[Durham INC] February minutes (DRAFT)
Pat Carstensen
pats1717 at hotmail.com
Mon Mar 21 07:31:48 EDT 2011
Resending to prepare for this week's delegate meeting. Thanks, pat
-----------January Delegate
Meeting
First Presbyterian Church
January 25, 2011
Attending the meeting
were:
Neighborhoods
Bay Point – Heather Myers
Chadsford – Darius Little
Colony Park – Don Lebkes
Cross Counties – Pat Carstensen
Duke Park – Ian Kipp, Bill Anderson
Fairfield – Melissa Rooney
Falconbridge – Rosemarie Kitchin
Golden Belt Neighborhood Association – John Martin, DeDreana
Freeman
Long Meadow – Pakis Bessias, Patti Rieser
Northgate Park – Mike Shiflett
Old East Durham – Chloe’ Palenchar
Old Farm – David Harris
Old North Durham – Peter Katz
Old West Durham – Eric Heidt
Parkwood – Mike Brooks
TLNA – Susan Sewell
Watts Hospital Hillandale – Tom Miller
Visitors
Jim Wise – News and Observer
Lynwood D. Best – City of Durham, NIS
Ernie Mills – Durham Rescue Mission
Minutes
Tom Miller opened the meeting, and delegates and visitors
introduced themselves. David
Harris moved and Mike Shiflett seconded to approve the minutes, which we did by
voice vote.
Tom reminded neighborhoods to pay dues ($25, but some neighborhoods give more) and send in membership profiles with by-laws (Appendix
D). The profiles could be used for
stories on the INC website; the by-laws could be helpful to new neighborhoods
looking at possible structures for their organization.
We discussed an NCDOT complaint that a Raleigh neighborhood was practicing engineering
without a license for looking at the manual about when a traffic light is
warranted and questioning DOT’s decision about a light for that
neighborhood. That action is being
mocked by folks as far away as New Zealand and by both Limbaugh and
Colbert. INC may want to take action
because it could be a precedent in saying that if you don’t have money for
professional services, you can’t play.
Pat will write a resolution and send it to the list-serve, and Tom will
invite someone from DOT to give their side of the story. This would be a good fit with the program the Transportation Committee is working for
March (probably to be held at Golden Belt, where it will be easier to show
presentation). The committee is
also continuing to watch a number of issues (Alston Ave, NC54 corridor, etc.).
There have been news stories that the billboard industry wants the NC General Assembly to pass a law
restricting the ability of local governments to control billboards and to
increase what can be cut down if trees impede your view of their beer ad. After some discussion about whether or
not to take the resolution in Appendix A back to the neighborhoods (and hope
the bill was still in play in a month), we voted to decide at this meeting, and
passed the resolution, with the understanding that typos will be cleaned up.
Continuing a response to how decisions are being made on
development, especially in South Durham, Fairfield brought in a resolution on spite strips and protest petitions. We decided that the whole chronology is
useful, but a shorter resolution was better, so the grey “whereas” paragraphs
were deleted. Melissa Rooney
moved, John Martin seconded, and we passed the resolution in Appendix B. Darius Little did not participate in
the discussion due to a potential conflict of interest.
The (NC) House Select
Committee on Homeowner Associations will issue their report and draft bill
soon. The draft bill has
provisions in 3 areas:
1.
Right of a home purchaser to know whether there
is a home-owner association and restrictive covenants on the property before they
purchase the property, as well as knowing how to get relevant documents.
2.
A “homeowner bill of rights” with respect to the
homeowner association would slow down the process of liens and guarantee the
right to participate and observe activities of the homeowner association (look
at books, see minutes, etc.)
3.
Add rights of the homeowners with the developer
(“declarant”) before the homeowner association is set up.
Something in this area will pass eventually (there have been
too many disputes), but the new Republican majority may want to have their own
committee first. We voted to set
up another ad hoc committee (consisting of Mike Brooks, Mike Shiflett and David
Harris) to look at the text and get a viewpoint from homeowner association
members of INC.
Pat Carstensen and Peter Katz reported that decisions will
be made about how to develop Rolling
Hills this spring, using a “paradigm change” that could affect funding of
affordable housing and other services for the people of Durham. CallingDurhamHome.org lays out many of
the issues involved.
Golden Belt brought up the issue of boarded-up houses and proposed creating anad hoc committee to see
what could be done, either to reduce the number or to make them look less “forlorn.” We voted to form the committee, with
John Martin as chair; they will report back by May. Rick Hester of NIS would be willing to come talk to us about
the problem.
We discussed the sale of stolen goods at certain liquor outlets. We talked at the end of last year about ABC licenses as a
carrot/stick to get better behavior.
Some of the stores that were recently caught selling shop-lifted goods
did lose their liquor licenses, through a technicality; it’s not clear whether
they can re-apply for a license.
They argue that if they don’t have a liquor license, they can’t make
enough money to stay in business (but how many sources of booze, cigs and junk
food do we need?).
Neighborhood (and
other) reports:
·
Trinity Park is responding to the proposed hotel
at the south end of the neighborhood.
·
Golden Belt submitted a resolution on Alston
Avenue and the Rescue Mission plans.
The Alston Avenue widening was originally a street-scaping proposal; the
traffic on the street is actually decreasing. Durham Area Designers is willing to do a charette for the
area if the Rescue Mission is willing to participate.
·
Comments are nearly done on the Ninth Street and
Design District Draft Regulations; the comments will be shared through the
list-serve.
·
Please check out Durham Public Schools’
legislative agenda.
·
Old North Durham has started a neighborhood
happy hour at Full Steam on the 2nd Wednesday of the month. Only Burger shows up about 6PM.
·
NCSSM is making another try at breaking the
world record in food collected.
The target is 545,000 pounds.
If you want to contribute money, the deadline is Sunday February
27. More info: http://www.ncssm.edu/fooddrive/?page_id=2
Announcements:
An interactive Community
Engagement Workshop focusing on Durham’s Strategic
Plan and how it aligns with the Budget and introducing the new Performance
Management System software (dashboard), will be held at the Holton Career and
Resource Center, 401 N. Driver Street, on Saturday, February 26 from 10:00 a.m.
to 1:00 p.m. Interested
attendees must pre-register by Friday, February 25 to
attend this workshop by contacting Marion Gray, via e-mail, at
MarionGray at durhamnc.gov
or phone at (919) 560-4111 ext. 20284 A light breakfast will be provided for
workshop attendees.
Conversations with Commissioners
meetings offer opportunities for the BOCC to meet face-to-face with residents
to have open dialogue about the budget and its deficit. The meetings will begin
with a brief presentation from the county and end with conversations between
residents and BOCC when the floor is opened for questions about the
presentation. The BOCC will begin its Conversations with Commissioners meetings
on the following dates:
· Thursday,
February 24, 2011, Northern Durham Regional Library, 221
Milton Road, at 7:00 pm
· Tuesday,
March 1, South Regional Library, 4505 S. Alston Avenue,
at 7:00 pm
· Wednesday, March 2,
1 p.m. at the Durham Center for Senior Life, located
at 406 Rigsbee Avenue
· Thursday,
March 3, Durham’s Main Library, 300 N. Roxboro Street,
at 7:00 pm
The Coffee with Council sessions are a
series of face-to-face meetings designed to give residents the opportunity to
provide direct input to council members on budget items for the upcoming
2011-2012 fiscal year. The sessions also include a review of the City’s budget
outlook for the coming fiscal year.
· Thursday,
March 10, from 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. – City Hall
Committee Room, 101 City Hall Plaza, 2nd Floor (PAC 5; Spanish translation
provided)
· Saturday,
March 12, from 10 a.m. to Noon – Lyon Park Community
Family Life and Recreation Center, 1309 Halley Street (PAC 3)
· Monday,
March 14, from 6 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. – Durham County School
Resource Center, 2107 Hillandale Road (PAC 2)
The meeting was adjourned.
Appendix A
A RESOLUTION BY THE INTERNEIGHBORHOOD COUNCIL OF DURHAM ON Local
Government and Billboards and Roadside Vegetation and Billboards (Passed)
WHEREAS the citizens of
every North Carolina city and county are best positioned to determine what is
best for their own welfare, how their community should appear, and how the use
of land should be regulated; and
WHEREAS every city and
county has each to its own satisfaction through the power long granted it by
the laws of this state regulated the erection and display of on and
off-premises signs; and
WHEREAS the bounty of
North Carolina’s natural beauty is the heritage and birthright of every citizen
and its proper stewardship is the responsibility of the people; and
WHEREAS the outdoor
advertising industry may ask the North Carolina General Assembly to enact laws
to restrict the power of cities and counties to determine for themselves which
land use and zoning regulations best protect the welfare of local citizens and
to take away from local communities the powers of self-government they have
long enjoyed; and
WHEREAS the same industry
may ask the General Assembly to enact laws to permit the cutting and removal of
vegetation along state highways and byways to the detriment of the natural
beauty of the state so that billboards should be seen where trees once stood;
IT IS THEREFORE RESOLVED
by the neighborhoods of the InterNeighborhood Council of Durham through their
delegates duly assembled that it shall be the position of the council that the
General Assembly should enact no law restricting or diminishing the right or
power of local governments to control land use through zoning and other
ordinances including the power to control and even ban billboards and other
signs.
IT IS FURTHER RESOLVED by
the neighborhoods of the InterNeighborhood Council that its officers and such
other persons as the president may appoint shall do every needful thing
consistent with this resolution and the bylaws of the council to protect the
prerogatives of local government to regulate land use including signs from
enactments which would reduce or diminish them.
IT IS FURTHER RESOLVED by
the neighborhood of the InterNeighborhood Council that it shall be the position
of the council that the General Assembly should enact no law permitting the
removal of trees or other vegetation long the highways and byways of the state
to improve the visibility of any advertising sign or display.
IT IS FURTHER RESOLVED by the
neighborhoods of the InterNeighborhood Council that its officers and such other
persons as the president may appoint shall do every needful thing consistent
with this resolution and the bylaws of the council to protect the natural
beauty of the state from destruction in favor of signs and other advertising.
Appendix B
A RESOLUTION of the INTERNEIGHBORHOOD COUNCIL OF DURHAM on Spite Strips
and Protest Petitions (Passed)
WHEREAS in 2005
developers conducted a private survey of a portion of the boundary of Jordan
Lake, which if validated would move prime development land from inside to
outside the critical watershed area, thus enabling the rezoning of 167 acres in
southern Durham County on the shores of Jordan Lake from low density
residential to mixed use allowing for approximately 1300 dwelling units and nearly
600,000 sq. ft. of non-residential uses; and
WHEREAS in
January, 2006, the then Durham County Planning Director administratively
approved the new survey without informing the County Commissioners or sending
it to the NC State Division of Water Quality (DWQ) for state review as required
by law; and
WHEREAS “the
Unified Development Ordinance (UDO) mandates that when there is a significant
change in an application, that the zoning map change be resubmitted and go
through the entire zoning process again” (Durham County news release, February
16, 2011); and
WHEREAS on
April 13, 2009, the Durham County Board of County Commissioners voted to hold a
public hearing and to vote on the aforementioned watershed rezoning in
accordance with the requirements of the UDO; and
WHEREAS on June
12, 2009, the aforementioned developers filed suit against the County, arguing
that the watershed boundaries must adhere to the planning director’s changes
and that the public hearing process was illegal; and
WHEREAS the UDO
requires for the county that a valid protest petition signed by at least 20% of
landowners on one ‘side’ of the boundary change mandates a supermajority (4 -
1) vote of the County Commission for approval of the change; and
WHEREAS in
August and September, 2009, Durham citizens and members of the Haw River
Assembly (HRA) requested (of the present planning director) but did not receive
a clear definition of the ‘sides’ of the watershed boundary changes because
such definition had not yet been determined due to the irregularity and
complexity of the land in question; and
WHEREAS on
October 5, 2009, after several deferrals of the public hearing, Durham citizens
through the Haw River Assembly filed a protest petition, and associated
calculations, determined valid by a GIS expert and the Southern Environmental
Law Center using their most conservative interpretation of the county’s vague
requirements for the protest petition; and
WHEREAS on
October 9, 2009, the Durham Planning Department, in consultation with the new
County Attorney, held a press release announcing their ruling that the protest
petition was invalid on the basis that the 20% threshold had not been met; and
WHEREAS on Oct
12, 2009, after several deferrals and a lengthy public hearing in which an
overwhelming number of Durham residents and neighborhood organizations opposed
the watershed boundary change, the County Commission voted 3-2 to approve the
critical watershed boundary change; and
WHEREAS on Nov
14, 2009, the Planning Department reversed its decision, and determined that
the protest petition was, in fact, valid, yet the petition was never applied to
the county’s boundary change ruling; and
WHEREAS after several
questionable deferrals, on May 24, 2010, Durham citizens filed a protest
petition against Rezoning Case # Z0800003 (to rezone from ‘Rural Residential’
to ‘Mixed Use Suburban’ the ~167 acre parcel now removed from the protected
watershed area); and
WHEREAS the NC General
Assembly on July 9, 2010, passed Bill S1399 which changed Durham County's regulations
for protest petitions in order to align them with the city’s, but also removed
the validity of signatures of landowners separated by more than 100 feet of
road right-of-way from the parcel to be rezoned; and
WHEREAS on Jul 12, 2010,
the current planning director ruled valid the Z0800003 protest petition; and
WHEREAS on July 13, 2010,
in a highly unusual maneuver, NCDOT accepted a 40-foot strip of land along 751
(a "spite strip") as an easement for a future right-of-way,
unknowingly bringing into question the interpreted validity of the Z0800003
protest petition, the learning of which caused NCDOT to subsequently reject
this land ‘donation’ on July 26, 2010; and
WHEREAS on August 9, 2010,
the Board of County Commissioners voted 3-2 to approve the Z0800003 rezoning,
and the county attorney gave his opinion that the NCDOT revocation was not
legal, thereby forcing the planning director to invalidate the protest
petition; and
WHEREAS on September 9,
2010, protest petition signatories filed complaint with the Durham County Board
of Adjustment (BOA) regarding the county’s handling of the protest petition and
its ruling in rezoning case #Z0800003, and on October 13, 2010, when the county
deemed the case inappropriate for the BOA, the citizens filed complaint with
Superior Court; and
WHEREAS it is unfair for
citizens to be stripped of valid protest petition signatures, and therefore of
their right to protect their interests from possible deleterious development
immediately across the street/right-of-way, based solely on the width of that
street/ right-of-way; and
WHEREAS there appears to
be no reason for the exclusion of landowners from signing a protest petition
based solely on the width of the street/right-of-way between his/her land and
the parcel being considered for rezoning, except as a way to disenfranchise
said landowners of the process by which to protect their interests;
NOW THEREFORE, BE IT
RESOLVED that the InterNeighborhood Council of Durham, through its government
and its members, requests Durham city and county government, to appeal to the
NC General Assembly, as necessary and remove from the following quoted protest
petition requirements the following phrase: “as long as that street
right-of-way is 100 feet wide or less” (UDO 3.5.13B.1.b.2).
“To qualify as a protest under
this section, the petition must be signed by the owners of either (i) twenty
percent (20%) or more of the area included in the proposed change or (ii) five
percent (5%) of a 100-foot-wide buffer extending along the entire boundary of
each discrete or separate area proposed to be rezoned. A street right-of-way
shall not be considered in computing the 100-foot buffer area as long as that
street right-of-way is 100 feet wide or less” (UDO 3.5.13B.1).
Appendix C
A RESOLUTION of the INTERNEIGHBORHOOD COUNCIL OF DURHAM on Golden Belt
Neighborhood Rezoning and Alston Avenue Widening (Proposed)
WHEREAS, the Golden Belt
Neighborhood was designated an Historic District and placed on the National
Register of Historic Places in 1985, and
WHEREAS, twenty-seven of the 110
contributing structures in the Golden Belt National Register Historic District
have been demolished since 1985, and
WHEREAS,
the Northeast Central Durham HOPE VI Revitalization Plan stated, “North East
Central Durham must also maintain and reinforce the connection with its history
and the historic assets that lend it character. The dignified mill buildings
that established this neighborhood can become focal points and symbols of the
community. The Revitalization Plan must also acknowledge the bungalows of the
Golden Belt historic district and complement their character in the design of
new residential development,” and
WHEREAS, the Northeast Central
Durham HOPE VI Revitalization plan also stated that North East Central Durham “must establish street patterns that physically connect
the neighborhood internally and to adjacent
areas. This involves breaking oversize blocks into
a more regular street grid and aligning intersections and streets to establish
a predictable pattern to the neighborhood,”
and
WHEREAS,
the N.C. Department of Transportation has proposed widening Alston Ave. to as
much as 82 linear feet at the intersection of Alston Ave and E. Main St. (by
comparison, Roxboro St. at the intersection of Main St. is only 58 feet wide)
and
WHEREAS,
DOT traffic engineers have said that the amount of traffic on Alston Ave. is
not too heavy for its present configuration, and
WHEREAS,
DOT plans would destroy current businesses and impede the creation of new
businesses on Alston Ave. because of the placement of retaining walls and
medians, and
WHEREAS,
the State Historic Preservation Office has issued a finding that the proposed
widening of Alston Ave. would have an “adverse impact” on the Golden Belt
Historic District, and
WHEREAS,
the Durham Rescue Mission has proposed closing two streets in the Golden Belt
Historic District, removing nine historic structures, and creating a “super
block” between East Main and Franklin St., and
THEREFORE,
the InterNeighborhood Council urges the City Government to
1)
Prevent street
closings that would damage neighborhood connectivity and the Golden Belt
Historic District.
2)
Prevent the
demolition or removal of any more historic structures from the Golden Belt
Historic District.
3)
Revise the Alston
Ave. widening project to improve the avenue without harming the surrounding
neighborhoods
Appendix D: Neighborhood Profile Form
InterNeighborhood
Council of Durham
Membership
Application Date:
1) Name
of neighborhood organization:
2) Purpose
for which the organization was created:
3) Describe
the boundaries of the neighborhood by reference to landmarks and include Durham
zoning atlas map or maps showing the exact boundaries of the neighborhood:
4) How
many households are included in the neighborhood?
Please
describe the source(s) for your answer to this question:
5) Who
are the members of the neighborhood organization?
6) What
are the qualifications for membership?
7) Describe
the government of the organization.
Include a description of the governing body and the
officers. Explain how they are
selected and what their powers are.
Does the organization have written bylaws or rules? Is the organization voluntary or
mandatory? Is it a corporation?
If the organization is voluntary and has written
bylaws or rules, please attach a current copy.
8) How
frequently does the governing body meet?
How frequently does the membership meet?
9) How
many members does the organization have?
10) How many households
do these members represent?
11) Who are the
current officers or members of the organization’s governing body?
12) Please provide
the names, addresses, phone numbers, and e-mail addresses of the chief officer
of the organization and its presumptive delegates to the InterNeighborhood
Council.
13) Annual dues
for the InterNeighborhood Council are $25; however, the council requires more
operating money than can be raised by dues alone. Please attach a check an amount no smaller than $25 as dues
for the current membership year.
14) I have read
the bylaws of the InterNeighborhood Council of Durham and I certify that the
information contained in this application is true and consistent with the
bylaws of the InterNeighborhood Council.
__________________________________
Chief Officer of the Neighborhood Organization named
above
________________________________________________________________________
THIS
SPACE RESERVED FOR OFFICIAL USE
Application approved:
By:
_____________________
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