Chapel Hill needs a Stuyvesant Town, a large-scale complex of safe, well-built, no-frills apartments with rents affordable to your average working stiff. For some years during my New York days I lived in Stuy Town, an 11,000-unit complex built on 80 acres of what used to house leaky gas storage tanks and businesses and apartments […]
All posts for the month March, 2014
Public-private = win-win
Posted by Nancy Oates on March 31, 2014
http://chapelhillwatch.com/2014/03/31/public-private-win-win/
Plans vs. promises
At its March 10 meeting, Town Council passed an Affordable Rental Housing Strategy that was such a foregone conclusion it should have been on the Consent Agenda. But without the fanfare of a staff-narrated PowerPoint and a time for public comment, council members and town staff would have been deprived of a feel-good moment. And […]
Posted by Nancy Oates on March 24, 2014
http://chapelhillwatch.com/2014/03/24/plans-vs-promises/
Hounding town staff
Town planning director J.B. Culpepper and I* went to see “The Great Gatsby” at the library, rather than attend the Planning Board meeting taking place at the same time. Culpepper evidently had confidence, as did I, that town planning department staff would do their job in presenting the revised plan for Timber Hollow to the […]
Posted by Nancy Oates on March 17, 2014
http://chapelhillwatch.com/2014/03/17/hounding-town-staff/
Brass tacks, not bronze plaques
Sometimes when I feel overwhelmed by deadlines, I’ll make a list of all I have to do, then slip in something that’s so easy to do it’s almost a given. “Wash hair,” I might write, or “check email.” I do that first, then I can feel like I’ve accomplished something, and I’ve managed to procrastinate […]
Posted by Nancy Oates on March 10, 2014
http://chapelhillwatch.com/2014/03/10/brass-tacks-not-bronze-plaques/
To our health
At the Feb. 24 Town Council meeting, a community member asked council members to pass a resolution urging Gov. Pat McCrory and the General Assembly to accept the opportunity to expand Medicaid, an option made available by the Affordable Care Act. The cost would be paid for by federal taxpayers, 100% for the first three […]
Posted by Nancy Oates on March 3, 2014
http://chapelhillwatch.com/2014/03/03/to-our-health-2/