Don heard that a store in Burlington sold Cheerwine with real sugar, not high-fructose corn syrup, and always one to encourage a healthy lifestyle, I went with him to search. I’d never been to Burlington beyond the outlet stores that used to flourish off the interstate until Tanger Mall lured them away. As we drove […]
All posts tagged affordability
Urban renewal
Posted by Nancy Oates on December 15, 2014
https://chapelhillwatch.com/2014/12/15/urban-renewal/
DHIC project DOA for now
Last week, the N.C. Housing Finance Agency announced its list of tax credit winners for affordable housing projects. DHIC was not on it. Recall that Town Council had agreed to sell 8.5 acres of vacant cemetery land to DHIC for $100 if the nonprofit would build workforce and affordable senior apartments there. DHIC said it […]
Posted by Nancy Oates on August 25, 2014
https://chapelhillwatch.com/2014/08/25/dhic-project-doa-for-now/
Section 8 crisis
The old joke goes that former first lady Nancy Reagan followed up her “Just Say No” drug abuse prevention program by tackling homelessness, with “Just Get a House.” Making decent housing available to people even in the lowest socio-economic categories has no simple solutions. Earlier this month the mayors of Chapel Hill and Carrboro staged […]
Posted by Nancy Oates on August 18, 2014
https://chapelhillwatch.com/2014/08/18/section-8-crisis/
Granite countertop city
Last week, the mayors of Chapel Hill and Carrboro held a press conference to wring their hands over the affordable housing crisis wrought by owner/investors of workforce apartment complexes no longer accepting Section 8 vouchers because those owner/investors realized they could install granite countertops and double the rent. While the mayors were pleading with those […]
Posted by Nancy Oates on August 11, 2014
https://chapelhillwatch.com/2014/08/11/granite-countertop-city/
Chapel Hill politics, Chicago style
My sister in Chicago periodically sends me articles about the shenanigans of Chicago politicians: ex-convicts who have served time for bribery, tax fraud and corruption running against one another; and a “visionary leader/advocate” filing to run again now that he’s out of prison for getting $40,000 of home renovations done in exchange for zoning changes […]
Posted by Nancy Oates on June 2, 2014
https://chapelhillwatch.com/2014/06/02/chapel-hill-politics-chicago-style/
Housing hypocrisy
I couldn’t help but wince when council members began their remarks at the May 19 Town Council meeting after nearly a dozen community members made impassioned pleas for money to support affordable housing. One organization played a 9-minute video of interviews with people who had benefited from affordable housing programs in Chapel Hill, perhaps assuming […]
Posted by Nancy Oates on May 26, 2014
https://chapelhillwatch.com/2014/05/26/housing-hypocrisy/
Hometown brand
Driving home from Raleigh one spring night with my car windows rolled down, I stopped at a traffic light. A car pulled up beside me, and the driver hollered out, “You must be going to Chapel Hill. I can tell by your bumper stickers.” Chapel Hill used to be known as an enclave for liberals: […]
Posted by Nancy Oates on April 7, 2014
https://chapelhillwatch.com/2014/04/07/hometown-brand/
Public-private = win-win
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 […]
Posted by Nancy Oates on March 31, 2014
https://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
https://chapelhillwatch.com/2014/03/24/plans-vs-promises/
Tenant cap could tap down rents
UNC student Kylee Wooten has the proper mindset to succeed as a first-year associate in a big-city law firm: a willing slave mentality that all but welcomes abuse. I gleaned this from an essay she wrote pleading for the town to raise the occupancy cap on the number of unrelated people who can live together […]
Posted by Nancy Oates on January 6, 2014
https://chapelhillwatch.com/2014/01/06/tenant-cap-could-tap-down-rents/