Bright spots

Over the past four months, we at Chapel Hill Watch have ranted and raved, chided and complained, held politicians’ toes to the fire and picked nits. We’re giving it a rest for the next few days to enjoy Christmas with our family. One of our traditions is looking at holiday lights. Here are some bright spots we’ve found around town:

U.S. 15-501 North, between Smith Level Road and the entrance to Southern Village: A couple of small brick ranches on the east side of the highway have created a winter wonderland that ranges from angels to elves, all lit up in colored lights, blinky and not.

Pinehurst Drive in Meadowmont: While the Old Money homes in The Oaks were a disappointment, one segment of Pinehurst in Meadowmont made up for it. Note the polar bear with the jaunty cap camped out on the lawn of No. 1152 and the 8-foot-tall nutcrackers guarding the door at No. 1148.

Honeysuckle Drive at the T with Sedgefield: Peer into the window behind a small stand of electric trees in primary colors to see the tallest indoor Christmas tree we’ve seen this side of Biltmore.

543 Piney Mountain Road: Santa prepares to drop down an inflatable chimney amidst hardwoods draped in colored lights.

Intersection of Old Forest Creek and Old Forest Creek: The yard is a veritable birthday cake afire with tiers of lights. Lit candy canes and an army of miniature Santas edge the curb, and lighted balls dangle from a tree. Circle the entire Old Forest Creek loop and peer into the cul-de-sacs. See the snow fall at No. 222?

N.C. 86 South, across the road from Joppa Oaks, about a mile south of Interstate 85: Set just to the south of Hillsborough, this house takes holiday lights displays seriously. Dozens of Santas cavort among a forest of electric trees. Angels hover and icicles drip from the eaves. In the center of it all is a small lighted cross. Well worth the drive.

Chandler’s Green: Enter at Sweeten Creek Drive off Sunrise Road to tour a neighborhood that could double for Universal Studio’s set from Christmas — the Movie. The tree dipped in red lights at No. 3605 sets the tone for these unique but tasteful displays. With icicles dripping from the eaves and a wreath and candle in each window, the houses at No. 7700 and No. 7600 Amesbury must have been beamed over intact from New England. No. 3903 Sweeten Creek wrapped its pillars like candy canes. Farther down the block, No. 4005 commands “Santa Stop Here” amid strands of colored lights, including blue and purple. Next door at No. 4007, an inflatable nutcracker looms over Santa sitting outside an igloo, huddling with his reindeer around a fire.

We’ll be back Monday. Happy holidays.

– Nancy Oates

Economic forecast

Last week the Home Builders Association of Durham, Orange and Chatham Counties teamed with the HBA of Raleigh-Wake County to organize the Triangle Housing Forecast, a three-hour seminar featuring a nationally known economist and several local experts in the housing industry. Taken on its own, the overall picture was discouraging. But compared to Atlanta and communities in Florida and California suffering the aftermath of popped real estate bubbles, the Triangle didn’t look so bad. Chapel Hill, in particular, had some veins of hope.

While Mark Vitner, a senior economist with Wells Fargo, acknowledged that the number of job losses nationwide — more than 9 million — is expected to exceed every post-WWII downturn, it has hit the private sector hardest and university towns and government seats the least. More of the jobs in Chapel Hill are through the state university than in the private sector. However, we don’t have a statistic that indicates how many town residents are employed through private enterprise as opposed to the state university. Anecdotally, we surmise that many of our town government employees can’t afford to live in Chapel Hill.

Residential real estate sales in the Triangle are down sharply compared to 2007 figures. But bear in mind that 2007 was an unusually good year for real estate sellers. The majority of home sales that closed this year were in the $300,000 and lower bracket. The average price of a home in the Chapel Hill school district that sold in 2009 was about $375,000.

The housing market is always cyclical. Many of the homes in Chapel Hill sold for significantly less than their 2009 tax valuation. Though that means Chapel Hill homeowners will pay tax on a value that is way above what they could hope to reap selling it, the Chapel Hill residential real estate sales in 2009 reflect a price correction that in the long run will stabilize the market. Data indicate that most people own their home for four years, on average, so most likely only people who bought a home in the past three years and had to sell this year lost money on the sale.

And 2009 marks the end of cheap and abundant credit. Though mortgage rates are expected to remain low in the coming year while unemployment is high, banks are increasingly reluctant to lend to private borrowers. This creates an opportunity for governments to snap up land with less competition.

Now might be the time to scout land for that new police station.

– Nancy Oates

A hybrid with zero mileage

Most people would agree that offering more challenging courses in the Chapel Hill-Carrboro high schools would be a good thing. The administrators in Lincoln Center, however, seem to have a different opinion.

There’s a debate developing in local education circles over whether to add some honors classes to the high school curriculum – advanced versions of some classes in the core curriculum. Right now, students who find classes are not challenging have no option but to take AP level courses. What’s needed is something in-between – honors classes.

The schools already have honors English and math courses. But biology, chemistry, physics, world history, civics and economics, and U.S. history only come in one flavor – regular — unless students enroll in the college-level AP courses. Adding honors levels to those courses would provide that step in-between.

Here’s what we’re looking at. In the course proposal included in the school board agenda for Dec. 3, the description for Honors U.S. History says the course would provide “the opportunity for advanced work, rigorous academic study and the practical application of the major ideas and concepts found in the study of American history . . . students will be expected to work independently at times and accept greater responsibility for their learning. The course is challenging and requires students to participate in problem-seeking and problem-solving, scholarly and creative processes, critical analysis and application, reflective thinking and the expression and defense of ideas generated through the study of the content.”

How could anyone be opposed to that? Well, some teachers don’t like honors classes because, they contend, there would be more white and Asian students in those classes and more black and Hispanic students in the regular classes. Teachers also worry that students will be placed on a track that will limit later choices. Students might be locked into a series of courses that could be too difficult.

Despite those reservations, CHCCS teachers have recommended regular and honors sections of those three science and three social studies courses, as is done in nearly every high school in the nation.  However, the folks at Lincoln Center want a hybrid model for all the classes except chemistry. In the hybrid model, the classes would mix in honors-level students with other students – “differentiation.”

The school board doesn’t like the hybrid model.  The teachers don’t know how they would teach a course in which students were “differentiated.”  There are no schools in North Carolina that use this model.  There has been no professional development in differentiation for CHCCS high schools teachers and no funding or plans for differentiation this year.

That’s where we stand. The school board decided at its Dec. 17 meeting to direct the administration to present options for honors courses in all six classes at its Jan. 21 meeting and to have a public hearing at a Feb. 3 meeting.  A decision would come in February or early March.

–Don Evans

More presence

Now that the Town Council has appointed a black woman to serve out the term of the vacated seat, someone in Town Hall needs to gets serious about improving minority representation on the 20 boards and commissions that advise the council and help inform its decisions.

In order to give the council advice that reflects the community’s wishes and needs, you would hope that the boards reflect the community.

But that’s not necessarily the case. The 20 boards and panels – from the Board of Adjustment and the Cemeteries Advisory Committee to the Personnel Appeals Committee — consist of 211 residents. For the most part the boards are about as white as they can be. There are exceptions, of course, but you won’t find a lot of minority participation on most of the boards. In fact, eight of the panels are all-white.

The Public Housing Program Advisory Board includes three blacks among its 10 members. That’s as diverse as it gets with these town panels. There is only one Hispanic among the 211 board members – she’s on the Bicycle and Pedestrian Advisory Board. Twelve blacks serve on the various boards, and five board members are of Asian/Pacific ancestry. That’s it.

The whitest board of them all is the Public Arts Commission, which has 15 members – all white.

There are more men on the boards, but only slightly more – 116 to 95. There are six boards that have more women on them than men, with the Personnel Appeals Committee and the Public Arts Commission the most attractive to women.

Serving on a board can be a big commitment of time. The Public Arts Commission meets once a month. Other boards meet less regularly, but serving on an advisory board or commission is generally for a three-year term, and applicants must complete and return a form to the town clerk. Then council members must vote to approve each appointment. Right now, a majority of the panels has at least one vacancy.

Let’s face it: Having a black woman on the council is only a start. Until the town does a better job of getting minority representation onto these boards, the decisions that affect all residents will not be as racially informed as they should be. While the council tries to get more of a minority presence, it must do more to attract minority representation on the panels that advise the council.

–Don Evans

Frank and earnest

The Frank has proven exciting to people who are not artists. Will the new gallery that had its grand opening Monday prove as exciting to UNC students, football fans and other out-of-town visitors? The gallery and the town are betting that those folks will drop in at the gallery and then be inspired to drop some cash at other Franklin Street businesses.

A nonprofit group of 25 artists formed the Franklin Street Arts Collective and, with the help of a $40,000 small-business loan from the Town of Chapel Hill to fund the collective, will open the gallery in the former Rite Aid building at 109 E. Franklin St. That unveiling of creative endeavors won’t be until late January and more likely early February because a good deal of uncreative wall painting, floor sealing and display-wall building needs to be completed.

Once all that is complete, the downtown will have an arts jewel that, while it can’t quite compare with Carrboro’s ArtsCenter, will be a step in the right direction. Kind of cool that a space where shoppers used to buy bandages, mercurochrome and prescription drugs will be graced with paintings and sculpture, and visitors will have access to the folks who actually made the art and can browse as well as discuss what went into this landscape or that photograph.

The gallery is 3,400 square feet and will be operated by the collective’s 25 member artists and include another 50 regional and national artists. They’ll do the staffing and create displays.

Gordon Jameson, chairman of the Franklin Street Arts Collective, said he envisioned the gallery as a way to help revitalize downtown as well as become an economic driver. He and Chapel Hill Mayor Mark Kleinschmidt want the gallery to be a jewel on Franklin Street.

Who knows – maybe we’ll get to see some of Dwight Bassett’s work there, since the town’s economic development officer, who played a crucial role in making the gallery a reality, is a sculptor. Might be kind of cool to sample his artistic chops.

–Don Evans

Strom’s legacy

Now that the Town Council has shown that it will take democracy only so far, it’s time to progress to the next phase of L’Affaire Bill Strom and count the blessings that the missing councilman left us, time to assess Strom’s legacy and review the things we have to be thankful for because of Bill.

Are you counting?

Still assessing?

There’s gotta be something there. Let’s see: Strom’s actions blessed us with five months of an empty council seat, which some wags would argue is one fewer politician heaping criticism on Matt Czajkowski for putting the kibosh on benefits for life.

I know town staff are grateful they don’t have to worry about the Strominator interfering in the selection of art projects – Strom terminated the downtown art kiosk because he didn’t want work by his ex-wife selected.

Strom’s abdication fostered vigorous debate among citizens about the best way to fill the vacancy, passionate debate that most council members ignored in a patronizing display of “we know best.” The majority of council members ignored informed residents such as Jim Merritt, who favored giving that seat to the fifth-place finisher, and the actions of a past council that filled the vacancies left by Joe Herzenberg and Roosevelt Wilkerson in the mid-1990s with fifth- and sixth-place elections finishers. Instead, they appointed one of the mayor’s ardent supporters and campaign worker. So much for our mayor’s plea not to “in the middle of something, change the way you do something.”

I guess we can be thankful that cloning has not advanced to the point where former Councilman Joe Capowski could get his wish that Strom could be cloned as his own replacement.

Laughter can make a community a better place, and Bill Strom’s name has become a popular punch line: A politician who sells his house on the QT, sends e-mail around town about his plans to move to New York (though ostensibly leaving his council colleagues off the recipient list), lies when questioned by a reporter, tenders his resignation days after the deadline to put his seat on the ballot, then turns off his cell phone and hops in an RV for a cross-country jaunt. At least it wasn’t to Argentina.

OK, so I’m not coming up with much here. Guess I’m going to have to appeal to those in the know, those who worked with Bill and can list his accomplishments. I’m not talking about how many boards he served on or who he bullied into getting his own way. Don’t regurgitate that silly town resolution our mayor slipped in his first night on the job. Give me something that is concrete and has made the community a better place to live in.

We have plenty of space here at our blog, so don’t hesitate to list every little thing that Bill did to make this a better community. Don’t be shy. Just list all that you know. Every little thing. Right here . . .

–Don Evans

Minor league

One of the advantages of going to the Town Council meetings in person, rather than watching them on TV “in the comfort of your own home,” as town news releases advise, is that you are privy to such off-camera moments as the look on Council member Penny Rich’s face when her colleague Ed Harrison championed the presence of women in politics because they have given us sidewalks, and he’s all in favor of sidewalks.

Early on in the meeting, Rich had let loose with a diatribe about how offended she was that a citizen had sent her an e-mail pointing out that Donna Bell, mother of a not-yet-year-old baby, might find the time commitments of serving on Council too taxing. Rich took umbrage that the citizen had not posed that concern about other candidates, even though the youngest children of the other candidates were school age.

Harrison, who prior to voicing his support for Bell warned Council members that they would be hearing more from his wife in the future, presumably heard it from his wife when he got home that night. At least we hope that she will be able to tutor him as to why his comment, though falling short of offensive, might have left some of us feeling discouraged about our elected representatives.

Several Council members made comments Monday night that showed why they are still in the political minor leagues. Mayor Mark Kleinschmidt used the we’ve-always-done-it-this-way defense to explain why the vacant council seat couldn’t be filled through a special election. “It would have been extremely bad policy to, in the middle of something, change the way you do something,” he said. Rich worried that black residents wouldn’t have any way of expressing their concerns to Council without one-of-their-own on the dais. Laurin Easthom registered awe about a “smart, intelligent” black woman, calling Bell “great,” though Bell has yet to do anything other than serve a few months on a town advisory committee after dropping off of the Planning Board some years back.

And as the Council rained accolades down on Bell, there sat Aaron Shah with some of his children witnessing how town government works in Chapel Hill. I don’t know what circumstances of life left Shah a single father of so many children, but I believe successfully running such a household is not easy, regardless of gender. His experience as a father and a coach of high school students suggest that he has a strong, persuasive voice, one that did not campaign for Kleinschmidt. It’s easy to see why the mayor would prefer Bell, his political ally and someone who listens as a profession.

Now that the Council has gender equity, let’s see whether these women use their voices, or whether they’ll blindly follow the plays of the Council’s Coach K.

– Nancy Oates

Politics, Chicago-style

Donna Bell got 6 votes and was elected; Matt Pohlman got 3,365 votes and was not. Go figure.

To show his willingness to serve on council, Pohlman campaigned more than 10 weeks,  participated in all 17 forums, raised money and had his positions on town issues questioned and examined through newspapers and Web sites and in person by voters. Bell typed up a one-page letter to the council saying she wanted the position.

At the special meeting Monday night, the new council appointed Bell, a loyal supporter of Mark Kleinschmidt for mayor, to the seat abandoned by Bill Strom, instead of listening to the thousands of voters who vetted and chose Pohlman. The council wanted to appoint a black person, and Bell had more experience than Aaron Shah on town boards (two, one of which she resigned from). To be fair, at least Matt Czajkowski and Gene Pease acknowledged that there had been an election and that the council should mind its results. Pease actually cited reason as a guide for making his decision. Imagine!

But Laurin Easthom said her vote as a council member was more important than the 3,365 that Pohlman garnered. Sally Green said having an appointed black member was more important than those 3,365 votes. Penny Rich was swayed by one e-mail that questioned the added stress of council duties on the mother of young children, and somehow that was more important than 3,365 votes. And Jim Ward all but said he was not going to be influenced by an election.

Bell contributed time and money to Mark Kleinschmidt’s mayoral campaign. She also posted an endorsement on Kleinschmidt’s election Web page, and she allowed her name to be used in an ad for his candidacy. And she passed out campaign literature in the Booker Creek precinct for Kleinschmidt’s campaign. By Chicago standards, patronage made the job hers, not Will Raymond’s, with his encyclopedic knowledge of town workings, or Pohlman’s, with his endorsement from 3,365 voters.

How much pressure is on Donna Bell now that she is a Town Council member? Lots. She must prove that she indeed represents the black community, as she pledged to do if appointed to the council seat. She has praised the Greenbridge project even though many in her Northside neighborhood, which it abuts, have opposed it. Will she keep her pledge to her neighbors? Or to the man she helped elect as mayor?

She’ll find few role models for representing constituents on this council. Many of its members make tough decisions easier on themselves by ignoring facts along with constituents, and cast their votes to make themselves feel better. Perhaps worried that they might need to begin reaching out to the black community and encouraging fledgling black candidates in the election process, they can relax after last night’s vote. Now, that responsibility is Bell’s.

–Don Evans

What is diversity?

Word on the street is that Mayor Mark Kleinschmidt is working to marshal four additional votes to appoint Donna Bell to the vacant council seat. She’s a Northside resident and landlord, and Kleinschmidt owes Northside voters one for tipping the election in his favor. Plus, Bell is black, and by appointing her, Kleinschmidt can scratch “diversify council” off his to-do list.

And if he does, he’s missed the point.

I’ve been working on a project with Duke’s Office of Institutional Equity, and on Friday I had some interesting conversations with Duke’s director of diversity and equity programs, the director of affirmative action and equal opportunity programs, and the director of harassment prevention and special projects. I wish Town Council could have listened in.

One of the main points that Duke’s director of diversity and equity programs tries to get across to executives and other team leaders in the diversity and inclusion dialogues she facilitates is that diversity is not containerized by representation. True diversity is not a numbers game. Rather it comes from doing the hard work upfront to create an environment in which people of different backgrounds can express their unique contributions and thrive, and the workplace is better for it.

One point the director of affirmative action and equal opportunity programs made was that to appoint someone based solely on race, ethnicity or gender is illegal.

The leaders of the black community have been noticeably silent on Kleinschmidt’s quest to fill a hole on the council’s diversity scorecard. Whether they feel sufficiently a part of Club Council to be heard, I can’t say.

Voices that have spoken up are the 3,365 residents who voted for Matt Pohlman to serve on council. I hope council members will listen to those voters. If the council sets its goals with inclusiveness in mind, Pohlman, with his financial expertise, is in a better position to help council achieve its goals than Bell, who is a social worker and presumably an expert listener. But every council member should aim to be an expert listener, even after the election. One need only look at Pohlman’s family to know that he has considered ethnicity issues. And Pohlman’s CPA skills enable him to make tax dollars go farther, so the town can afford to do more for those who have been disenfranchised historically.

True diversity leverages the unique talents contributed by people of different races, ethnicities and genders, even those people who are white and male. Let’s lobby council not to take the easy way out.

–Nancy Oates

A sales update

Just to update the latest sales figures for 140 West Franklin from Ram Development: A company representative sent an e-mail saying it has 30 signed contracts.

Wait a minute, isn’t that the same number the company gave out in September? Only then it was people had put money down on 15 units, and others had given their word to buy 15 more. That’s, um, let me get out the calculator, yep, that’s 30 units. The company’s chairman, Peter Cummings, also used that number in a story in The Chapel Hill News at the end of November.

Hmmm. By all appearances Ram hasn’t sold another unit since September. Or at least, its sales have not kept up with cancellations. But Cummings expects lower prices to spur sales to the point that another 30 units will be sold during the winter and spring, thus enabling the company to borrow the money it needs to move the project forward.

My source says I will get an update on any more sales as they become available. For the past year, all the updates we’ve received give the same numbers.

***

I admire anyone who applies for an appointment to the Town Council. Serving on the council is demanding, to say the least, and it must be a daunting experience to detail why one should be chosen. Here are a few of the reasons various applicants cited Wednesday night for why they should be chosen: “I’ll be an effective council member immediately . . . and I have policy goals similar to those of Bill Strom.” “Running for office is a public vetting process . . . a political campaign is a wonderfully rigorous process. It engages the citizens and the candidates.” “The council should take a special interest in listening to viewpoints that are not their own.” “The council could use a CPA, a new voice on the political scene.” And my favorite, “I’m a Taurus.”

Let the council know your choice for the council seat. Send e-mail to Mark Kleinschmidt (mkleinschmidt@townofchapelhill.org), Matt Czajkowski (mattczajkowski@nc.rr.com), Laurin Easthom (laurineasthom@gmail.com), Sally Greene (sally@ibiblio.org), Ed Harrison (ed.harrison@mindspring.com), Gene Pease (genepease7@gmail.com), Penny Rich (prich1@nc.rr.com) and Jim Ward (jimward@nc.rr.com).

–Don Evans