Hammered earlier this year in announcement of an 11% tax increase (see Pulp Chapel Hill Tax Increase Story), Chapel Hill Mayor Foy asks faithful to approve issuing library expansion bonds without telling how much your taxes will rise.

Library supporters want to expand the town library (separate from the county library system) from 45,000 square feet to 65,000. The cost will be $16,000,000 in capital bonds and $1,000,000 more per year in operational costs.

Showing faith based governance, Mayor Foy supports the 2003 voter approved library expansion bonds and is asking town residents whether they're still willing to pay more for a larger library. To assist citizens in proving their faith in OPie governance, neither he nor the town staff has issued any estimate of how taxes would increase in response to issuing the bonds.

See N&O Library Story.

No word on when a unified, county-wide library system will be considered over redundant, Balkanized town and county library systems.

Now you don’t see gangs. Now you do.

Pulp readers are familiar with the past inability of Chapel Hill politicians and officials to recognize publicly the presence of gangs and gang members in southern Orange. (See Gangs in Southern Orange Stories.) “Facts optional” behavior is acceptable in southern Orange governance, particularly if it's in furtherance of local business interests. Gang presence has not been wanted… until now. Thus, gangs have not been present, despite warnings from outside southern Orange.

Gang presence now serves a governance purpose as a Halloween “devil inside the party” threatening public safety. Thus, gang members in Chapel Hill (at least as Halloween party visitors) now can be acknowledged.

Mayor Foy created the need for a scary bogeyman by declaring in August 2008. “I think the first thing is to make it clear to people that they're not invited. It's a local party. The trend is toward larger and larger crowds; the trend is toward longer and longer nights, and that's a trend that we need to reverse. We want Halloween to be an event that students and people in Chapel Hill can continue to enjoy, but we want to stop it from being regional or statewide.” See Pulp Foy Halloween Story.

In response, Police Chief Brian Curran and Recreation Director Butch Kisiah deliver the gang bogeyman on schedule. ”As the years have gone by we have observed fewer people in costume and more people who come for the sheer spectacle of the crowd. Many people come from out of town. Binge drinking prior to arriving on Franklin Street is common. Included in this crowd, unfortunately, are those who would look to take advantage of this situation in a mean, violent or criminal manner. We have observed over the past several years the addition of criminal street gang members mingling through the crowd.” See Herald Sun Halloween Story.

Town expenditures of $221,000 to subsidize a UNC student street party are complemented by a survey of local businesses indicating that money is lost by businesses during the Halloween event.

No word on whether or not the sighted gang members are just wearing gangster Halloween costumes.

On 9 September 2008, the Chapel Hill Councilors ignored the recommendations of the town planning board and approved “Woodmont”, another, so-called “smart growth” village mixed use (VMU) development comprising 91,500 square feet of office space and at least 88,900 square feet of multifamily homes and retail spaces. Located in Durham County as the town of Chapel Hill spreads beyond single county boundaries, Woodmont will eventually comprise up to a total of 600,000 square feet of VMU use, located off N.C. 54, east of Barbee Chapel Road.

For those Pulp readers wondering why the town of Chapel Hill is in Durham County, state municipal annexation law is designed to promote cross county annexation by towns and cities. The annexation of the vacant Woodmont acreage is designed to promote deals between politically connected developers and town governance boards such as the Chapel Hill town council.

In April 2008 the town planning board saw Woodmont as an office park disguised as a VMU, a VMU to be plopped into the middle of low density residential use. Such conclusions are not surprising given that the owner of Woodmont project is a well connected Triangle office park developer, Capital Associates.

The town council saw tax revenues. Money to feed a ceaselessly burgeoning government bureaucracy trumped any zoning legal concern over the rights of nearby residential town citizens, who can’t afford to move elsewhere regardless of what the council approves.

The town council saw an office park amidst low density residences as being in furtherance of the town’s comprehensive zoning plan, an office park built with the tallest structures on the highest point of the landscape.

The town council saw an office park with six story structures and segregated multi-family residential structures as fitting within the two to three story structures with integrated living units described for VMU use in the town’s comprehensive zoning plan.

The town council saw a fit between Woodmont (an office park with two story, lighted parking decks, and segregated high density residences (8 to 15 housing units per acre)) and existing low density residences.

The town council saw no problem with approving Woodmont without any promise as to when a separate new traffic intersection would be built onto NC 54, one of the most congested roads in southern Orange, even though NCDOT has a current backlog of $65,000,000,000 in requested projects statewide.

The town council saw a reduction of 10% in traffic use for an office park because of the existence of Chapel Hill Transit, even though Woodmont is not scheduled for a transit stop, the closest stop being half a mile away at the Meadowmont VMU.

The local media saw increased real estate advertising revenues. (See N&O Woodmont story.)

The power of locally connected developers over Orange County governance boards continues unabated. Developers of the Chapel Hill village mixed use (VMU) hill sprawling, twisty road community known as the “Goat Trails” (aka Southern Village) have proposed a six-story building in the middle of the village center. Less than a decade ago the 60-foot spire on Christ United Methodist Church symbolized the faith of local urban planners in “humanizing” suburbia. Now that spire will be dwarfed by the new symbol of local urban planning, the Trump-like profiteering of a high end condo block blocking people's views.

Currently, the village center has parking for those visiting the stores and shops of the village center. In the words of developer dream team member and former Chapel Hill mayor Rosemary Waldorf, ”[a] hotel or new residential condominium building could be a third 'anchor' in the Village Center, along with Weaver Street and the Lumina Theatre.” Ms. Waldrop and associates D.R. Bryan and John Fugo are all members of the team seeking approval for a 1,000,000 square foot project at Buckhorn Village.

No local political observers see the well-heeled developers having any difficulty in getting their friends on the town council to rezone the entire village center as a VMU, a designation not in existence at the time of approving the Goat Trails. As reported in the Chapel Hill News, the increase of 90,000 additional square feet (sf) would take the village to about 440,000 sf, not counting about 58,000 sf in structured parking below the building.

In the words of local campaign financial contributor Ms. Waldorf, ”It gives the building owners here a little bit more flexibility in responding to the market.”

No word on how the developers will make up for the lost recreational credits in paving over the open space and parking.

Related Companies, L.P. is an opaquely owned firm that develops, manages, and finances affordable apartment complexes, more than 1,100 properties in 47 states. Related wants to buy and rehabilitate a 1970s apartment complex in Chapel Hill, the Timberlyne Apartments complex, 144 garden style apartments at 200 Westminster Drive.

The entire complex will be converted in one fell swoop to low income housing. According to the developer, the complex currently has 80% market rate tenants and 20% low income tenants. After the rehabilitation project is complete, all of the the units will be set-aside for tenants who are 60% of the area median income or below.

There’s only one hitch, Related Properties wants to rehabilitate the complex using $8,000,000 of tax exempt financing issued by the town of Chapel Hill, along with $1,700,000 of tax credits against future taxes allocate by the state (through the North Carolina Housing Finance Agency (NCHFA)).

Taxpayers beware. If these “pass-through’ bonds are issued to further private profiteering, the town’s credit rating can be affected if the private entity defaults.

The issue has been transferred to the town Council Committee on Affordable Housing, (see town memo).

Pulp readers are aware of both the increase in seroius crime activity in southern Orange County and the denial of local public officials that crime is a problem, as robbery occurs openly on the UNC campus (as reported by the N & O}.

In the latest Opiate move (not in response to increased local crimes, but merely to remove unwarranted fear of local crime) the municipal governments of Chapel Hill, Carrboro, and Hillsborough have banded together under a new public safety initiative called “Community Safety Partnership”. The program enrolls government employees to report suspicious activities or violations while performing their non-criminal enforcement roles. Even the water police, OWASA, are joining in, throwing in their fleet of meter readers.

On 9 September 2008 by Mayor Kevin Foy of Chapel Hill, Mayor Mark Chilton of Carrboro and Mayor Tom Stevens of Hillsborough announced the public safety program. Government employees are being charged notifying law enforcement if they come upon anything of a suspicious nature, an accident, or perhaps a citizen in trouble or need. Community Safety Partnership troops are undergoing training to report ”motor vehicle accidents, reckless/impaired drivers, crimes in progress, audible alarms, overcrowding of bars or restaurants, blocked or obstructed fire hydrants, damage to firefighting equipment, parking in fire lanes, illegal burning, environmental issues, other hazardous conditions and water main breaks.”

Stressing that there is no link between crime rates and the new program, Mayor Foy said in a town media release, “Our communities are safe places to live, and our crime levels are low; nevertheless, there is much we can do to create an environment free from crime and the fear of crime. Public servants who regularly work outside in the community in various capacities already are a great a resource and have potential to be even more helpful to residents.”

No word on when cameras will be installed outside every home to increase safety and the reporting of municipal violations by town citizens.

Orange County offers continuing health benefit coverage to former elected officials. Although these elected positions are part time positions supposedly performed as a public duty, local elected officials have deemed their sacrifices so great that they should receive lifetime benefits that even part time municipal employees that have worked for decades don’t get. Such is the nature of progressivism in southern Orange where many work in a bubble of health care benefits not shared by those on the lower side of median income levels. (See Opies.)

The feeling of entitlement is best described by Mayor Kevin Foy. He tried in the summer of 2008 to get such benefits for Chapel Hill elected officials. (See Pulp Chapel Hill Health Benefits Story.) According to Mr. Foy, town council work is demanding and limits some members to part-time jobs without health insurance. Raising the “pre-existing condition” concern that affects every Chapel Hill citizen and not just Councilors, Mr. Foy says, “Then what do we do [if they get a pre-existing condition]? Have a bake sale?”

Now the N and O reports that, according to a UNC-Chapel Hill School of Government professor and the Mecklenburg County attorney, such benefits may not be legal. (See N&O Health Care Benefit Story.)

Mr. David Lawrence, UNC SOG professor, says that state law allows employees or officers covered by a retirement benefits system can also receive health insurance after retiring. However, town and county board members aren't eligible under the law for membership in the retirement plans.

Elected officials are waking up to the conditions most citizens face in obtaining health care insurance. Individuals and small businesses have to pay much more in health insurance if they or their personnel have developed medical conditions. Local elected officials don't want to share such pain. They feel entitled only to gain.

In Orange County, one former commissioner gets health benefits from the county, with Commish Moses Carey becoming eligible at the end of the year.

No word from any municipal attorney on Mr. Lawrence’s opinion.

No word from any local municipal elected official on why they shouldn’t receive instead a “gold card” to the local UNC emergency room, where they can wait for hours to receive medical attention amongst the flood of ciudad del santuario residents clogging the system.

Ostensibly everything from not asking for new taxes to holding off permanent health care benefits for retired local officeholders has been affected by the poor state of the economy. But you would never know that from the latest political junket leaving southern Orange.

Everybody who is anyone feeding at the local tax trough is going for a three day jaunt to beautiful Ann Arbor, Michigan. Why there? According to the Community Leadership Collaboration, “leaders of the greater Chapel Hill and Carrboro community to learn from the experiences of another successful community and to create and strengthen relationships among participants that will help us successfully address our community’s challenges and opportunities here in Orange County.”

Individual cost for this junket? About $1500 when all is said and done.

In these tough economic times, about 40 people from government are going, for a cost of about $60,000. Local tax exempts receiving funds from those government officials will be there too. About six of them. Don’t forget the development interests, friends of the government officials all. There will be about 20 of them.

Be square if you are not there at taxpayer expense.

No word from the local steno pool on the total cost to local taxpayers.

The star studded list:

The town of Chapel Hill is finally looking at the financial costs of creative class events such as the Halloween Night party on Franklin Street that attracts 80,000 attendees. Town costs are about $200,000 for one night of wretched excess.

When asked about people from outside Chapel Hill attending the gala festivities, Chapel Hill Mayor Foy aka (“Mr. Diversity”) says, “I think the first thing is to make it clear to people that they're not invited. It's a local party. The trend is toward larger and larger crowds; the trend is toward longer and longer nights, and that's a trend that we need to reverse. We want Halloween to be an event that students and people in Chapel Hill can continue to enjoy, but we want to stop it from being regional or statewide.”

When questioned on the financial savings to the town if the event is reduced in size, Mayor Foy unabashedly with a straight face replied, ”What people need to understand right now is we're working on making Halloween a smaller and safer event. We're not trying to save money. We're trying to make sure we have a safe environment for people.”

Daily Tar Heel Halloween Story

No word on how much UNC is offering in funds to compensate the town for a student party event.

Orange County tourism woes will be solved by political junketeering. County Commish Mike Nelson is coming to the rescue with another junket, this time to hunky Vancouver, British Columbia. Pulp readers may remember previous Commish Nelson junkets, such as his visit to South Beach in Miami to free Elian Gonzales from the reaches of his father.

Although tourist spending was up 7% in CY 2007 ($147,550,000), it’s down in Orange County for CY 2008. For the first time in five years, southern Orange lodgings weren’t booked at graduation time, according to Ms. Laurie Paolicelli, executive director of the Chapel Hill/Orange County Visitors Bureau.

For Pulp readers familiar with the economic theorems of supply and demand, the growth in available rooms may be part of the reason. But that hasn’t seemed to occur to Ms. Paolicelli. She and Commish Nelson are eyeing the gay and lesbian tourism market to save local tourism. They will attend at taxpayer expense the International Conference on Gay and Lesbian Tourism in Vancouver to promote the Chapel Hill/Orange County area as a place to visit and hold meetings. In Ms. Paolicelli’s words, who worked for the Palm Springs Visitor's Bureau, ”It saved Palm Springs' tourism industry, and Sonny Bono was very supportive of it”. (See Chapel Hill Nelson Junket Story.)

Neither Ms. Paolicelli nor Commish Nelson has provided any look at a thought out program for Chapel Hill successfully promoting itself as a “gayborhood“ worth visiting. Chapel Hill must compete with the likes of the Florida gayborhood powerhouses of Key West, Ft. Lauderdale, and South Beach as well as the California powerhouses of Santa Monica, Palm Springs, and San Francisco. Apparently they are unaware of the three steps to successful GLBT marketing, namely, getting in depth knowledge, positioning and preparing oneself, and finally reaching out. (GLBT Marketing Advice.) The bottom line is that GLBT marketing doesn’t come cheap and requires a constant pumping and flow of public tourism funds.

Chapel Hill has a long way to go in order to become a destination gayborhood. It’s not even on the gay college town “B” list where it might have a chance to reach around onto the gay “A” list. According to OutTraveler, the top ten college towns for gay travel are: Austin, Texas; Columbus, Ohio; Madison, Wisconsin; Iowa City, Iowa; Ann Arbor, Michigan; Bloomington Indiana; Lawrence, Kansas; Columbia, Missouri; Champaign Urbana, Illinois; and Lincoln, Nebraska. (See Top Ten Gay Travel College Towns.)

No word on whether or not another Gay Pride parade will be sponsored by the town of Carrboro akin to the 1995 butt cheeks and chaps sashay display.

As noted last week in a public statement by Chapel Hill Councilor Mark Kleinschmidt, “We're a community that fortunately has a lot of people on the street at a time. Those people are having a good time and visiting businesses downtown and they're walking around spending money. That kind of place is generally where people ask for money and where people gravitate to.”

Recognizing the ”geniousity” of Mr. Kleinschmidt, a gentleman armed with a shotgun is believed by police to have committed two robberies within 10 minutes of each other on Sunday evening (20 July 2008).

Two men were walking south in an alley near the Varsity Theatre toward East Franklin Street around 6:30 p.m. A man approached them, produced a shotgun and demanded money. About 10 minutes later, a woman was in her vehicle using at automated-teller machine at a Wachovia Bank at University Mall, at South Estes Drive and U.S. Highway 15-501. Allegedly, a car pulled up beside her. A man with the same description as the Franklin Street robber got out of the car and approached her vehicle. He produced a shotgun and demanded money.

(See WRAL Robbery Story.)

The failure of Chapel Hill to arrest a resident charged with serial misdemeanor criminal offenses leads to the fecal smearing of a public bathroom in Sugarland, a Franklin Street business in downtown Chapel Hill. Town leaders don’t rally to the victim, the business owner. In a “three stooges” response so typical of Chapel Hill, they rally instead to the side of the fecal smearer.

If you commit misdemeanor crimes and warrants are issued, in most towns in North Carolina you will be arrested. Not so in Chapel Hill.

Here are the bare facts, as reported by the local media. (See Herald Sun Homeless Man Story.)

Walter Cates, a homeless man, was being held in lieu of $300 secured bond in the medical unit of Raleigh's Central Prison on Thursday, one day after a warrant was taken out by the owners of Sugarland. (See Sugarland.) He was arrested in the 100 block of Main Street in Carrboro.

Mr. Cates is wheelchair-bound with part of one leg amputated as a result of severe diabetes. He regularly sits outside Sugarland near a bus stop and a crosswalk.

On 15 July 2008 a man wheeled Cates into the bathroom at Sugarland. Co-owner Katrina Ryan told the two men to leave, citing previous disputes with Cates and complaints of trespassing they'd filed with the Chapel Hill Police Department. They refused to leave the bathroom. When Cates exited about 15 minutes later, Ms. Ryan found human feces scattered on the floor and smeared on the walls.

Upon being called to the scene, the Chapel Hill police told Ms. Ryan that they couldn’t arrest Mr. Cates because they hadn’t seen him smear the feces on the wall. However, the police stepped in and told Mr. Cates to leave and not return to Sugarland.

Too bad the local media doesn't report that in Chapel Hill, no one from the town government will step in and assist a business owner until they have feces smeared on their walls… and then only out of fear of embarrassment will they give as minimalhelp as possible.

In Chapel Hill, victims have to go out and claim justice for themselves. So the Sugarland owners had to go into court without town support and repeat their complaints to a magistrate the next morning in order to geta warrant.

Pulpsters may remember previous Pulp stories about troubles downtown. (See Pulp Genital Exposer Story and Pulp Genital Exposing Civil Rights Story.)

Yes, Mr. Cates was involved.

No, no one from the local media or police did anything after the Pulp publications.

Why is that important?

Mr. Cates has gotten bolder in his criminal actions over time, what one would expect as a rational response to irresponsible criminal justice administration. The untold story is that Councilors (such as Sally Greene and Mark Kleinschmidt) have interfered with the administration of justice using their executive imprimatur.

Mr. Cates is alleged to expose his genitals to Sugarland employees. Town response is having Councilor Mark Kleinschmidt comes to his general defense.

Mr. Cates is alleged to lewdly solicit young women at Sugarland. A warrant is taken out. Nothing happens. In fact, according to Orange County officials, a series of warrants dating back to 2006 have charged Mr. Cates with disorderly conduct, soliciting or begging for money, misdemeanor larceny, driving with a revoked license, and, now, damage-to-property.

Frustrated by town inaction, Sugarland co-owner “Doc” Ryan is reported to say, ”It's horrible, We feel it's a fraudulent misrepresentation for the Town Council to say that they care about downtown at all.”

Town stooge “Moe” (Councilor Mark Kleinschmidt) charges “Doc” Ryan with being associated with a ”school of thought in town” that any punishment short of hauling panhandlers off Franklin Street and jailing them for a long period of time is too soft. “Moe” believes Chapel Hill's panhandling ordinances are “plenty tough”. In Chapel Hill you can get fined up to $50 if you ask for “contributions” within 6 feet of a bus stop, 20 feet of an ATM or on a town bus.

“Moe” Kleinschmidt also labors under the belief that Chapel Hill has ““challenges related to this issue that other communities don't have. We're a community that fortunately has a lot of people on the street at a time. Those people are having a good time and visiting businesses downtown and they're walking around spending money. That kind of place is generally where people ask for money and where people gravitate to.” (No report on whether or not “Moe” has ever visited the many towns scattered across North Carolina to see that, amazingly,they too have tourists walking sidewalks.)

Town stooge “Larry” (town manager Roger Stancil) responds to the arrest by blaming the actions of an individual on a broken mental health system in North Carolina. (There is no record of any mental health problem with Mr. Cates that would require being put in a mental health institution.) “Larry” says ”I think it's really easy to blame the town and the police because we're right here.”

Town stooge “Curley” (town police chief Brian Curran) says that Mr. Cates is a well-known exception who poses several challenges for the Chapel Hill Police. According to “Curley”, Mr. Cates' wheelchair is a problem for patrol cars. (Apparently, “Curley” forgets that the police own a number of SUVs that can easily accommodate someone with a wheelchair.) Also, if the Orange County jail doesn’t have room for Mr. Cates, then the police ask for Mr. Cates to be released. (No word on why “Curley” felt that feces had to become involved before Mr. Cates is put in jail, as in this instance.)

“Curley” Curran also confirmed that Chapel Hill police have previously waited to serve warrants on Mr. Cates until he had sufficient warrants for them to be embarrassed at their inaction. For “Curley”, ”It's such a production to get Walter served. We're not talking about warrants where he's shooting people or anything like that; it's usually failure to appear or something like that.” (No word on whether or not any other miscreants are piling up warrants in Chapel Hill. If about to be arressted by Chapel Hill police, you can mention the policy regarding Mr. Cates and ask for equal treatment.)

Unbelievably, although Mr. Cates committed his fecal smearing less than two blocks from the local courthouse, according to “Curley” Curran, it's a ”challenge” getting Mr. Cates to show up in court. Because of his travel difficulties, the Chapel Hill police runs a taxi court service for Mr. Cates when he needs to show up.

In a related business story, sales of Sparky’s turd polish have skyrocketed.

As reported in April 2008 in the Pulp (see Pulp Exposer Expose), civil rights are important to Orange Progressive politicians. Not in the manner of Dr. King marching in Memphis for the rights of municipal workers, but in the manner of browbeating municipal workers (the local police) not to do their jobs.

Rogue Councilor Matt Czajkowski, continuing his streak of not drinking the Orange Progressive Cool-Aid, raised the specter that Chapel Hill may not have a monopoly on good governance, in general, and may not have workable solutions to unwanted public behavior such as public urination, public shouting of obscenities, or public genital exhibition, in particular. As can be seen on video (see Chapel Hill Meeting Video at the five hour mark), on 25 June 2008 Mr. Czajkowski spoke up about people not wanting to visit Franklin Street. He spoke about finding successful, proven ways to counteract unwanted public behavior downtown.

The bastions of Orange Progressive civil rights, Councilors Easthom, Greene, and Kleinschmidt acted as if Mr. Czajkowski had publicly urinated on the council table.

In a surreal demonstration as to how “reasonableness” is considered “unreasonable” in southern Orange, Councilor Greene led the charge by going off on the assertion that “it's already been done”. She did so without once admitting that there is a real problem with unwanted public behavior in downtown Chapel Hill.

Councilor Easthom bemoaned the problem as not being one of irresponsible behavior for which an individual should be held accountable. For her, the problem is one of the social condition imposed by society on an individual. Apparently, homelessness induces public urination lewdness, and obscenity.

But the piece de resistance of surreal argument belongs to Councilor Mark Kleinschmidt. He used Mr. Czajkowski giving the example of a “street person” shouting public obscenities as “proof” of Mr. Czajkowski being biased against street people in terms of their civil rights. Without Mr. Czajkowski having said anything like that either directly or indirecty, Councilor Kleinschmidt had no compunction in charging Councilor Czajkowski with being only against unwanted public behavior by street people. Apparently, Councilor Kleinschmidt feels that if 95% of the public urination is caused by a small minority of people, then implementing effective ordinances against public urination by those people would be a violation of their civil rights.

Pulpsters remember that Mr. Kleinschmidt previously has marched down to Chapel Hill Police Department headquarters and read the riot act… to the police concerning a gentlemen in a wheelchair who has publicly urinated in front of children at Kidzu. To Mr. Kleinschmidt, the rights of a serial lewd pervert demand more protection than the rights of young children.

No word on when room and board at their home will be offered the Franklin Street flasher by either Councilor Easthom, Greene, or Kleinschmidt.

With all the furor over Chapel Hill Councilors voting to give themselves (since rescinded) health benefits most citizens don’t have and, even more amazingly, benefits even town part-time employees don’t have (see Pulp Healthcare Benefits Recission Story and Pulp Healthcare Benefits Heavy Lifting Story ), Councilor Laurin Easthom has sleuthed around and found the source of discontent. It’s the vaunted and powerful Chapel Hill Republican lobby which has the enviable record of having no registered Republican holding a local office at least since Reconstruction, if then.

In a guest editorial in the local real estate advertiser, Ms. Easthom showed true Orange Progressive leadership. She didn’t explain why she thought she was owed free health care. She didn’t explain why she thought using the consent agenda process to stop public debate was okay. (All she had to do was ask Mayor Kevin Foy to remove the healthcare item off the consent agenda before the vote and there would have been discussion.) She didn’t explain why holding office in Chapel Hill has been shape-shifted from public service into public gain.

Ms. Easthom believes that the healthcare item “has been completely overblown”. She goes further, “Some of those who have been the most outspoken, and continue to criticize and continue to threaten to put out petitions on items other than health care, are Republicans.” For Ms. Easthom, “[t]he fire was indeed started, but I think it is continuing to be fueled by a group of individuals who would love nothing more than to “stick it” to the council and pave the way for their candidates next year to run. It just makes me want to run more.”

Unfortunately, Ms. Easthom failed to note that Chapel Hill elections are non-partisan.

Showing the true backbone of progressive leadership, the Chapel Hill Councilors voted on 17 June 2008 to rescind their vote last week to give themselves health benefits most citizens don’t have and, even more amazingly, benefits even town part-time employees don’t have. See Pulp Heavy Lifting Healthcare Benefits Story.

In keeping with fair and open government, Mayor Foy refused to let a petition organizer (equipped with over 500 signatures within one summer vacation week) speak out about the issue at Monday's meeting, pleading the press of heavy local developer approvals on the agenda.

According to Mayor Foy, council work is demanding and limits some members to part-time jobs without health insurance. Raising the “pre-existing condition” concern that affects every Chapel Hill citizen and not just Councilors, Mr. Foy said “Then what do we do [if they get a pre-existing condition]? Have a bake sale?”

Showing the true nature of progressive leadership, the Chapel Hill Councilors voted on 9 June 2008 to give themselves health benefits most citizens don’t have and, even more amazingly, benefits even town part-time employees don’t have.

All you have to do is serve eight years on the Chapel Hill Town Council, and you have 75 percent of your healthcare benefits paid for by Chapel Hill after you leave office, period.

The caring and sharing nature of second termer Mayor Kevin Foy can be seen in the town’s “fair and progressive” process. The healthcare benefits decision was placed on the consent agenda, thereby depriving public input before a vote. Councilors took their vote BEFORE citizens could comment. One speaker after the fact said in a “disgruntled” tone, ”Does it matter what I have to say if you already voted to approve it?” To which Mayor Foy glibly responded, ”We can change it.” No changes were made despite Mr. Foy admitting the unpredictable nature of the cost of the healthcare benefits he will be eligble for at the end of his present term.

Once again Councilor Matt Czajkowski proved his “unreliable” progressive nature. He pointed out that town taxpayers could pay for decades if a young candidate completes two terms in a part-time job. (See Pulp Czajkowski Off Medications Story.) Not understanding how Orange Progressives ignore financial cycles relying on the non-local university economic engine, Mr. Czajkowski said, ”This is not the time for the council to be voting to spend money on itself” .

Mr. Kryder also ignored the true spirit of Orange Progressivism, offending the sensibilities of all Councilors, save Mr. Czajkowski, saying, ”I don't want a young person coming up here, serving eight years and then having me pay 75 percent of their health care, I think that's atrocious.”

See Herald Sun Healthcare Benefits Story.

Unfortunately, small business owners who rent space can forget to negotiate with the landlord on a lease extension before the lease is close to running out and they have few options. After 18 years in Eastgate Shopping Center, Joe Rowand learned in February 2008 that his Somerhill Gallery's lease wouldn’t be renewed with 45 days to vacate.

Trying to stay in Chapel Hill, Mr. Rowand needed 9,000 square feet, a lower rent pricing, a vehicular traffic location, and accessible. Finding that combination in Chapel Hill is like finding a shrine to Jesse Helms in Chapel Hill. See N&O Somerhill Gallery Story 1.

So, the gallery is moving to Durham in the old American Tobacco complex. See N&O Somerhill Gallery Story 2.

In the words of the crackerjack Chapel Hill municipal tax paid ED manager Dwight Bassett (who works in close coordination with the crackerjack Orange County municipal tax paid ED manager, who works in close coordination with the crackerjack Carrboro municipal tax paid ED manager, who works in close coordination with… well, you get the picture) “there wasn’t enough property selection for Somerhill to consider in relocating in Chapel Hill and that there were specific needs that could not be accommodated with our existing inventory”.

Having lost this premier art gallery, Chapel Hill compensated by hiring a Public Arts administrator for the 50 pieces of Chapel Hill public art, yet another full time employee added onto the swelling public job rolls, with a salary of $63,000 annually.

On 14 May 2008, Chapel Hill Town Councilor Matt Czajkowski revealed once again that he’s not taking his political medications. He confused local town financing of elections with a guaranteed means for subsidizing incumbent campaigns.

Councilor Czajkowski got into a tussle with guardian of the civil right to micturate publicly, guardian of the civil right to expose genitalia publicly, and executive director of yet another local tax-exempt organization Councilor Mark Kleinschmidt. According to the stellar logic of Mr. Kleinschmidt, ensuring a candidate’s viability by requiring an unknown challenger to get a large number of contributors before receiving public money will increase the chances for a diversity of opinion on the town board. Mr. Kleinschmidt (an incumbent up for re-election next year and anticipating recipient of a taxpayer campaign subsidy) didn’t address the difference in difficulty between an unknown challenger reaching this goal and a well-known incumbent reaching this goal.

Town Councilor Laurin Easthom (also up for re-election next year and anticipating recipient of a taxpayer campaign subsidy) backed up Mr. Kleinchmidt in his circular thinking. Ms. Easthom, an apparently self-described not-as-privileged licensed realtor, licensed dentist, and amazingly low $460,000 assessed value, 4000 square foot homeowner in the Larkspur subdivision, raised the politics of envy by charging Mr. Czajkowski as being ”luckier” financially than most Chapel Hill citizens.

No word on whether or not the rest of the council will seek judicial authority to administer medications forcibly to Councilor Czajkowski.

No word on when the Councilors will file full financial disclosure statements to show just “how lucky” each has been in life.

See Pulp Czajkowski Transfer Tax Story.

On 28 April 2008, Chapel Hill Town Councilor Matt Czajkowski revealed once again that he’s not taking his political medications. He’s immune to bozo tax shilling.

Former Chapel Hill Councilperson, Orange Progressive propagandist, and Carrboro Mayor political attack surrogate (aka ”Weaver Guy” on local political blogs and forums) Joseph Capowski spoke at the town council meeting for the home equity tax/local land transfer tax vote on 6 May 2008. (See Hot Orange Capowski Shill Story.)

Councilor Czajkowski cast the lone dissenting vote against the local transfer tax resolution. Unbelievably, he claimed the home equity/land transfer tax was just a way for politicians not to be held accountable for the financial consequences of their growth policies. Again showing disturbing logic, he said, ”We need to put greater restraints on property taxes. To me, this is a backdoor tax that allows politicians to avoid higher property taxes.”

No word on how the rest of the council intends to administer medications to Councilor Czajkowski.

No word on what additional full time employee the town manager will now hire to address the Councilor Czajkowski “crisis”.

No word on whether or not the next state Bozo convention will be held in Chapelboro.

See N&O Capowski Shill Story.

On 22 April 2008, Chapel Hill town Councilman Matt Czajkowski revealed once again that he’s not taking his political medication. He’s not drinking the Chapelboro Cool-Aid.

A public hearing was held concerning the proposed “Residences at Grove Park”, yet another higher density infill project for Chapel Hill. The proposal is to tear down 111 units on 12.9 acres and replace them with 346 units and 580 parking spaces. The site is located between Hillsborough Street and Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd. at 624 and 626 Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd. and at 425 and 429 Hillsborough Street

The developer is none other than Ram Development, the development group that is in partnership with the town of Chapel Hill in developing the town-owned Parking Lot 5 on West Franklin Street.

Councilman Matt Czajkowski had the audacity to question Mr. George Cianciolo (Chapel Hill Planning Board chair) with questions about why higher density infill is desirable for Chapel Hill, why growth for growth sakes is good public policy.

Further, Mr. Czajkowski showed disturbing logic in stating that “if more people are living in Chapel Hill but driving to work at RTP, what is accomplished by transit-oriented development? Certainly not a reduction in fuel usage or emissions”.

Finally, Mr. Czajkowski showed a complete lack of appreciation of planning poseur form (see Phictionary) in pointing out that Mr. Cianciolo was advocating for living near work and taking public transit while he doesn’t do so himself.

Consummate Chapelboro Cool-Aid drinker, executive director of yet another local tax-exempt organization, and on-again, off-again political power couple paramour, Mark Kleinschmidt showed the resolve of the majority of the board, stating that Chapel Hill is under a lot of pressure by developers who want to build similar properties. Speaking the language of a staunch property rights Republican, Mr. Kleinschmidt opined ”We as the town can't strip someone's private property interests from them. No matter how much we want to do that in some instances, we can't do it. It's a fundamental right that they have. We can't close the door on that. We did it for eight or nine months in the northern area and you remember what that was like. Everyone was screaming at us. We got sued.”

No word from Mr. Kleinschmidt on whether or not the town being a partner with Ram Development on Lot 5 colors his reasoning.

Civil rights are important to Orange Progressive politicians. Not in the manner of Dr. King marching in Memphis for the rights of municipal workers, but in the manner of browbeating municipal workers (the local police) not to do their jobs.

Local politicians often wonder out loud why more people don’t visit Franklin Street. You might get the chance to visit with an older gentleman in a wheelchair. He might lewdly solicit you if you're a young woman. He might urinate in front of you. Then again, he might just be content with exposing his genitalia to you.

The flashy Franklin Street fixture has been cited dozens of times for his questionable behavior. So what do Councilperson Sally Greene and Councilperson Mark Kleinschmidt do about this situation? Why they march right down to Chapel Hill Police Department headquarters and read the riot act… to the police.

The gentleman in the wheelchair has civil rights. He can’t be stopped from cruising Franklin Street sidewalks. He can’t be stopped from urinating at will in front of Kidzu.

Councilpersons Greene and Kleinschmidt appear to prefer to protect the rights of a serial lewd pervert over protecting the rights of young children.

No word on the affordable housing to be offered the Franklin Street flasher by the town council.

In a strategic planning aka cumbaya (see Phictionary) session, Chapel Hill Councilman Matt Czajkowski spoke up about the social engineering aspects of the craze for developer profits in pushing mixed use developments. Mr. Czajkowski had the audacity to challenge if families prefer to live in high rise, multi-family, mixed use developments. ”Guys, you're making a massive assumption that families want to move into high density development.”

Mr. Czajkowski’s remarks were in response to Mayor Kevin Foy’s comment that ”We assume that mixed-use development is the best development, and on top of that, we assume that people want to live in dense development.”

In an Orange Progressive put-down, executive director of yet another local tax-exempt organization, on-again, off-again political power couple paramour, and fellow Town Councilman Mark Kleinschmidt accused Mr. Czajkowski of “harboring a 1950s perspective”. Readers should note that Mr. Kleinschmidt wasn’t born until the late 1960s and is not a practicing breeder (see Phictionary).

Town councilman Jim Ward piled on indicating that he didn’t care what ordinary families wanted. He doesn’t care if people want to live in high density developments. He assumes that it's the best way to grow Chapel Hill. “And you're making the assumption that they will or will not [live in whatever the council wants them to live in],”

No word on why any social engineering councilman thinks that growing Chapel Hill’s population is desirable.

No word of any discussion of carrying capacity occurring to the social engineers of the cumbayah circle.

See Chapel Hill Herald Cumbayah Story.

Orange Methodist Church on Historic Airport Road (MLK Blvd.) in Chapel Hill has been the site of religious worship for over 180 years. As its congregation has expanded, its facilities have grown as well. Now church elders want to build a 57,000-square-foot addition and 188 extra parking spaces on the 16-acre site.

Not wishing to be surpassed by the usufructing (see Phictionary) movement in ”Keep It Weird” Carrboro, the Chapel Hill Planning Board has requested that the town council “encourage” the church to consider a publicly available park-and-ride facility at the site. According to the Planning Board turning the church parking lot into a park-and-ride would help the town meet its goal of increasing bus ridership, as well as mitigating traffic from Carolina North. But then, according to this Planning Board, there should be fewer public parking spaces at Carolina North (less than one mile closer in to the Chapel Hill historic business district) when it’s built.

Usufructers must wait until the March 17 meeting to see if they get private land for public parking spaces.

No word on whether or not the lack of parking and traffic issues will limit the development of Carolina North instead of local churches.

No word on whether or not the Town Council will solve the problem of downtown parking lots that remain unused before muscling a church for free town parking.

No word on which churches Planning Board members attend that only use parking lots on Sundays.

No word on where church members are supposed to park for the daily activities of daycare, bible studies, youth groups, community meetings, ESL classes, funerals …

SeeOrange Methodist Church.

SeeN&O Town Council Story.

Ken Pennoyer has been hired as the new business management director for the Town of Chapel Hill, at an annual salary of $112,000.

Roger Stancil, town manager, says ”Ken's considerable experience in managing the finances of a larger neighbor that is also a Triple A bond rated community will benefit Chapel Hill. His experience with managing technology as well as financial operations makes him a perfect candidate for this newly defined position. I am delighted with our Town's ability to attract and retain individuals of such high caliber to our senior management team.”

According to the town press release: “Pennoyer has worked as finance director for the City of Durham since 2003 and as assistant director since 1999. A certified internal auditor, Pennoyer holds a Master of Business Administration from Villanova University in Pennsylvania and a Bachelor of Science degree from Central Connecticut State University. Stancil said the new director will be tasked with transitioning the finance department into one that manages the business of the Town including budget, accounting, business analysis and information technology. He will be a strategic partner with both core administrative departments and key operating departments in thinking about the future of the Town and addressing future challenges.”

Mr. Pennoyer’s experience includes advising Durham in 2006 on a non-competitively bid proposal by the New York-based firm of Rice Financial Products (Rice), a proposal to swap $106 million in municipal debt for lowered interest rates. Rice would have tried to exploit differences between the bond rates used in the US for tax-exempt debt and the bond rates that European banks charge each other for deposits to make money for both itself and the city. In this proposed financial deal, Rice was reported to be due to receive $700,000 in fees for its services, along with $40,000 to lawyers and $100,000 to a city consultant.

The Rice deal wasn’t without downside risk to the city. While Rice projected that Durham could’ve saved as much as about $8,000,000 over 15 years, it also could’ve lost as much as about $14,000,000 if market conditions changed adversely, what Mr. Pennoyer described as “negative savings”. The Rice proposal was put in front of the city council for a vote despite a substantial lawsuit ($231,000,000 in damages) facing the Rice firm from a disaffected California water district client (West Basin). In addressing the observation that Rice might be bankrupted (having fewer than 30 employees), leaving Durham to collect from the proposed insurer of the deal (the Bank of New York), Mr. Pennoyer is reported to have said that ”The concern is that this lawsuit could impact Rice's ability to execute the contract. Obviously, that the case exists is not good.”

At the time of the deal being presented, one former West Basin board member (Tyrone Smith) had pled guilty and was imprisoned for receiving cash bribes from Rice’s consultant (who had been paid $250,000 by Rice to win approval for the company's rate swaps). Furthermore, Rice’s political consultant on the West Basin deal also had pled guilty to bribery charges. (Rice denied any complicity or liability.)

Also at the time the News & Observer asked Duke University law professor James Cox, a legal adviser to the New York Stock Exchange, to analyze the West Basin legal filings. Professor Cox said that the case against Rice was strong. He also said that Durham's approval of a deal with the firm at that time would have been irresponsible. “This is an investment banking firm in a free-fall situation. If they [the Durham council] are sold on the rate swap, they should consider using another firm. To do business with a company under the cloud of criminal acts in a noncompetitive contract? It defies reason.”

In 2006, Durham voted 4-3 for the Rice debt swap deal. It was never consummated. As quoted in the 11 August 2007 Herald Sun, Mr. Pennoyer said ”The market was pricing [the Rice deal] in a way that didn’t meet our [savings] threshold. That is at this point off the table.”

(Portions originally reported in the N&O. See N&O Rice deal story.)

(For further commentary, see INDY Rice deal story.)