I sure would like to see the document Matt Czajkowski was asking for at last Monday’s Town Council meeting. Czajkowski had requested a one- or two-page listing from town staff that would lay out what other financing or bond requirements, certificates of participation, interest-bearing and required debt service, and other fiscal obligations that the town […]

Randy Kabrick, OWASA’s board chair, may have thought that the upside of sitting through four hours of a Town Council meeting before he had to give his report Monday night might work in his favor. Council members might be too worn out to pay much attention. He could run through his PowerPoint slides and be […]

The list of items on the Town Council agenda for tonight’s meeting is long. There are many topics to discuss, but a few do stand out. Town staff is recommending that the council take no action on a petition regarding the operation of the town’s skate park. Ryan Ogilvy, manager of the Chapel Hill Skate […]

When I was a kid, we sometimes played a game called Hot Potato. Kids would sit in a circle and toss a ball to one another while music played; when the music stopped, the one holding the ball was out, gone, loser. That Hot Potato concept may explain why 140 West Franklin seems to be […]

Nancy and I got an invitation to speak about community journalism and the role blogging can play in keeping residents informed. This afternoon we’ll talk to students in a class taught by Leroy Towns, a professor in the UNC School of Journalism and Mass Communication. Prepping to speak to the fast-track freshmen got us to […]

Will Raymond mentioned at the Town Council public hearing Monday night that Google Fiber would bring benefits to Chapel Hill that we can’t see right now. He’s right about that. But he didn’t mention that those benefits will come at a cost in privacy and how much marketers and the government know about us. The […]

Taking the long-term view before making short-term fixes yields better decisions and reduces the chances of having to make expensive, time-consuming corrections. Some members of the town’s Sustainable Community Visioning Task Force have taken a stand for looking at the overall needs of the community and how action in one part of town affects the […]

If you had to decide between parking on a side street for free or paying $450 for a spot nearer the office, which would you choose? I know what my decision would be. And I believe it’s the same as a bunch of UNC workers who seem to have chosen to park on the streets […]

Having been a public servant, I know firsthand how some members of the public (oftentimes lawyers) view the “servant” part literally and treat us accordingly. So I should have been better prepared for town attorney Ralph Karpinos’ disingenuous response to my e-mail. Months ago, I sought an answer to a simple question: What would it […]

No tow truck operators showed up Monday night at the Town Council meeting. No vehicle owners with a burning desire to test their luck on private lots anywhere downtown. And no parking lot property owners. The council’s scheduled public hearing on the town’s changes two years ago to the fees that can be charged for […]