When I sat in the audience, mining Town Council meetings for material for my Chapel Hill Watch 
blog, solutions to the problems council members wrestled with seemed so obvious.
Once I was elected and shifted my seat to the dais, the answers weren’t so black-and-white. The job requires more nuance, discernment, balance and patience than it appears.
So having four former council members endorse me for re-election speaks volumes about my ability to do the job. Former council members Jim Merritt, Matt Czajkowski, Joe Capowski and Julie McClintock have evaluated my performance during my four years on council and want me to serve four more. All four have confidence that I will represent them and other town residents fairly.
Looking out over the audience from the dais, I get a better sense of the imbalance of power in the way our processes work, how members of the community have to turn out in force to rebut a development team, and even then, their concerns sometimes are brushed aside by a polished presentation from a developer who does that for a living.
As council members, we have to have studied the information staff sends us prior to each meeting. We ask questions ahead of time, sometimes doing our own research. Every decision we make involves a tradeoff.
We read through hours of emails every week and take time to craft a thoughtful response. We find ways to interact with the community, to get out and about outside of our typical routine, to understand what life is like for the diverse constituency we represent.
And on top of that, we have to pay attention to the dynamics among council members on any given night and our ongoing relationships with one another.
Four former council members, from four different eras, approve of how I’ve done my job for the past four years and want me to continue for four years more. They know the intricacies of the job and the stamina and forbearance it takes. Their endorsement holds tremendous value to me.
Please join them in voting for me to continue to work for you for one more term on Town Council.
— Nancy Oates
