Board of Aldermen - Regular Meeting

Ms. Good evening. Good evening, everyone, and welcome to the 11/18/2025, meeting of the Carrboro Town Council. This is a regular business meeting, but a little irregular, as this is Councilmember Haven O'Donnell's last business meeting. And I do want to acknowledge that as she enters her next chapter.

I'm pretty sure she's not done yet, and that she will continue to be working out in the community, but we'll have an opportunity to hear from her more on December 2 at our organizational meeting. And I would like to now welcome Lee Francis IV. He is the husband of our Carbara Poet Laureate, Liza. And he has on a snazzy vest in honor of, tell us,

Native American. Native American Heritage Month.

Yes. And it looks really, really nice. And I like your medallion. You want to talk about that snazzy medallion?

So I also like, I would consider myself an indigenerd. So this is my Superman and Flash medallion that we have, traditionally beaded.

Oh, and welcome. I mean, you look amazing. Just really festive and representing.

Absolutely. I'll greet traditionally Lee Francis. My name is Doctor. Lee Francis. My family is from the Pueblo Of Laguna, from New Mexico, which is about 45 miles west of Albuquerque.

I am so honored to represent here doing poetry, and of course, my wife, the poet laureate, to be able to do some poetry tonight for you all for Native American Heritage Month, the month of November. So this is a poem called Grandfather Corn, and this is about my family and about my son and my relationship with them. One. In our winter kitchen, my father and I plant corn in little clay pots beside the window. We are having trouble situating the corn seeds, which is to say we have spilled dirt everywhere.

My father does not mind the mess. He is telling me a story of planting corn in the cebolleta of his childhood, the way his grandmother taught him carefully in the springtime, carefully in the high desert. He would begin each dawn with a song and whisper secrets to the infant corn to make them laugh as he tickled their ears with stories of youthful dreamings. In the evening, he would feed them one spoonful of water as the moon rose over the wood smoke of fresh oven bread, the old adobe house, and grandfather's mezita. Late at night, he would sneak out to the garden, put his ear to the ground to hear a heartbeat, hundreds of heartbeats, thousands of heartbeats, all synchronized, heavy, and tremendous.

Then, he would retrace his steps, following his early morning footprints back to his bedroom window. Later, when we are done, he carries me to my winter bedroom. And in the evening, when the corn is all asleep, I dream of old Pueblo magic and my grandmother's ancient garden. And I watch the corn laugh and grow tall in the wind and pollinate the summer sky with its breath. Two.

In our winter kitchen, my son and I are planting corn in little clay pots beside the window. We are having trouble situating my son in his high chair, which is to say he has spilled dirt on himself, on the dog, on the floor, everywhere. I do not mind the mess. And I tell him a story of his old Pueblo grandfather singing the corn into being, telling me winter stories, reminding me of all things temporary, even gardens. There are ancient ways on my tongue and old adobe moonlight beneath my fingernails, a gifting for you, my son, as our time is short to plant the corn before the harvest.

And someday, when he stands tall like the midsummer stalks, he will understand this lesson, but not now. Now, it is time for a bath and a song. And later, I carry him back to his winter bedroom, wrap him in an old grandmother pendleton, and cradle him in youthful dreams of old Pueblo magic. And later in the night, I hear laughter and a heartbeat. And in the early morning, I find footprints beneath his window. Thank you so much, Doa'e. Have a wonderful evening and a great meeting. Thank you all.

Good evening, everyone. We have a couple of resolutions as well as about four proclamations. I would like to begin the evening with current event. This is a message from the mayors of Carrboro, Chapel Hill, Hillsborough, and the chair of the Orange County Board of Commissioners. I am sure that most of you are aware of the ICE activity in and around our areas.

We affirm that in Carrboro, Chapel Hill, Hillsborough, and across Orange County, our communities are made better by the diversity of people within them. We understand that federal immigration authorities are active in the triangle, causing fear and creating uncertainty in our communities. Their operations in other cities have used racial profiling to detain legal and law abiding community members without due process or cause. We strongly denounce actions that sow fear among community members, undermine our local community safety efforts, and infringe on the human rights of our most vulnerable friends and neighbors. Regardless of where you live, work, or play, here is some important information to know.

It's important to know your rights and have a plan. Our local law enforcement agencies do not participate in Immigration and Customs ICE or U. S. Customs and Border Patrol operations. If you need the police, EMS, fire, crisis response, or other emergency service, call 911.

We know that many of you want to speak out, and we ask that you do so peacefully. We ask that community members rely on trusted organizations that provide accurate information and assistance. We are monitoring the situation and remain in close contact with our partners. We will continue to share additional resources. This is a joint statement from myself, Mayor Jess Anderson, Mayor Mark Vail, and Chair of the Orange County Commissioners Chair, I'm sorry, James Edda Bedford.

I now would like to invite well, actually, I don't think he's going to get up Councilmember Posada Orozco, either here or at the dais. He will bring forth a resolution.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. I wanted to start in Spanish and let folks know that are listening that folks on this dais understand that immigrants make our community better. We understand that we want to make a community that's safe and secure for everyone who resides in it. Today, I have had the displeasure of having to coordinate and assist in the coordination I wasn't alone. There were so many people who were doing this in verifying actions that were happening across the triangle in the Mecklenburg area, in the Boone area that are quote unquote targeted approaches, but in reality are ways of causing distrust fear into our communities.

Here in Carrboro, I want to note we had several alerts, and we had many folks, some of them in this room, who ensured that they were there present to make sure that the alerts were real or if they were not, ensuring that the community knew that as well. And we have many organizations who are working diligently to create spaces where folks can feel secure and resources. I want to thank the hundreds of volunteers in the Triangle who have been activated today, verifying situations, monitoring their communities, patrolling cities to make sure that we are letting folks know what's happening out there and the thousands of folks who are working to create a better North Carolina for immigrant communities. I had the pleasure of working with Councilmember Palmer over the last couple of weeks or sorry, days on creating a resolution that I'm going to ask him to read here in a moment that not only highlights the history of Carver being a welcoming town for our communities, but also reinstates our determination to make sure that we're doing everything in that power to protect our community members regardless of the country they are born in, regardless of their status, legal status here in our communities, because a carbro is for all of us.

I will come back to give some resources before we take a vote because I think that's an important piece. But councilmember Palmer, I wanna just thank you again for your collaboration in this. And if you would please read the resolution.

Since you have your suit on, you wanna come up here? Thank you, council member Palmer.

So just super briefly before I read this, I wanna I wanna say, what is a Kavanaugh stop? I my my peer mentioned targeted enforcement, but a Kavanaugh stop is the practice of federal agents, whether CBP, ICE, HSI, or another agency, detaining and questioning or interrogating people based on their perceived race or ethnicity. In the past, this would have been clearly and patently illegal, a mockery of due process. But now we have the head of CBP in an interview with WBEZ admitting that they racially profile, that they rove, that they come in front of grocery stores, and detain people based solely on their race or ethnicity. The result being that Porch, a local organization that serves 50 to 60% of the families are Spanish speaking, dramatic decrease in attendance at school, dramatic rise in requests for direct delivery because they are afraid to go outside.

That is not okay. This is terror in our communities. And now I will read the resolution. A resolution in support of immigrant communities and Fourth Amendment rights for all Orange County residents. Whereas the town of Carrboro has pursued equality and safety for all residents through the adoption of the Language Access Plan, the racial equity action plan, and the Carrboro comprehensive plan, and more.

And whereas on 11/18/2014, the town council approved a resolution declaring Carrboro to be a welcoming community for minors seeking refuge from violence in their home countries and urging the federal government to ensure that those seeking safety in The United States receive due process and legal representation. And whereas on 11/14/2017, the town council approved a resolution supporting the expansion of the temporary protected status program and urged the Department of Homeland Security to renew the program for Nicaragua and another on 04/04/2023 for Guatemala. And whereas on 03/19/2024, the town council approved a resolution supporting immigrant communities in Carrboro, committing to foster a welcoming environment for immigrants in the town and empowering Carrboro law enforcement to take steps to build trust in the immigrant community. And whereas on 05/20/2025, the town council voted unanimously to designate the town of Carrboro a Fourth Amendment city excuse me, a Fourth Amendment workplace reinforcing the town's commitment to honor and uphold the Fourth Amendment rights of all of our residents. And whereas on the weekend of 11/15/2025, US Customs and Border Protection agents launched numerous operations to detain, arrest, and harass immigrant communities within a two hour radius of Charlotte, resulting in arrests of undocumented and US citizen residents, as well as heightened fear and distrust in law enforcement and whereas the threat of unconstitutional and discriminatory seizure of property and persons by federal authorities is preventing immigrant households from safely engaging in public life, including pursuing education and employment.

And whereas the town of Carrboro has a long history of supporting immigrant communities and creating a welcoming town to all, no matter their place of origin. And whereas the town council unequivocally supports our immigrant communities and understands the vital role they play in the town of Carrboro, the state of North Carolina, and The United States Of America. Now, therefore, be it resolved, the town excuse me. The Carrboro Town Council condemns in the strongest possible terms the ongoing discriminatory actions of US Customs and Border Protection and other federal agencies acting under the direction of the current federal administration in North Carolina. Be it further resolved, the town council reaffirms the town's status as a Fourth Amendment workplace and urges all local business, schools, health care facilities, and other town institutions as well as the governments of peer municipalities and boards of education in Orange County and county government of Orange County to review their Fourth Amendment policies and or create policies and goals in service of protecting our immigrant communities.

And finally, be it further resolved, the clerk of the town of Carrboro is instructed to deliver copies of this resolution to the governing bodies of the other municipalities and boards of education in Orange County and to the Board of County Commissioners and County Manager of Orange County NC. Back to you, Councilmember Posada Orozco.

Thank you, Councilmember Palmer, for reading the resolution. And before I officially move it, I wanted to give a couple of action points for community members. There is a number of organizations that are working very closely together. And many folks have heard of Cimbra. Many folks have heard of RadarSafe.

Both are organizations that are collaboratively verifying and funneling any alerts or any sightings or any possible sightings. So folks, if you see anything, please reach out to 50714, which is one of the hotlines where you can call in. There's also the Cimbera hotline. Folks, Feel free to call that one as well. They're all being routed to the areas where these both organizations are focusing in.

And then please, if folks want to get additional resources, follow the North Carolina Migrant Network, the ACLU, as well as CMRA NC and Radar Safe for additional information and resources. This is a moment for our community to really step into our values as we already have been doing. So thank you again, Councilman Hartmut, for your partnership in this. Thank you to the council for our ongoing work. And with that, Madam Mayor, I would move for the passage of this resolution.

Thank you so much. If we could just get a second. Seconded. It's been moved improperly seconded that we move the resolution in support of our immigrant communities and their safety and their well-being. That's a little paraphrase, but that's basically what it means. So all in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion carries, seven-zero. And thank you so much to both of you.

Appreciate it. I have a resolution promoting the development of adequate affordable housing. It is from the Orange County Board of Health. And, council members, you have this resolution in front of you. I think it was also sent to you electronically.

We received no comments back, so I'm assuming that it is all good. And so I'm going to read from it. And I see Quintana Stewart there. Or are we sending someone there's someone else that's coming up, isn't it? Okay. Okay. So I'll read, and then you may come up and give comments. Whereas housing is a human right, not a commodity. Because humane and adequate housing is necessary for all humans to live their best lives and to rise to their full potential. And whereas, Orange County is experiencing a housing crisis.

County residents identified a lack of affordable humane housing as a top concern, both in the 2023 community health assessment and the county wide assessment for the Orange County strategic plan. The county has 13,689 fewer units than we need, and this deficit disproportionately affects individuals earning less than 50% of the area median income, with a deficit of 9,555 units. Whereas unstable housing significantly harms individual health, living unhoused disrupts access to sanitation and supplies, increases social isolation and stigma, impedes access to health care, and increases exposure to hazards such as heat, cold, and physical and sexual violence. These effects accelerate aging with premature onset of chronic medical conditions, functional and cognitive impairments, and increased mortality. Individuals who are unhoused have seven times the mortality rate from all causes and 14 times the overdose mortality rate compared with their housed counterparts.

Whereas, lack of housing causes significant adverse impacts to public health for communities. Communities lacking adequate housing experience disproportionate levels of incarceration, increased levels of drug use, and overuse of hospitals and emergency medical services, straining medical providers and increasing wait times. Whereas, zoning and land use policies profoundly shape our built environment, deficits in affordable housing reflect longstanding zoning policies that have had an exclusionary effect, including limits on small scale multifamily housing, commonly known as missing middle housing. Best practices, such as APA's Equity and Zoning Policy Guide, can help correct these harms. Orange County and the towns of Carrboro, Chapel Hill, and Hillsborough are engaged in the process of developing new land use plans and or zoning ordinances.

Now, therefore, be it resolved on this 10/29/2025 that we, the Orange County Board of Health, recognize the lack of affordable housing in Orange County as a threat to public health. To address this, the Board of Health recommends that the Orange County Board of County Commissioners and the governing bodies of Carrboro, Chapel Hill, and Hillsboro incorporate the following in their land use plans and zoning ordinances. What I will tell you is there are 14 items here. If you don't mind, I'm just going to run through them kind of briefly. I may not hit all of them, but I do believe, town manager, that this will can go out on our social media in its entirety for folks to really have a full look at it.

So, basically, it really is about ensuring that our policies, ordinances, and administrative practices do not unduly restrict the development of adequate, affordable, and attainable housing. Implementing incentives for developments that incorporate desirable residential characteristics, such as clustering of units to preserve natural lands, mixed housing types or sizes, support for multi generational housing, cooperative housing initiatives, and connection to public sewer systems. Also, where on-site wastewater systems are utilized, consider basing residential density on number of allowed bedrooms instead of number of units, as this is a more precise measure of development, intensity, and impact. Develop a significant portion of the jointly owned green tract, with affordable and missing middle housing options both for rent and for purchase revisit interlocal agreements with other jurisdictions as needed to implement all of the above. Work in collaboration, I'm sorry, with the City of Meben to optimize residential development with municipal utility services in and near Meben's extraterritorial jurisdiction were located within Orange County, and also explore the potential for new developments to utilize community on-site wastewater systems in lieu of individual wastewater systems for areas unserved by public wastewater for these community systems incentivize enhanced design standards and treatment criteria.

So, I'm just reading some of the bullet points that the very good bullet points, I might add, that the Orange County Board Of Health has presented to us. And I invite you up. Give me your name again. Hi, Dean. Come on up, and give whatever comments you would like. You can find this in its entirety, on, our social media. In the interest of time, I just kind of skirted through it

a little bit. Thank you.

Thank you so much for having me this evening. My name is Jean Phillips Weiner, as mentioned by Mayor Fuschi, and I am the strategic plan manager for the Orange County Board of Health. Our board of health, in 2023 assisted with our community health assessment and were present at several listening sessions where they heard from community members about their concerns about health issues and health in the community. And repeatedly, we heard issues about the cost of housing as a major health concern and particularly concerns about people's ability to both afford their housing and their basic needs such as food, utilities, and health care. After we heard this from community members, the board of health spent the last year hearing from subject matter experts who work in housing, housing justice, zoning, and land use.

And based on those, findings, we put together this resolution and recommendations, to sort of amplify affordable housing as a public health issue and address it within the context of public health and health needs. So, we do hope that you will consider these recommendations as you work to revise Carrboro's land use plan. And, I'd like to thank you very much for your time and your attention.

Thank you so much. We appreciate it. And council members, if I could get a motion and a second for this important resolution, please. So moved. Seconded. All right. It's been moved and properly seconded. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed?

The motion carries to pass this resolution, seven to zero. Thank you again. Moving to our proclamations, I would like to start with the Transgender Day of Remembrance Proclamation. Whereas, in 1998, Rita Hester, a black transgender woman, was murdered, this crime remains unsolved. And whereas in 1999, Gwendolyn Ann Smith organized the first trans transgender day of remembrance in honor of Rita Hester and other transgender people who had lost their lives to violence, it has been observed every year since.

And whereas, according to every town for gun safety, since January 2017, three hundred and eleven transgender and gender nonconforming Americans have been murdered, the majority of whom were black and Latinx women. And whereas there is significant incidents of misgendering or misnaming transgender victims of crime in police reports indicating that the number of transgender victims of violence and murder is likely far higher than what is officially reported, and local law enforcement is not required to, and frequently fails to, report hate crimes, including murder specific to the LGBT QIA plus community. Whereas, we have seen a rapid rollback of the rights of transgender Americans in the past year, with restrictions at the federal level such as serving in the armed forces, obtaining a passport or visa with an accurate gender marker, limiting federal funding to be used for transgender health care, and in the case of transgender youth attempting to ban transgender health care altogether. And whereas, we have seen at the state level additional restrictions designed to demean and disrupt the lives of their transgender citizens, including the state of North Carolina, now using birth certificate updates to forcibly out transgender North Carolinians. And whereas Congress and the executive branch must not only undo the onerous restrictions placed on transgender and gender nonconforming Americans in the past year at the federal level, but protect and preserve their rights through inclusive legislation.

Now, therefore, be it resolved that I, Barbara M. Fouchey, mayor of the town of Carrboro, do hereby declare Thursday, 11/20/2025, as Transgender Day of Remembrance in the town of Carrboro. I ask all residents to reflect on the challenges and dangers facing the transgender members of our community, and to work to ensure that social and legislative progress be made so that all people can safely live as their true selves. Now, therefore, be it resolved that the transgender pride flag be flown at Carrboro Town Hall from Friday, November 14 through Friday, 11/21/2025, in remembrance of those transgender Americans whose lives were cut short by violence. I now invite Becca Eversol from our planning department to accept this proclamation and say a few words.

Welcome, Becca.

Thank you, Mayor Fischke. I usually speak at this podium as a member of staff on transportation matters, But today, I speak as a member of Carrboro's transgender community. Since my transition journey began, I have struggled to find a safe space, a place where I felt at home. Carrboro has become that that safe space. But even a safe space isn't perfect.

There are far too many dark corners of this world where it is dangerous to be trans. And because of that, far too many have faced death. Honoring their lives is the purpose for transgender for the Transgender Day of Remembrance. I call on my trans siblings here in Carrboro to come together and to help build a stronger community. One day, maybe no longer have to mourn those we've lost, but instead celebrate our joy. Thank you.

Thank you, Becca. Thank you so much. You're welcome. One day. Next, I have a proclamation for Care to Share Day.

And I will invite up whoever the Owasa rep is that will accept the proclamation when I finish reading it. I see Mary Tiger there. Whereas in 2025, nearly 11.3% of households in Carrboro were estimated to have incomes below poverty level. And whereas, at 4,000 gallons of use per month, the average water and sewer bill in Carrboro requires nearly seventeen hours of work at minimum wage before taxes to pay whereas clean water is critical to public health and the vitality of our community whereas orange water and sewer authority is prohibited by law from providing discounted rates based on income whereas providing equitable drinking water and wastewater services to the community requires investment in the community's water and wastewater infrastructure Whereas Owassa or maybe not the whereas Owassa has worked since 1997 to provide water and sewer bill assistance to members of our community through the Care to Share program. And whereas, in 2024, Care to Share donations exceeded $25,700 and provided utility bill support to 84 households.

Whereas, it is easy customers to contribute on their monthly water and sewer bill or through a one time gift to the Care to Share program and whereas, non Owassa customers can support Care to Share by giving directly to the Care to Share program And whereas, during the month of November, we celebrate thankfulness for what we have. Now, therefore, be it resolved that I, Barbara M. Fouche, Mayor of the Town of Carrboro, North Carolina, do hereby proclaim 11/20/2025, as Care to Share Day in the town of Carrboro in conjunction with the Orange Water and Sewer Authority. This, the November 2025, and I will invite Mary Tiger. Oh, I'll invite my Saraw, Doctor.

Mangum, up to the podium. You so much. You're welcome.

It's a pleasure, first of all, be here, and thank you so much, because it the Care to Share program is extremely important to our community. Water is everything, in case you didn't know it. But, it's also important that we participate in providing that water to our community and to our members that cannot afford to pay for the water. It's not getting any cheaper, and the quality of water that we have in the community is extremely important, and I will say that Owasa does a great job of providing us with quality water. In fact, I think it's the best in this state, as far as I can see.

As a member of the Water Board, or I shouldn't say Water Board, Water and Sewer Authority Board of directors. Board of directors. It's an honor to accept this, and also I would encourage you to add money to your bill so that our members in our community can continue to see the quality of water that they have been receiving over the last how many ever years they've been in effect. So, you again for acknowledging the Care to Share program, and thank you as a community for providing that support.

Thank Thank you, Doctor. Next up, I have a proclamation recognizing the two hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the United States Postal Service. Whereas 2025 is the year of the two hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the creation of the United States Post Office, the predecessor of the modern Postal Service, one year earlier than the founding of the country itself, and later enshrined in the U. S. Constitution.

And whereas, the Postal Service has played a significant role in the historical development of the country from the establishment of roads, railways, and airlines, and a vital part of the fabric binding together the people of the country. And whereas, the universal service obligation in current law, which enables the population to receive equal and affordable services no matter who we are or where we live, is a democratic right of the people. And whereas, the U. S. Postal Service serves 169,000,000 addresses and some six and sometimes seven days a week.

And whereas, the United States Postal Service does not receive taxpayer money, but rather runs on its own revenue created by postage and postal products. And whereas, due to its public mission, the Postal Service is the low cost anchor of the $1,300,000,000,000 mailing and package industry, which supports 7,000,000 jobs across the country. And whereas, the Postal Service is an important source of good, union, living wage jobs with fair hiring practices and equal pay for equal work, for workers from all walks of life, and is one of the largest employers of veterans. And whereas, any effort to privatize the United States Postal Service in whole or in part would undermine the very public mission of the Postal Service, the universal service mandate and the dedicated work of hundreds of thousands of public servants. And whereas, while communication habits are always changing, the United States Postal Service remains a vital source of communications the exchange of ideas, financial transactions, private and secure correspondence, mail order medications, mail in voting, and e commerce packages, and a host of opportunities for new and expanded services.

Whereas, the United States Postal Service is owned by the people and is a wonderful national treasure encapsulating the best of government of, by, and for the people. Therefore, be it resolved that on this November 2025, the town council of Carrboro goes on record in support of the public mission of the United States Postal Service contained in the 1970 Postal Reorganization Act, which says, The United States Postal Service shall be operated as a basic and fundamental service provided to the people by the government of the United States, authorized by the Constitution, created by an act of Congress, and supported by the people. The Postal Service shall have as its basic function the obligation to bind the nation together. And be it further resolved that this body appreciates the role of the United States Postal Service on its two hundred and fiftieth anniversary, salutes the hardworking postal workers from all walks of life who serve the people and business community and supports a robust and thriving public postal service for generations to come. And I believe we have accepting is Brandon Mangum, union rep.

He was still working at

06:00, but I think

we have someone else there.

Oh, This is Andre Barnes. Well, actually,

I'm James Edick, the officer in charge of the Carmel Post

Office. Oh, welcome. Nice

Hi. Good evening, everybody. Madam mayor, town council. Thank you very much for this town proclamation. Very much appreciate it. Two hundred and fifty years of the postal service has served our nation. I hope the postal service in the local car borough has taken care of you as customers and our deliveries. It's been a challenging year for us with the tropical storm that came through with our neighboring office in Chapel Hill where they had to deliver out of our unit for a couple of months. So it was quite crowded if you came to the parking lot, but we continued on. Both offices worked together to make sure that both towns were serviced daily to make sure we deliver the mail, the packages. It is seven days a week. It is twenty four hours a day that the postal service is in operation, and I really appreciate this, madam mayor. Thank you everybody for your time.

Thank you so much. And I also want to recognize community member Barb Steinross for bringing this to our attention.

I'm just grateful that you accepted it. I love our post office.

Yeah, me too. Thank you so much. Appreciate it. The last proclamation is for Small Business Saturday, is coming up. Whereas, the town of Carrboro celebrates our local small businesses and the contributions they make to our local economy and vibrant community.

And whereas, Carrboro is home to more than 300 small businesses, which employ thousands of residents and contribute significantly to the town's economic viability, cultural identity, and quality of life, and include everything from independent retailers and restaurants to service providers, artists, and entrepreneurs. And whereas, the town's comprehensive plan, Carbara Connects, affirms our commitment to a vibrant and inclusive local economy and promoting living wage jobs and locally owned businesses. And whereas Small Business Saturday is a national movement that encourages residents to support small, locally owned businesses during one of the busiest shopping weekends of the year. And whereas, supporting Carrboro's small businesses strengthens our local economy, fosters community connections, and helps preserve the town's distinctive character and entrepreneurial spirit. And whereas, 68¢ of every dollar spent at a small business in The U.

S. Stays in the local community, and every dollar spent at small businesses creates an additional 48¢ in local business purchasing local goods and services. And whereas, the town of Carbara recognizes the importance of supporting local businesses not only on small business Saturday, but throughout the holiday season and year round. Now, therefore, I, Barbara M. Fouche, Mayor of the town of Carrboro, North Carolina, do hereby proclaim 11/29/2025, a small business Saturday in Carrboro, and urge all residents and visitors to visit and shop in our local small businesses and celebrate the contributions they make to our community.

This, the November 2025, supposed to be accepted by Ian Scott, Carrboro Business Alliance. There's Ian. Hey, nice to you. Come on up. Welcome, Ian. And thank you so much.

Madam Mayor and Council, thank you so much for the recognition of the locally owned and small businesses here in Carrboro. On behalf of the Carrboro Business Alliance, we're grateful for the recognition. It's hard to imagine a Carrboro without its locally owned small businesses. They are so much a part of the fabric of our community, the character of the place we all cherish here. I'm proud to receive this on their behalf, and regret to say how there is a a what should be a truly celebratory time, and a time we're looking forward to as particularly the local retailers, a a cloud hanging over today, particularly with so many business owners, their customers, their colleagues in actual fear at this moment.

And we sincerely appreciate your recognition of and sharing of resources about opportunities for fourth amendment workplaces. We are we are joining you in that effort to make sure local businesses are aware and and protecting their employees as they can. Sincerely appreciate your recognition here and and appreciate all the opportunity to talk about oh, I just wanted to mention housing. The one thing that most locally owned small businesses across Carrboro say they repeatedly need more of is more housing, particularly more housing that's affordable to the median income earner in our community and that's proximate to our downtown. We encourage you to continue your efforts to add more housing and more affordable housing options across Carrboro.

Thank you all so much.

Thank you

so much, Ian. We are down to the town manager's report. Town Manager Tony.

Thank you. Good evening, Mayor and council members. Really quickly, I just want to mention that Carrboro has several advisory boards and commissions that advise the town council on a wide range of issues. We're currently looking to fill some of these vacancies. We strive for a diverse representation on volunteer boards and commissions, and residents of all backgrounds, identities, and perspectives are encouraged to apply. Volunteers who are appointed by the town council have an opportunity to directly influence local decisions, policies, and priorities. So, I encourage people to take a look at our website and see some of the vacancies available, and I encourage you all to apply. Thank you.

Thank you so much, town manager Tony. We are down to our public comment period.

And

I have three people signed up for public comment for items that are not, related to the downtown area plan or the volunteer annex ation out at the Jay Creek development. So I would like to just follow the list here. Lars Knapp. Lars, come on up. Subject matter, AWACA Annual Report. Welcome.

I probably feel a little

bit off topic tonight. Before I get started, I want to just briefly acknowledge and thank the council for the resolution regarding the current immigration actions. Of course, the humanity of these people always comes first, but I also want to acknowledge that these are the people who formed and have formed and continue to form the backbone of the workforce that is rebuilding our neighborhood in Weather Hill Point after the flood and for them to be so inhumanely treated as abhorrent. Up next, want to talk very briefly about the Owassa annual report. Our community is excited to be engaging in a meeting with the Owassa team on Thursday of this week, which will take place at the University Lake Dam.

You will see this information in your annual report from Awasa as I reviewed it ahead of time. There is a single line item in that report that I noticed and wanted to call out for further question from council, and that is the climate adaptation plan. As Awasa is presenting, and I, of course, do not know what they are going to say, I would like there to be a a focus and a drill down on exactly how Awasa plans to plan ahead for our changing climate in terms of not only protecting their own infrastructure, which we all agree is incredibly important, but acknowledging how their aging infrastructure, the aging infrastructure that they manage, has impacts on our communities. The overwhelming bulk of water that is that caused the flood in Weather Hill Point came from the University Lake. The current aging dam is a spillway is a over top dam where Owassa has no control over the flow, and that lack of control over the water level in University Lake means that there is very little that they can currently do to take any preventative measures ahead of storms.

Of course, we know that this is not going to be a fast change in Weather Hill Point, but we are hoping to continue to partner with the town of Carrboro and move toward partnering with Owassa for Owassa to be a player and have a seat at the table. At present, their reaction to this has, and I will be honest, felt a lot like they do not feel that they belong at that table, that they do not have a role to play. Climate change is a big problem. Climate change is going to require every single person who has even a small part to acknowledge that they need to do all that they can to help protect our communities. We get to deal with climate change today.

More people are going to be dealing with climate change tomorrow, And I simply ask that you drill down deeply as Awaz is speaking about their climate adaptation plan, talk about that infrastructure, and work through that problem together with them. Thank you.

Thank you so much. We appreciate that. Good comments. Thank you. And so what I didn't do is I didn't talk about the guidelines.

So let me just go back and talk about the three minutes. We will adhere to the three minutes. To be fair to everyone that comes to the podium, please address your comments to the town council about whatever your issue is. And please do not bring forth anything in reference to elected officials, town staff, or any other community member. We do want to hear from you in reference to whatever issue that you want to bring forth to the council.

And then, the guidelines will other guidelines will continue to be on the screen. And I will go ahead and say, ahead of the public hearing I'm jumping ahead a little bit, but I just want to go ahead and say, we do have one, two, three, four, five, six there are seven people signed up. Those are the people that I will be calling forward to. Do see another hand, but there probably will be several more hands. Our Carrboro Town Council procedures manual, we have agreed upon an hour for public comment.

But it will be at the discretion of this council if they want to allow more time for public comment. I am talking about when we get into the public hearing for the downtown area plan, where we believe we will hear from many members of the public. So I do want to go ahead and just kind of put that out. And council members, we can address that once we get into the public hearing. And thank you. Next on the list, have Joc Manosh, WCOM. Welcome, Joc. You're welcome.

I'm Jacques Menach. I'm the founder of the Arts Center in Carbure and the cofounder of WCOM FM, a community radio station broadcasting at one hundred three point five FM and streaming live at wcomfm.org. This is the twenty first year we are on the air in Carbboro. I'm the Chairman of the Public Gallery of Carrboro, Inc, a five zero one(three) organization dedicated to supporting public art in Carrboro and the region, the fiscal agent for WCOM. We have recently raised over $50,000 to move our studios from the old Art Center Building to the new Dreckford Library complex at 203 South Greensboro Street.

One of our strategies to raise funds for the move was to improve our programming and bring yet more diversity and relevancy to the community and region. Our current programming is extremely varied. It includes music for all tastes, live and recorded poetry, interviews, talk shows, including mental health, aging sports, home power and public affairs. We have been able to create new shows that seek the inclusion of LGBTQ community and the Spanish speaking community. One of our shows in hyphen is bilingual and includes children.

Other shows feature a Chilean native who brings his music and culture to the area and interviews local Spanish speaking artists and many nonprofits. It's called Vientos del Sur with Rodrigo Tosi. Since early October, I have hosted a show called State of the Station by interviewing artists, town staff, town officials, people in the streets, other DJs, business owners. I'm trying to prepare for the next twenty years of this community radio station. Bringing new hosts, training them and finding underwriters to support airtime is costly, so is the overhead.

I am here asking for two things at this time. One, we're asking the town of Carrboro for a $13,000 grant, roughly equivalent to the amount of rent we pay to the town of Carrboro every year to occupy our studios in Suite 154 of the new library building. And two, we're asking the town to please put pressure on the contractors who promised the antenna to be erected on the roof of the Dreckford Building and is included in our lease. We need the antenna in order to have a functioning emergency alert system so we can help the community during events such as floods or other natural or artificial disasters. Thank you very much.

I want to tell you one more thing since I have seventeen seconds. I got a number of calls, WhatsApp messages from our neighbors in my community, and they all said the same thing. Thank REPRESENTATIVE:] you.

Thank you so much, Jacques. We appreciate it. I have someone. It looks like Natoli? Natoli?

Natoli? It was also about WCOM. Sir, who are you? Natoli?

My name is Rocco Ronald Natoli.

Nick Natoli. You so much, and welcome.

I first came to Carrboro in 1961, and I have been a part of WCOM and worked at the station for twenty three years. WCOM one zero three point five FM is live and local the way radio used to be and can be heard online at wcomfm.org. The station is located in Carrboro and always has been. I have some important points that people should know about WCOM. This station has served Carrboro and Chapel Hill on the air for over twenty one years.

WCOM gives citizens a voice, a powerful voice on the FM dial during the era of media consolidation. The station has local music and local talk radio that you can't hear anywhere else. WCOM has trained hundreds of radio broadcasting people trying to get into the business, citizens of these communities. The station, this station, WCOM, your station, remains deeply embedded in its communities. WCOM can be heard worldwide online.

And without community support, without you, there would be no WCOM. Know that everyone and every donation made to WCOM will help make the station stronger. Finally, everyone that works at WCOM is a volunteer with no pay or salary, and it's always been that way for twenty three years. Thank you for the opportunity to come before you, madam mayor, town council. That's what I have to say.

Also, I want to salute Jacques Menage, who started the station, and no one has worked harder. Thank you very much.

Thank you. We appreciate it. So that concludes the public comment portion that I have in front of me. I assume everyone else is here for the downtown area plan or the public hearing after that about the voluntary annexation. Yep.

Town manager, next item or I'll just move into the consent agenda. Just don't worry about it. So we're down to the consent agenda. So consent agenda items are a part of Normal Town business. We do have nine items on the consent agenda. I don't believe council members I think all questions have been answered. And so, I would entertain a motion to move these nine items. So moved. Seconded. All right.

It's been moved and properly seconded that we pass the consent agenda with these nine items. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion carries, seven-zero. We are done with the consent agenda. Town Manager Tony.

First item is public hearing. Purpose of this item is for the town council to continue the legislative public hearing, receive public comment on and consider the adoption of the draft downtown area plan, which explores opportunities for growth in the downtown area along Jones Ferry Road, in line with the Carrboro Connects comprehensive plan.

Thank you so much, Town Manager Tony. I just wanted to say briefly, of course, that the public hearing is still open. And we will be hearing from the public, whoever wants to come up. And we will start probably with some kind of brief presentation from town staff. Welcome.

Thank you very much. Thank you, Madam Mayor, and town council members. I'll be up here briefly. You know, as has been established, this is just a continuation of the public hearing. I have just a couple of procedural notes about that, which and then after the deliberation and the public hearing is complete, I can come back up and go over the procedural steps for taking action this evening. The only note about the public hearing is there needs to be a motion to close it after the end of the public comment. And so after your deliberations, I will come back up. We are grateful to our consultant, Faiza Nichols. Danny Wilson is here. He has a very short presentation this evening that he can go through, if you would like.

And I will go ahead and turn it over to him. Thank you very much.

Thank you so much. Welcome, Dan.

Thank you very much. Good evening. Appreciate for you having me again this evening. So as Duncan mentioned, we just have a very brief presentation for you. I'm really highlighting a few things that we discussed during the last meeting when you opened the public hearing. So I wanna point a couple things in your packets. There is a list of engagement efforts. You can see part of it on the slide this evening. Steph put this together to show more comprehensive view of the outreach and engagement activities that have taken place over the last fourteen months. We've held 35 total events.

I do wanna note one thing I commented on when staff showed this to me was 764 letters were mailed twice and 342 postcards were handed out, distributed door to door. That is above and beyond any community I've worked with as far as getting word out to residents and community members about a plan. All we can do is invite people to participate and make sure they know their voices are welcome. We cannot force anyone, of course, to come and and talk with us during the process. Also, in this item, you can see a map that shows some of the the workshop locations and where flyers were distributed and those sorts of things.

And I know we talked about last time, yes, it is concentrated in the downtown area because that's the the area we were studying, but also there were activities and and items that occurred outside the study area throughout town as well. So I did wanna point that out to you. It's in your packets. And then another item in your packet this evening is a memo that staff and Friesen town staff and Friesen Nickel staff jointly put together regarding some of the specific questions that came up from you all and also from the community during the last meeting. And you can see responses in red.

I do wanna mention in this memo items two, three, and nine have recommended minor modifications to the plan based on questions and discussions we had when I was here last. So if you were interested in moving forward with making a a motion to approve it, those are maybe items you wanna take a look at to to see about including in that motion at your your pleasure. But also wanted to talk on a few specific things that came up. Flooding and storm water was one of the the big items that came up and just wanted to to highlight all of these items that have come up. They're integrated throughout the the plan itself, but flooding and storm water really the first goal.

So the downtown area plan has five goals. Goal number one talks about climate resilience, which includes flooding, increased rain events, and all of those sorts of items. They also, there are several elements of the implementation plan that specifically deal with storm water in particular and obviously storm water to reduce flooding events. So for instance, built environment number 12, evaluate communal storm water control measures. So one of the challenges of the downtowns is a lot of it's developed such as your downtown.

There's a lot of impervious surface. There's also really small lots which makes it hard for an individual property owner to put in a storm water pond or deal with stormwater. So this recommendation is for the town to take a proactive step and evaluate a communal stormwater location that could accept water from multiple private properties in downtown to then treat it and allow it to be discharged safely. You can see built environment number 14, the retrofit parking lots. This looks at reducing impervious coverage and implementing some of the items you can see on the screen here as far as rain gardens or other infiltration elements into existing parking lots to reduce impervious coverage and slow storm water.

Housing affordability is obviously a huge topic. It has been a a very large topic since we started this project. It has come up many times. It is identified in goal number two of the plan. Also, if you look through the plan, there's 427 mentions of affordable housing, so it is very much front and center.

Again, some of the implementation items, policy recommendation number six, looking at the UDO update project and encouraging affordable housing to be included in there as far as one of the the items in the UDO update that I know you're working through currently. Also, future vision for each of the the character areas includes affordable housing explicitly as a desired element to be included throughout the downtown area. The economy and business discussion that we've had, there are a lot of questions about supporting small businesses and that's goal number four of the plan as far as supporting small business and local business and providing opportunities. Again, a couple of the implementation items, policy recommendation number five. Again, the UDO update that you're currently working on, making sure there's an allowance to encourage affordable commercial spaces.

And then operational and programming, number 17. This is for the town to develop and maintain a pop up storefront. So that could be a space, almost an incubator space for people to test new business ideas in the downtown area. And there are also 36 implementation items that directly tie back to goal number four, so the supporting businesses in the downtown area. So there is a lot in the plan directly tied.

Again, this is a short presentation. We could go through the whole plan but everyone would appreciate me a lot less at the end of that meeting. So also wanted to touch on the designs and renderings. I know there's been a lot of conversation around these items. So just to reiterate, I know we talked about it a lot last time but the renderings are not intended to say a property should be built to look just like this.

It's intended to show a suite of elements incorporated into an example that town staff, planning board, town council can use when talking with private developers and property owners to say these are the elements that we would like to see in private development. So the top right image for instance, this uses a greenway or multi use path as the main entrance. So it prioritizes bike and pedestrian access. It incorporates native plantings, storm water, innovative storm water measures with rain gardens throughout, as well as integrating, you know, public art and some other elements. We also looked at so for instance, the bottom right image, doing step back architecture to make sure the pedestrian space feels comfortable.

So there's a lot of discussion around building height and there's a relationship between building height and pedestrian comfort. So we're trying to thread that needle. And one of the ways to do that is to step back your building design and architecture to make sure as a pedestrian, you're interacting with one or two stories, not five stories. So there that is shown in the bottom right hand image. And then again, there are a lot of other elements throughout.

So operational and programming implementation item number seven talks a lot about evaluating property redevelopment opportunities. And again, this is for staff to talk about this with the private sector. So a lot of the development and redevelopment in downtown area will occur when the private property owners or developers come forward to the town. So the intent of this is to provide information for the town staff and again, elected and appointed officials to convey goals and desires to those private interests. We've also talked about the relationship of this downtown area plan and where that fits in the planning scheme of things.

So everyone's familiar with the Carrboro Connects comprehensive plan. That is the town wide, very high level document that covers every part of Carrboro. The downtown area plan is the next level down. This really focuses obviously just on the downtown area. You can see our study area on the map on the screen.

And there are many other plans at this level. But then really when you go down to the next level, the UDO update that you're working on now is where a lot of the detail that has come up should reside. That is town wide but contains very detailed information. So if we're talking percentage of commercial to residential breakdowns for development, that level of detail is really in the UDO. And there are many other elements like that that the UDO should really cover and that's something that this plan says from the community's voice, you all should be looking at when you're updating the UDO.

Is please don't forget to look at affordable housing. Please don't forget to look at building height relationship to affordable housing and those can be then assessed at the UDO level. The UDO also pulls goals and strategies from other plans and higher level plans. So again, it's not just the downtown area plan. We pulled information from the Carrboro Connects plan, the UDO will as well. It'll also pull information from this plan. But just wanted to talk about that relationship a little bit. So I know we talked about engagement and I've I mentioned to this last time as well. So the downtown area plan has engagement and community input at its core. We started with the Carrboro Connects plan and the input gathered through there and reviewed that and and pulled that information here.

We reached out historically under representative residents and business owners, held multiple meetings and pop up events, distributed flyers and information to historically underrepresented community members, had business owners, stakeholder groups and talked to business owners and really intended for this to be a platform for the community's voice and making sure that the the things we heard from the community are shown through this plan. And I also want to remind everyone, adoption of this plan is not the end, it's the beginning. So this plan sets a launching point for the town to then move forward with implementation and the community conversation continues throughout. So again, this is adoption does not stop the community conversation. It does not say that we're done.

It says, okay, we have the road map in place, let's

get started.

So implementation starts with project selection and budgeting. All of these, again, have community input and conversations. Then you get into site specific planning and design. Let's say you decide to do a community communal storm water for downtown to reduce flooding. So you then identify a location. Well, what does that look like? Then that community conversation begins again. So you get into specifics for there. Or is it, let's extend bike lanes further down a road. Well, what does that look like?

And what is the access management with individual driveways? And every single project you select moving forward will then warrant additional community conversation and input to make sure it is being implemented in a thoughtful manner. And the intent of this plan is to provide the framework for how to to look at that and the lens through which those are viewed to make sure that this can continue in a logical manner and down the the right path. There are also a lot of community partnerships referenced in here and celebratory elements with community partners because the town cannot do it by itself. You all know this.

It takes a community, not just a group of elected officials and a group of town staff. It takes everyone involved. So again, there's many opportunities for community input and conversation to continue even after adoption of the of the plan itself. With that, I'll be happy to answer any questions you may have.

Thank you so much for your presentation. Council members, you want to hear from the public and go back to staff and the consultants. So we'll come back to you after. So I have seven folks signed up to speak on this item, and how many more are not signed up to speak on this item? So in the overflow are there? Could you raise your hand again? I think I saw like four. Thank you. One, two, three, four. Thank you.

And let's see how many in the overflow. Yes. That was the consultant. Was it Danny? Danny Wilson? Danny Wilson, I'm sorry. Yes, Danny Wilson. Thank you, Mr. Joyner. One other person, so we're good.

So we know the guidelines. And so we will begin with Jane Daniewicz. Jane, come on up. Welcome. And you are the chair of?

I am the chair of SEAC.

Yes. What I thought. Thank you.

Okay. Good evening, council members and mayor. The downtown area plan and the revised UDOs to follow will benefit by integrating green infrastructure with affordable housing. I'm really happy tonight to be connecting everything and emphasizing affordable housing. One cannot be prioritized over another.

I would like to comment on the economic viability and long term value of green infrastructure in affordable housing. Green infrastructure is a network of natural and semi natural elements designed to deliver ecological, economic and societal benefits. Green infrastructure is not a developer's trade off or an extra luxury amenity, but is essential in creating sustainable and equitable urban environments. It is an economically sound investment that yields multiple financial and social returns. The perceived upfront costs of green infrastructure are often seen as prohibitive, but this view is shortsighted and incorrect.

Traditional cost benefit analyses often fail to capture the long term economic, social, and environmental returns on investment that green infrastructure provides, such as reduced energy consumption, improved storm water management, enhanced property values, and decreased health care costs. Don't think of green infrastructure as an added cost, but instead as a strategic investment that yields multiple returns, enhancing the lives of residents, strengthening communities, and contributing to a more resilient and sustainable ecosystem. Economic analyses demonstrate that the long term cost effectiveness of green infrastructure considering life cycle benefits and avoided costs associated with environmental degradation and public health crises. Upfront investments in green infrastructure are offset by long term savings in energy consumption, water management, and health care costs. Enhanced property values and increased rental income from green buildings generate economic returns for developers and property owners.

Green infrastructure creates green jobs in design, construction, installation, and maintenance, stimulating local economies, and creating economic opportunities for residents. Furthermore, the avoided costs associated with environmental degradation and public health crises such as heat related illnesses and flooding damage represent significant economic benefits for all. If you support affordable housing, then you are in favor of green infrastructure. I urge the town council to integrate and include green infrastructure as a cornerstone to the UDO rewrites. Thank you.

Thank you so much for your comments. We appreciate it. Thank you so much. Next on the list is Glen Tompkins. Welcome, Glen.

Thank you, Madam Mayor, Tank Council. My name is Glen Tompkins. I live at 1615 Homestead Road in Chapel Hill. Friends, Carbaronians, countrymen, lend me your ears. I come to speak on the Roberson Street development aspects of the downtown area plan.

I've been a resident of Carbara, Chapel Hill, or Orange County since 1999. While I may sound like I've just stepped off the plane from His Majesty's Aisle, this is most definitely my home. I am also on the board of the South Orange Rescue Squad. I mention my British heritage because we are known for our love of queuing and orderly processes. However, when it comes to emergency services, orderly clue orderly queues are the enemy of survival. The South Orange Rescue Squad has stood on Roberson Street since 1974. To put that in perspective, we predate predate the existence of the nine one one system. System. We are not a social club. This is a very serious organization with a critical community focused mission.

We operate a station equipped with state of the art ambulances and significant technical rescue equipment. Our basic life support ambulances can be dispatched to 911 calls twenty four hours a day, three hundred and sixty five days of the year. We augment Orange County Emergency Services, and quite literally, we save lives. Just earlier this year, during the severe flooding caused by tropical storm Chantal, SOARS did not hunker down, SOARS deployed. We rescued Orange County residents whose homes were inundated with storm water.

Our first responders recently delivered lifesaving CPR to a gentleman in cardiac arrest. Because of that rapid response, in seconds and not minutes, he was transported to UNC, and to the best of my knowledge, is enjoying his life, what's left of his liberty, and is pursuing happiness to this very day. This this brings me to the sticky wicket in the current downtown area plan. The plan explicitly identifies Roberson Street as a prime location for festivals and redevelopment. While I enjoy a street party as much as the next person, mixing a festival going party crowd with the facility that requires immediate, high speed egress for emergency vehicles is a logistical paradox.

You cannot have a street filled with revelry and road closures at the exact moment a cardiac arrest call come call comes in. An ambulance simply cannot mind the gap. Therefore, may I ask the council may may I ask you the council specific? I ask you to delay any final decisions regarding the redevelopment and designation of Roberson Street until a formal and proper consultation has been conducted. Please ensure that SOARS is not just notified, but is actively engaged in the planning process. Thank you for your time, your services, and your ears.

Thank you so much for your for your comments. We also received an email about this very matter I was going to mention it later from the chair of the board at SOARS. And so we appreciate you bringing it into the space. David Silph? You sure you don't want to bring up the roof?

Yeah, yeah. One minute. Yeah. My name is David Silfen. I am a retired paramedic from Orange County. I was the former deputy operations manager for Orange County. Also moved here some thirty years ago. Two weeks after moving here, I joined South Orange as a volunteer. So, I not only got paid to do what I like to do, but I also volunteered my time. Glenn pretty much said it all.

I think that people have no understanding of who this organization is. It has actually been here since 1971, started by community members. It is still highly active with community members. College students start their medical careers right here. Some of the top doctors I am not making this up across the country were members of South Orange.

I just got back from Alaska. The emergency room doc that runs it up there was a former South Orange member. We are an organization that's strictly volunteer. We get no money from any government agency. By the way, if you'd like to give us some money, we function on our own.

Our only income comes from either events that we do college or for billing for Medicare and insurance companies. Every person there works for free. And I feel that because there's such a great community group, they absolutely or we should absolutely be a part of any planning for that one street. I'd love to see Carrboro blossom and, you know, I love the idea of cobblestone. But please consider us. It's kind of important. So, thank you for your time.

Thank you so much, Mr. Sofan. I appreciate your comments. Next up, I have Melba. Your last name, is it Rivera? Melba and Selah? Steel Cobb? Yes, come on. Welcome.

Thank you.

Downtown area planning.

Good evening, madam mayor and council members. Thank you for giving us the opportunity to share feedback together.

First of all, she's the boss.

Alright. Alright.

Okay. So

my name is Melvin Ribeiro, and I stand here Shoulder.

To shoulder with my neighbor, Ciela Steelcock.

We're affectionately known as the James Street gang, and several of our neighbors are here as well. Ceil and I have lived side by side for eleven years. We're both homeowners, we support our local businesses, and we live much of our daily lives in Chapel Hill and Carrboro. We bike, we walk, and occasionally we call on the Carrboro PD for support. I also serve on the economic sustainability commission led by the exceptional John Hartman Brown and Leeny Newman.

We truly appreciate the work that's gone into the downtown plan. Fourteen months is a long haul, and it shows. We also know this is new territory for many of us. As neighbors, we learn from one another and from other towns. Melba has shared Waxhaw's downtown draft plan with the town clerk and as an example of what we could look towards. We?d like to offer three key recommendations before adopting.

So one, preserve historic charm, build into the plan the new traditional architectural standards, modern interior and traditional exterior. The goal isn't to be anywhere in North Carolina. The renderings, while examples, don't reflect our historic charm. We appreciate what's in the plan, but I think we can have more standards built into it. Our unique character is an economic asset. Quite frankly, it's the magnet to maintain our economic power in Carbara. Mayor Fushi, how am I supposed to recruit a James Beard chef if I don't have our characteristics built into the plan?

Number two, deepen community engagement. We'd love to see more intentional conversations to outline details on green infrastructure, economic slash business development, affordable housing, and transportation slash traffic. Staff and consultants have done strong work and now we?re at the refinement stage. A lot has changed over the last fourteen months and we need your flexibility to incorporate these changes.

And the last point is strengthen the market analysis built into the plan, incorporate more data on retail leakage and economic trends so we can better support strategic business recruitment, and ensure the plan offers clear, practical guidance for long term economics viability. The nation is watching North Carolina, and why not put Carrboro on the map?

Thank you for the care that youve put into this process, and we hope youll include more detail prior to adopting the plan. We're in this together to set up for a strong future.

All right, now. I'll have a hand clap for that. I like that. It was cute. And thank you so much for that. Next up is Richard. Is it Shram? Shram? Shram. Welcome, mister Shram.

My name is Richard Shram. My wife and I have lived in Carver forty nine years. I would like to comment on the town's engagement efforts described in the engagement summary appended to the downtown area plan. The summary describes 13 engagement initiatives, some of which consisted of multiple events, and provides participant and attendee numbers for nine of them. If you add up those numbers, the total is 566.

Obviously, more than 566 residents participated in the drafting of the plan. But even if that number were increased by 100 or 200 or 500, it would still represent a small fraction of the over 21,000 people who live in Carrboro. Engagement efforts focused on residents who live and work downtown, but the desire for broader engagement was a theme in the mail in comments reported in the summary. Comments that reflected, quote, a desire for more community engagement and clearer communication. Residents requested additional public workshops, especially for neighborhoods adjacent to the planning boundaries.

I would like to focus on one item in the summary that suggests the inadequacy of the town's engagement initiatives. Earlier this year, the town planned two events described as stakeholder presentations that were designed to, quote, provide a project update to community stakeholders and obtain feedback about the draft character plan and renderings showing development examples. The summary reports are only on the first presentation, only one presentation, which was given on February 19. Just how well the town promoted this event may be suggested by the number of stakeholders who attended it. One.

The engagement summary shows why the plan why why many people in town believe the plan reflects the desires of the council more than those of the people who will have to pay for it if it is approved. I ask the council to postpone a vote and launch a robust and truly inclusive engagement program, one that explains to us the challenges and consequences of various scenarios of future growth and asks us if we are willing to accept those consequences. Like, for example, five to seven story apartment buildings looming over Downtown Carverhill. A serious engagement effort would provide many more opportunities for many more of us, not simply to be heard, but actually to shape the future of our town.

Thank you, Ms. Schramm. Next up, we have Diane Robertson. Welcome, Diane. And after Diane, I have Linda Hock.

Thank you for this opportunity. It's good to see you all here tonight. To say that we are living in a time with when governance at the national and state levels leaves many of us feeling unsettled is a word that is insufficient. That I also feel that about the governance closest to me is equally disturbing. Again, counsel is considering big and major changes without building consensus and creating community buy in.

Recently, I attended a meeting on this subject that only came about because several of us learned that the DAP was on the agenda and asked that meetings be held at areas of that had been ignored. It was clear many who attended had no idea that this major change to the physical layout of Carrboro, to say nothing of the fiscal impact to our community, was afoot. These conversations were a start, but based on attendance and comments, it was clear that this should be a beginning and not a point of conclusion. At the meeting I attended, there were questions taken by staff. I asked what the problem that the DAP is designed to solve.

Most of those in attendance were learning about this for the first time. To build a shared vision, we need to ask questions that are relevant to concerns from the community, not present ideological conclusions that build on a plan to fit that. In a town that is already one of the top five densest towns in the state, a major change to downtown will impact the residents North of Main Street who also contribute to the financial health of Carrboro. Here are a few questions that might be answered and explained to residents before adopting a plan. Who will pay for the downtown area plan?

How will this plan make Carrboro more affordable for current residents? How much did this current iteration of the consultant plan cost? What is the estimated cost to implement it? Building climate resilience is the first goal listed in the plan. How will you balance the impact of growth in impervious surfaces and the loss of trees and other climate supporting natural resources?

Storm water issues are already undermining existing neighborhoods. What is the plan to actually build climate resilience? The only developments council has approved so far are large single family homes outside of the downtown core. These are not affordable and have involved clear cutting the very thing that creates climate resilience. Chantal is not a one off.

As a Tree City USA, Carbrough is expected to have a tree committee. Who's on that committee? What do they do now? How will they change how will that change with DAP? According to the ParkServ analysis, well I'm not going get through all of this, affordable housing which we all want is stressed and I think that this is something that's going to be spoken to later, but we heard about affordable housing. We need to see how it's going to be built and maintained.

Thank you, Diane. Linda? Linda Hock? Welcome.

I'm Melinda Hock and I live at 102 Mill Rock Court and I've lived here for fifty years. I'm just I'm going to throw out what I was going to say, which was highlights from the letter I wrote you all within the last hour, two hours. And just say you're beginning to see the shape of what needs to be responded to. And this is why I would urge you to pause in the adoption of the plan tonight because you do not have community buy in. And there's a question of how you define community.

You are at large representatives elected to represent the entire Carrboro community, not selected elements or sections of the Carbure community. There's a question of strategic smart growth and whether this is student rental housing or whether it really answers the affordability question. I went to the work session. I heard it was all about 80% of the AMI. That's not going to help the most struggling members of this community with decent housing.

The green infrastructure, everyone has emphasized. Storm water is your number one problem. No house is affordable if it floods constantly. The question is who pays the tax burden on and let me tell you, the increase in taxes for this year is unsustainable. And then finally, let me bring the character.

No place, I wrote a column for seven years about sense of place. And I could write that column in a town, in an area that had a sense of place. What I have seen so far and the stuff I heard during the work session was throw character out. We don't need it. Well, if you throw character out, you don't have a sense of belonging.

And moreover, in your plan, it talks about the arts. Crafts, I think one member here on the dais talked about having the arts and crafts people and all these people coming to shop. They're not going to come to place this characterless. As Gertrude Stein said, there's no there, there. Why would they?

It would be ugly. It wouldn't enhance their spirit. And then last, in my last thirty seconds, there is an issue of disenfranchisement that has been going on. And this is the fourth time the council and the town, and I'm not sure who's responsible for it, but there have been multiple projects now where the town, the broader town has not been involved or informed. And citizens are afraid. They feel left out and excluded. And I don't think that's the way you build community. Thank you.

Thank you, Linda. I'm going to ask that we maintain the quorum. I know, you know, everyone is getting their comments out into the atmosphere tonight. We welcome that. But if we could just kind of keep tone it down just a little bit, I would appreciate it. Thank you. I'm going to call up. I saw Terri Buckner's hand, so I'm going to go ahead and call you. There was a gentleman in the back there. Yeah, and you can come on up after Terri. And was there two people in the

It just one that was in the overflow room.

I thought there were three people in here. Am I missing someone? Okay, so there'll be one more. So Terri, the gentleman in the back, and whichever one of you. Oh, oh, so both of you. So there'll be four here. Okay. Go ahead, Terri. Welcome.

Terri Good evening. A report came out today from a Carolina demography that focused on housing cost burden across North Carolina, and it broke it down by county. And I think there was some really good information in there that you all need to really consider. They define housing cost burden as households that pay over 30% of gross household income on housing, and then uniquely, they earn less than 75,000 per year. So in the comprehensive plan, you use the 30% cost burden, but you don't link it to salary or income.

Based on what Carolina demography says, that makes 26% of Orange County residents cost burdened. I don't know what part. They didn't break it down by municipality. But in your market analysis conducted for the UDO, the median household income of Carrboro is 86,000. That means that affordable housing, remembering what median means, median means half above and half below, at 85,000 income and 75,000 as affordable break, that means roughly 40% of Carrboro residents are cost burdened.

And what the Carolina demography points out is that this is for renters only. Homeowners are not equally cost burdened. In fact, we have one of the lowest cost burdened for homeowners. So, that's only eight to 10%, just in case you're interested. Renters, if Carbara if the solution that Carbara's looking for, which is what I've heard in your UDO discussion last week and in other discussions, is affordable housing for renters, then maybe we need to reconsider that.

At least consider what needs to be done for homeowners if they are the least cost burden. So, I would like to hear us have some conversations about ways that we have affordable home ownership. Things like help with, for first time home owners putting down down payments or low cost loans. You know, at least make it part of the conversation. It's not part of the conversation right now for the downtown area plan where you're planning all of these apartment buildings and we've got a problem.

We've got a problem with affordable housing, but we're running into a solution without having really looked at a full range of possible solutions. I know it's the one that you want. It's the one that fits with the smart growth ideology. But is it really right for Carrboro? And what I would like for you to do is consider other questions that might be appropriate and delay the decision. Thank you.

Thank you, Terry. Appreciate it. The gentleman in the back, sir. If you would just state your name, please.

Hi, everybody. My name is, Barney Cohout, and I've lived in Carrboro well over three decades. I live in at 112 Carroll Street. I'm a certified arborist, and I also am certified in stormwater management. And I have a couple issues I'd like to speak.

As a certified arborist, how could I get on this tree council? I only have thirty two years of experience as a certified arborist. And maybe if my my neighbors all know me, they could give me recommendations. I am one of the unrepresented population. I did not get a letter.

I did not know about this meeting. One of my neighbors told me about this meeting. I'm sorry. The town of Carrboro just lost their public works department by flooding. Town of Carrboro also does not have a stormwater engineering department. They don't have an engineer. We don't even have a new location for these new facilities yet. Tim West is the owner of a property at 107 Carroll Street. It was flooded 13 times. Our neighborhood was annexed in 1980 when the town of Carrboro had a population of 5,000 people.

It was not voted upon. It went to the North Carolina Supreme Court, and the North Carolina Supreme Court said, there's no reason to think that the town of Carrboro would not bring up the standards of this community to meet the rest of the standards of Carrboro. We still have flooding to this day. The case went all the way to the North Carolina Supreme Court, and then and here we are now with 22,000 people living in the town of Carrboro. I see a rendering of the downtown, and the downtown has these huge trees that are 30.

When they put them in, they're seven feet tall. It's a little misrepresentation. And why did they send two letters to the same person? Why didn't I get a letter?

Thank you.

Thank you for your comments, sir. So we have I love the enthusiasm. We have two ladies in the front, so whoever wants to come first. Just state your name, dear, when you come up here. Thank you.

Hello. I am Mary Faith Mount Coors. I do not have prepared remarks. I live at 1531 Pathway Drive. I've lived there for twenty one years, raised our kids there.

And I am just getting up to speed on this plan. I am not up to speed. But what I've learned so far is that 294,000 of our taxpayer money dollars have been spent on consultants to develop this plan. I can only imagine what more could be spent, as some have mentioned, to carry out

this

plan. I have learned that there are pillars that are supposedly governing the plan, but what I haven't learned, as some have mentioned, is how the plan actually speaks to those pillars. Those include the climate aspects and the affordable housing aspects and some of the main reasons that the council is saying the plan needs to happen. And I think one of the biggest things I've learned and that I heard when I spoke with other CARBOS citizens Saturday before last at one of the sessions that I went to quickly to try to learn what was going on is we are putting it's as if we're just putting this all in the hands of developers and saying because that's that ends up being the end kind of response is the developers will do it. And, you know, I I know that other Carrboro residents have said, we don't want to be Carrie.

We don't want to be the new Chapel Hill. We want to be Carrboro. And so I just I'm here knowing that I am learning. But I guess, as some have mentioned, more learning by the citizens, I think, is needed for this kind of planning. And so while I appreciate the immense time I'm sure all of you have put into this, I think that we need to be able to be asked more about what the future needs to look like for the town and how a plan like this actually meets some of the pillars that are laid out that we are trying to speak to and trying to meet.

So, thank you very much.

Thank you for your comments. We appreciate it. State your name, please.

Yeah, I'm Marcy Waters. I live at 1540 Pathway Drive, and I've lived in Carrboro for twenty five years. And just to put that in perspective, I am a Navy brat. So, the longest I lived anywhere else was like two years except for college. So, this is really home. Similar to Mary Faith, I've raised my kids here, first one's off in college. My husband's also a teacher in the district. And so, don't have prepared comments like Mary Faith. I've just recently learned about this. I went to the one of the info sessions at MLK Park, which was helpful.

But, again, there were sort of lots of pretty pictures, but I don't really have a good sense. So, things that I've heard a lot of similar concerns from other speakers that I would like more information on. So, you know, affordable housing is a huge issue. And just as an example, with a husband who's a teacher, at one point we met with somebody who was running for the school board, and they assumed he lived outside of town because teachers can't afford to live in Carrboro. When we moved to Carrboro, I was hired as an assistant professor.

And Carrboro was the less expensive place to live, right, versus Chapel Hill, and that's not the case anymore. So affordable housing is really important, but we want that to also be, you know, again, this issue of homeownership versus apartments. We want homes for those teachers who ideally will stay here for their entire careers like my husband has. I'm also very much care about the environment, and I'm so happy to see that that is really baked into the plan, but I don't know the details. And so, again, things like, you know, this is a tree city.

I love that aspect about Carrboro. I love the big oaks that are downtown. And I would hate to see, you know, this big old canopy cut down for new builds. So I hope that's baked in. I love seeing the pictures in the plan that said native plants.

But I don't know, is that a must or a nice option, right? Because if we're really concerned about the environment, we need to be concerned about every aspect down to the food web and the native insects. Now I lost my train of thought. I would love I am not an arborist, but hey, I would love to be on the tree committee too, so if you need more people. So I guess the other thing that was also mentioned oh, twenty nine seconds. Okay. I saw in the plan it said context sensitive development. I will tell you that I think Chapel Hill has no charm, personally. I'm just going to throw them under the bus. They have no charm.

And we really need to keep the charm that we have. We do not want the sorts of new construction that's happened in Chapel Hill. I visit a lot of college towns with my job. I see a lot of college towns, and I know Carbrough's not the college town Chapel Hill is. But I see a lot of college towns with charm. We need to keep the charm that Carbrough has. Thank you so much for your time and the opportunity to talk.

Thank you so much for your comments. This enthusiasm is all over me. Are are you the one the one from the overflow? Welcome. And your name?

Hi. I'm Everett Goulden from 108 South Peak Drive. And I wanted to express my support for the downtown area plan, and specifically for the pedestrianization of East Beaver Street on behalf of myself and several friends who are part of the Carbara Run Club and so are out running tonight instead of being here. I hope, that after the plan is approved, that's one of the first changes the town implements as I've heard about this and I've looked forward to the implementation of this street being pedestrianized since I first heard whispers of its future pedestrian pedestrianization when I moved to Carbara four years ago. Data on pedestrianizing of other streets throughout The US and world supports that this posit pedestrianization would be a huge boon culturally and financially for Carbara. So again, I hope it's one of the first actions taken after the plan is accepted. Thank you.

Thank you so much for your comments. We appreciate that. And that is all that I have. Nobody else in here? Nobody in the overflow?

That was it? All right. Council members is there one more? So I'm going to go ahead and close the public hearing. So I'm going go ahead and close the public hearing, and we're going to move to counsel questions and deliberations.

Duncan is here as well as Danny to engage us and answer questions as we move towards wherever we end up. Have council members, we have Attachment A and Attachment A1. And I'm sure that you have read and know what each one of those mean. And whoever wants to start first with any kind of questions or comments, I'm just looking to see who would. I'll start with Mayor Pro Tem now.

Thank you, Mayor Fuxi. Just a couple things off the top. Procedurally, I appreciate the edits from the CEAC. I am going to be asking that we amend Attachment A to include reference to green infrastructure in place of references to trees and plantings, I think is the language. I have it here in a browser tab that's stuck.

But I do think that the green infrastructure language, which starts on page 16 and continues throughout the document, is a more appropriate usage, more comprehensive. And so I like that. And then this is I have some other thoughts that maybe we can come back to, or I'm happy to go at greater length. But everybody one of the things that we hear and we've kind of been talking about is everybody hates these renderings. We know we know everybody hates the renderings.

And so I want to speak straight into the renderings thing. And then I think maybe we have an idea that can help with this. So the renderings put us in kind of an awkward place with a document like this. So this document, as you have heard, sits between the comprehensive plan, which was adopted in 2021 and kind of outlines 2022, my mistake which kind of outlines sort of the goals for the whole town on the scale that the downtown area plan is doing. But more broadly and one of the series of goals in there is that we need to get more specific about the vision for our downtown.

So this kind of moves down the funnel. And then we are also engaged in the Unified Development Ordinance, which will put this vision into plan. So a developer some of you have heard this, some of you have not. It's clear from the comments. A developer would not be building from this document from the downtown area plan. And as such, these renderings have been a persistent problem in discussing this document because they're kind of useful in a certain way to have a sense of scale. And I think Danny and the consultants have done a really good job terms of making them useful in that way. I think if we look at them as, here is how a large building that does x, y, and z in function might relate to a street. Or here's how the setbacks might look in relation to a greenway. Here's where bike parking might go.

These are questions that maybe we would want some visualization for. What the consultant doesn't have in front of them and can't respond to is the aesthetic guidelines that we will be codifying in our UDO. It's pretty appropriate for the consultant to have made these look generic. They are generic. But their place in this document, I think it is clear, is counterproductive at this point. So I have some longer thoughts. Oh, god. I hope not too much longer. But I have some other things to discuss. But right off the top, I wanted to put the green infrastructure edit in front of you all.

And then I wonder what you think, colleagues, about just kicking these renderings into the appendix to be listed with the engagement materials. If you look at the way that the rendering section is, binding. It's kind of its own thing in between like street cross sections and other things. It doesn't, it's not doing anything for us. And it has persistently been a problem in community buy in and like reading this document and like how we want it to feel.

It doesn't look like how any of us imagine Carbara. And while that's sort of not a problem as an operational document, it's not appropriate as a public document. So I wonder, do we lose anything, colleagues, by taking these renderings, clipping them in entirety and putting them in the appendix alongside the rest of the engagement materials. Because I think that they have been engaged. And so that's all I've got for now. In case there was cross talk, I wanted to get those things early. But I can hold for now.

If we could just kind of be quiet in the council chamber as the council is talking, I would appreciate that so we can hear each other. And so I thank you for that, mayor pro tem, now. The renderings have been quite an issue from the very beginning. And so I don't know how my how the rest of you feel, but, yeah, I would like to see them move to the appendix with the engagement material. I found them you know, renderings are just that.

They're renderings. They're ideas. I'm sure the consultant used things he heard from community members in reference to some of these renderings. But the scale, the height, I know has been alarming for many. And so we do recognize that and appreciate having that idea on the table. I think it's one we can grab hold of. Anyone else? Councilmember Haben O'Donnell?

Well, I'll just say one or two things now and then maybe further into the discussion. I agree about the green infrastructure raising that up and not only taking to heart and planting in the DAP the recommendations of the climate and environment advisory committee, But also teasing out very specifically, and this is something we worked on for years but never really got to complete, is to officially create a tree advisory commission. Sami and I worked on that for years, the pandemic came up and we kind of lost it. So that's one of the things that I would like to come out of this conversation that we have counsel support to create that. In addition, that the green infrastructure items not be a trading piece in the quest to work with developers.

It should not be that bargaining chip that developers can easily get what they want by giving up the green infrastructure, the tools that we have that give us climate resilience. I do want to lift up the concern of the South Orange Rescue Squad. I really I'm shocked tonight that it's the first time I'm hearing of it. When I looked at the plans, for some crazy reason, I just thought it was something that was addressed. I don't know what made me think that it was addressed maybe because the, you know, the fire chief and other folks had not brought it forth.

But, so I want to thank the South Orange Rescue Squad folks. I've known many people who volunteered over the decades. That's something that needs a careful review and it needs to be put to the forefront because that is our closest local full rescue squad. So I wanted to lift that up and ask for that. So culture, charm, character.

I found it ironic that the plan refers to character areas that do not elevate the character that we feel for Carrboro. I think there needs to be conversation about what folks in Carrboro would like to see as part of the culture and the character of Carrboro for this plan. That's absent. And I kept hearing over and over again how the look, the feel, the sense of place in the document is missing. And it did come up not only in conversation about the downtown area plan, but it also came up in terms of the unified development plan, the UDO.

So, counsel needs to take time to explore what is it about Karbrough's character that we feel we need to preserve. When Jim Spencer and folks who are working on no, wasn't Jim, I'm sorry, it was Lance. We were working on the Carrboro, our motto and our logo, okay? We had a huge amount of input and it took a very long time to come up with it's carbro, feel free. But everyone felt that they had a stake in that.

I think that's the piece I'm looking for in this because it is our downtown and it is a place that already has a certain personality as a destination. The music festival, the poetry festival, the Carrboro Day, Earth Day, Pride. I just could go on and on. Nearly every month has something very special. And where does it most happen?

It happens downtown, but this plan doesn't feel like that. It allows for it in one way, but it doesn't feel like it. Carbara is about how it feels. So I would encourage counsel to pause and think about how we can add that into the conversation because that's the most important part of the conversation. You know, we can all figure out what kind of buildings we need to have and how we have to step back and how we can fit in pocket parks.

But once a place is built, it's really hard to input the feeling. And I'm hearing that from people on all kinds of levels. So I would say this, that there are some really good parts to this plan, but it's getting lost in the community conversation because number one, a lot of people didn't know. Now people are finding out. Let's use this moment to build community and really look towards making our downtown look and feel the way we, the way we feel about it here for everyone because as was said at the very beginning by Eli Azar, Carbara is for all of us And it's our common interest and our common cause to make our hometown feel and look like something that we, you know, that we want everyone to come and enjoy together.

So I would just recommend figuring out how we want to get these things engaged and look at a timeline, hit pause for now. And I know folks on the dais do not agree with me. They want to go forward today. But I think in the greater hope for a town that wants to come together instead of feeling that it's not moving to develop its downtown together that we figure out how to create a timeline that includes those conversations with everybody.

Thank you so much, Councilmember Haven O'Donnell. I have Councilmember Merrill on deck. But I do want to piggyback off the character conversation and not really sure what we need to do with the plan in order to incorporate that beyond what's there, but certainly open, you know, to hearing more about that. I grew up in a small town in rural Eastern North Carolina, Duplin County to be exact. And, you know, Duplin County, specifically Warsaw, North Carolina, where I grew up, has not changed a whole lot over the years.

The biggest changes came when I-forty came through, and that's when we saw the greatest change. We got a lot of it's the last rest stop before the beach. It's also the home of the Duplin Winery, for context. But the downtown itself has seen incremental changes over the years, but it still very much looks like it did when I grew up there. What I will say about this plan, I do think it is a good plan.

There's a lot in it that I can agree with. But I think we all hear from community here tonight, and even those that are not in the space tonight, we're talking about this pause. And before I move to Councilmember Merrill, I'm going to send a question to the consultant and or staff. So if we're even I don't know how counsel is going to vote after the conversation. I have no idea.

But what does pausing look like if this counsel said, Hey, you know, we don't want to move on this tonight, maybe mid February. So where does that put the consultant? Where does it put town staff as far as next steps? And I'm asking that question, but Councilmember Merrill is going to make comments. And then whenever you feel like you want to come up to the podium and provide some type of response, I, for one, would want to just hear how all that might go. Councilmember Merrill?

All right. You all

know I don't talk

very much, so I had to write down what I wanted to say. But yeah, I wanted to share why I support adopting this Downtown Area Plan. At its core, this plan is a guide, does not approve any construction, and it does not override our development review processes. I think that's something that has kind of gotten a little muddied. So it gives us a shared vision so that future proposals are shaped by our town, Carver's goals, rather than by chance.

That matters because we know change is the only constant, and planning for it is always better than reacting to it. I support this plan because it strengthens several values the community has affirmed repeatedly. It directs growth to our downtown, where we already have transit access and existing infrastructure. That helps protect our tree canopy and neighborhoods while still allowing the town to welcome new residents. It broadens our housing choices, including opportunities for affordable and workforce homes located near everyday destinations.

It also strengthens conditions for a more resilient tax base by supporting local businesses, small scale entrepreneurs and the kinds of commercial spaces residents consistently say they want more of. The plan also reinforces the fundamentals. It calls for safer sidewalks and bike connections, improved transit access and more green infrastructure, including street trees, native landscaping, and enhanced stormwater features. These priorities run throughout the town's comprehensive plan as well as this plan's goals and recommendations. We have received many emails and public comments, and I want to acknowledge and address some of the questions that have come up.

The plan guides height and building form based on context, not a single standard. It emphasizes transitions near existing homes, continued protection of the Lloyd Broad neighborhood and thoughtful attention to the surrounding built environment. The aim is not height for its own sake or density for its own sake, but to create the kinds of housing and commercial opportunities the community has asked for. Providing room for more homes in the places where it is appropriate is one of the tools that we have to support affordability, reduce displacement pressures, and give residents better access to the things that make daily life work. I've received we all received one email today that I found this sentence to be particularly insightful.

When land and home prices are high, limiting housing growth in the name of maintaining the existing physical building character of the town is also a commitment to changing the characters who live in our community, replacing those who are younger, poorer, and more diverse with those who are older, wealthier, and white. And I fit into two of those categories because I'm getting older and I'm white, but I ain't wealthy, so sorry. Nothing in this plan directs anyone to change their home or property. Future redevelopment will still move through our normal processes, and adopting the plan does not commit the town to building anything or raising taxes. What it provides is a clear framework so that when proposals do come forward, we evaluate them consistently and in ways that reflect community priorities rather than treating every project as a one off.

CARBOR works best when our community works together, and this plan gives us tools to uphold our values as we grow. And it helps ensure that the choices we make today leave room for future generations to thrive here as well. Thank you.

I appreciate that, Councilmember Merrill. I really do. Yeah, I just think it's important, and I think you laid it out very well, like, what the purpose of the plan is and that we're not green lighting projects. We're approving a framework for the future of our downtown and surrounding neighborhoods. And I think that is important context as more and more community members come online and, you know, hey, you know, we're working on this plan. And so I do appreciate your comments very, very much. I do.

Can I jump in with some Chris talk on this point about that, just to the Southern Orange point? Just I don't want us to move on from that since Randy mentioned it and the guide nature of this plan. I think where we're running into we hear you loud and clear, Southern Orange. I think the problem here is the term Festival Street. This is really like an urban planning term for if you look at the way the street cross section are for a more pedestrian and bicycle integrated street, it does not connote that there will be festivals on the street.

But I want to raise that and underscore that in particular reference to what Jason and Marefucci and Randy are saying, no changes to that street would be made without the stakeholders. Sword is very much included. So I just I think I lost I'm trying to find you in the room. I think I lost you all.

Okay. My laughter

was the two gentlemen in

the front.

Well, I hope you hear me wherever you are. But we take that point very much. And so I just since that came up, I didn't want that to go unsaid. Festival Street is really not a festival. And we would not redevelop the street without consultation.

Right, right. Thank you for that. Mayor Pro Tem now, council members, any council member Frey?

Thank you, Danny, for addressing the Festival Street question. And you saved me from reading the section on Roberson Street, which is short enough to read out while leaving out Festival. I'll just do that because it makes sense. So just to catch up here, it says, all I'm going to do is I'm going to read this section. And the only words I'm going to leave out are Festival Street, the one time that they appear.

To help give it context, it says Roberson Street presents a unique opportunity for Carrboro. The street runs parallel to Main Street and provides access to parking behind Main Street's historic commercial buildings. It connects the new Drakeford Library Complex to the Art Center and the Libicoten Bikeway. It will provide access to the new parking garage behind the Drakeford Complex. Roberson Street is envisioned as a shared space where pedestrians and bicycles are prioritized and vehicular traffic must travel slowly.

This could have sidewalks that are at the same level as the street to indicate the free movement of pedestrians throughout the corridor. The road surface should be something other than asphalt such as bricks or pavers serving as a visual cue to traffic that Roberson is not an ordinary street. Trees, flowers, and other vegetation could be added to create a linear park along Roberson Street, and art installations could be added to celebrate Carrboro's history and the rich art scene to tie in with the art center at the eastern end. So adopting this plan does not change any of the rules of the street. It's an example of what a street of this kind could look like and a suggestion that that one makes sense.

We would of course be talking with SOARs about, hey, do brick pavers does brick pavers work here? Is this safe? How do we make sure that while other vehicular traffic must travel slowly, the ambulances can get out whenever they need to? So just to clear that point up. I have a couple of short points I want to address. Some of these are responses to either emails that I wasn't able to respond to in time or to folks that commented before. There was a really good point about the market analysis. That is not part of this plan. There's a big market analysis for Carbara as a whole that's happening as part of our UDO process. So it's coming.

It's just not in this because this is just for downtown area plan and we wanted the market analysis to include not only downtown but the whole town. Native plants are not optional. This is also a UDO point. We were just talking about this last Tuesday and saying that some of the things that we were not willing to accept as being negotiable from developers included are storm water standards and the use of native plants from a list. So a developer that comes forward under this new plan and under our new UDO is not going to be able to just say, hey, I want crepe myrtles.

Do me a deal. They need to go by the plan that we have on the list that would be incorporated in that UDO. I also wanted to know, there's a really good point about loving the big trees downtown and one thing that we take very seriously is figuring out how we keep having big trees downtown because a lot of the big oaks downtown are like 70 year old Willow Oaks. They've some of those trees have got about ten years left in them. Willow Oaks do not live a long time.

So we need to be planning now to plant more long lived trees as things go on in downtown so that we still have big trees twenty years from now and thirty years from now and sixty years from now and so on. Okay, great. Here we go. I really wanted to lift up Terri Buckner's comment about cost burden. It is an enormous problem for Carrboro.

More than half of Carrboro rents. I would say that it is a reasonable guess that more than half of Carrboro renters are cost burdened. And we have a duty to act as a town to remediate that. One of the single most effective methods that we know of for keeping rents from rising or even reducing rents is there have got to be more places to rent. And so that is driving a lot of the decisions that you're seeing in this plan.

The focus on affordable housing and the focus on residences downtown is because that is the only way that you get affordable housing at scale in Carrboro. Okay. I think my last point here is that I wanted to address this point that the plan doesn't capture the feel because I think that's really important. So I have a short, sort of a short story to tell, if I may, Madam Mayor. That I had a cookout last summer behind one of the units in White Oak with Councilmember Posada Orozco and some of

his

neighbors who lived, who had rented in White Oak, had jumped on a unit when it came up for sale. I want to keep them anonymous and not like tell their whole story, but I will just note that both of these folks were working middle class jobs. They were not well off. And they were able to find a place to live in Carrboro. They were minutes from everything.

They had a teen child who was roaming with the feral child pack of Carrboro and they'll be home, I don't know, for dinner sometime. And all of this was possible for them because what they needed was because they were living in walkable downtown Carrboro. What they needed was close by. That ability for working people to find a home in Carrboro and have a good life that is not dependent on cars and the expense, to have a life where they could go get what they needed. They had a car, but they didn't need it for most of their everyday life and they had an affordable place to live.

That is the image that I have in front of me as I'm thinking about the kind of lives that we want to make possible in Carrboro. We want people to able to raise a family here and live an affordable life. When White Oak was built, it was the destroyer of neighborhoods. Right? There were three large identical townhome communities built right on the edge of what was then the bulk of populated Carrboro.

And people were absolutely furious about the destruction of the town's character. These properties were built up at a density dramatically higher than anything around them at the time. They're actually built at a density higher than anything we have built since 1990 in Carrboro. They were We don't have all of the Not all of the detailed conversations from the adoption of the land use ordinance have lasted to this day. But I would not be at all surprised to learn that the development of that and other what are today our most affordable places to live in Carrboro were part of the impetus of shutting off development using the land use ordinance in the early '80s.

But that place that made so many people so angry about the destruction of the character of Carrboro is today one of the places where the character of Carrboro shines through most clearly because it is a place where people can live together affordably and pursue their vision of the good life. So, my hope with this plan is that this is going to enable the next fifty years version of that good life. Where I'm going with that is that this plan is definitely not going to capture the feel of Carrboro. The downtown area plan can't feel like Carrboro because the feel of Carrboro is not defined by its buildings. It's defined by its people.

And if we don't make it possible for the people that make Carrboro so great to continue to live in Carrboro, the wait staff and the cashiers and the grad students and the teachers and the musicians and everybody else that makes Carrboro awesome, then Carrboro will cease to feel good even if every single building downtown stays exactly as it is. So it is with that in mind that I support us moving forward with the plan. Thank you very much to my colleagues for their patience, and thank you to everyone for listening.

And Councilmember Frey, thank you for those comments. I'm going to ask once again that the audience please refrain from talking, whispering, laughing during counsel deliberation. We would appreciate it, just so we can hear each other at the dais. And I thank you for that. Is there anyone else?

I would like to since there's nobody else right now, I would like to call up town staff, Duncan, as well as Danny. Can we go back to that question that I had asked earlier about what that would even look like for town staff as well as a consultant if the council voted to delay into 2026? What more can be done? And just a general idea of how all that might be laid out or work.

Absolutely. So first off, we wanna make sure council's comfortable with the plan. And so any a delay in the 2026, some procedural things would need to happen. So for instance, we're at a contract, so we'd have to go into a contract

I figured that much.

And update some of those procedural items. But otherwise, we could definitely take a look at any requested edits you have to incorporate in the plan. We could talk with counsel about the the goal for delaying, and what you would like to see occur between now and and that time, and then work with staff to to make sure we're working towards that ultimate goal.

And your engagement, should that say, we say February 2026. I'm just throwing out a date. So are there higher levels of engagement other than what we have seen thus far to try to reach deeper into communities, since we've heard from folks that they're just receiving the information, just getting into it. Is there anything else there? I guess there always is room for more engagement. But what exactly would that look like? Will we just kind of be doing what we've done? I'd still hear talking somewhere.

Yes. So you can always do engagement.

I know it's hard to map out. But I assume that that would be part of it. It would be more engagement with the community.

Yes. So you can always do more engagement for any plan in perpetuity. You can continue to talk to people. So we definitely could schedule additional engagement. It would, would assume, be some open house events, sit down, maybe some small, again, stakeholder groups and

listening Yeah, you're Okay. I mean, I get it. You know, the purpose of the plan and we've reiterated that several people have said it it is a guide, you know, to our downtown for the future and some surrounding neighborhoods. And I just I really want to keep that context and that purpose, but I also feel like there may be public trust issues here. I see your hand, but public comment period is over.

I appreciate that, Terri. And so don't exactly know what to think at this moment. I see Palmer's hand. Someone record Terry Buckner's Mr. Joyner, I'm sure that you got that.

But overall, I do think the plan is a good plan. I think, you know, the purpose of the plan is good. I think our definitely, UDO will inform this plan. I'm going to go back to what Councilmember Merrill was saying earlier. We're not green lighting anything here, and I still think that there is this trust issue about what it would actually mean if the council decided to adopt this plan tonight.

And I don't know that anything that we would say would make a difference for some community members. And, of course, you're entitled to think as you would, but I wish there was a little more trust here between your elected officials and yourself. I will just go ahead and say that. I thank you for that. I'm going to move on to Councilmember Palmer.

Yeah. And this is not a question directed at staff. This is sitting with folks' comments and sitting with my colleagues' comments. The core thing that I want to express is I I came to this work in December 2024, which is after the start of this, but not by much. This project of getting to tonight has closely paralleled my own experience up here, learning how decision making works up here, learning how community tends to give feedback, learning how historically we have gotten feedback and how we've sought to adapt to more closely align our decision making with what we understand to be our shared values.

When I campaigned, I had palm cards, and I stated very clearly on them that I strongly supported the Carbro Connects comprehensive plan. Every interview I gave, every questionnaire I sent out, I said I look forward to implementation. This is a next step, but it's not the last step. Carbro connects is 30,000 feet. It's airy.

It's values. Our UDO, that's law, And we will get there. This is an intermediate step. There's more to come. And I just want to diametrically just complete op I've heard more than one way how the plan does not feel like Carrboro.

But through this process, I've seen this plan change multiple times precisely because Carbara showed up to give feedback. This plan is very Carbara, and I'm very excited about it. I really strongly encourage folks who have expressed doubts, who have expressed concerns, to engage with it more. Please go back and look at Carbara Connects again and look at this document. And if you do not feel that it is a good encapsulation of our values, we still want to hear from you because this is not done.

This work is never done. But we are at an important crossroads in more than one way. When I was first talking with folks, housing was not the top first thing in what I talk to folks about. In doing this work, it has become clearer and clearer to me how urgent housing is. I I I'm sorry.

I don't have I didn't come with prepared remarks, and I don't mean to slow this down. But I I just I really have to offer the mirror image, the mirror universe version of what I have heard tonight, and that is that this plan is very Carrboro. I have engaged with it, and I have seen Carrboro engage with it to make it more Carrboro. I'm excited about the future of Carrboro. I think we are setting ourselves up for success by having climate as a foundational part of what we do.

I think that's going to be a differentiator for us moving forward. It is baked into this. I will keep talking for too long, so I'm going to stop myself.

Thanks. Mayor Pro Tem now?

I don't have too, too much to add except for a couple of things on why I'm about to move that we do adopt this. The question of urgency here is right now Diane made a great point in her comments that we only approve car based sprawl, for lack of a better word, outside of the downtown urban core. That's what our ordinance prompts. I'm coming into my fifth year on council. And I have had precious few opportunities to vote for a project that really looks like the projects that we want.

When we get them, when you think about like Heather Washburn's project on Jones Ferry, which is I think currently being bogged down in another text amendment, we're putting smart footprint, ecologically sound integrated development into hundreds of thousands of dollars of delay, we are turning them into, through our inaction, vanity projects. And nothing could be more urgent than getting this right. I think with sustainability, one of the things that really is I've heard a couple residents say, why is this sustainability? And so I think we sort of have some understanding, I think, of where our colleagues land on the value of densification. But downtown is impervious today.

Downtown has buses today. It's a little bit glib. It's a little bit reductive to say that development can only improve our storm water condition downtown. But that is like very nearly the concrete truth. And in particular, as we look at if you turned into our work session last week, we were discussing the possibility of zoning through the Jones Ferry Corridor in particular for regional storm water control measures, which have been really successful on the periphery of downtown.

The South Green storm water retention measure almost certainly saved dozens of homes in Chantal. And so that's the urgency. The urgency is we need to do better than we are doing right now for the next storm, for the next good project. These are steps that we just have to take. And in the spirit of a couple other things that I'll put here.

So we want to make sure that we are setting ourselves up for success with the UDO. We identified a couple little points of conflict in terms of the way that our approach to some existing districts we want to make sure that this document allows the UDO to do what has been reflected in our work sessions. So I'm going to move attachment a one and I'm going to offer an amendment to the language in the end. I'm going move attachment a one to end, now therefore be it resolved that the town council specifies the following revisions to be incorporated into the final plan. One, replace reference to tree and planting strategies with quote green infrastructure.

Strike PR 10 and PR 14 from the policy sections. Number three, remove the reference renderings section to the appendix to be listed with other engagement materials. Did y'all get that? Now therefore be it resolved that the town council specifies the following revisions be incorporated into the final plan. Replace reference to tree plantings strategies with green infrastructure, strike PR 10 and PR 14 from the implementation strategies, and remove the reference renderings to the appendix for engagement materials.

So that's the motion.

Seconded.

So it has been moved and properly seconded for Attachment A1, and that was green infrastructure inclusion of green infrastructure, move the renderings to basically the engagement section, the appendix. Go back to the first one.

We had green infrastructure strike PR 10 and PR 14 from the implementation strategies and the renderings, green infrastructure implementation strategies renderings.

Okay. You sure can before we go to the vote. Here. Councilman McDonnell. I

just wanna uplift what the mayor, her her question about, maybe hitting a pause or a delay till February 2026, possibly having more engagement. I do believe it is a matter of public trust. I do believe that this plan and the UDO need to have the kind of engagement that we all feel that we are all stakeholders. This boardroom belongs to the people. This town belongs to the people.

And sometimes it's important that the people know that.

Thank you for that, Councilmember Haven O'Donnell. Before we take the vote, I want just go back. Maybe it was Danny, and maybe was Duncan. This guide, the Downtown Area Plan, this guide, I remember seeing a slide that spoke to continuing levels of community engagement as it rolls along. Do you have that slide?

Because to me, that's indicative of flexibility and still being able to make room for community members to come in and weigh in at any point. It is not closed off to the public by us adopting the plan tonight. And so I want to just further clarify that and really dig in there, that we're not closing off the public from the implementation of this plan with the lost my train of thought with the words, but mea pro tem now's addition to attachment with the additions to attachment A1. So I wanted to just kind of reiterate that again. Do you have that slide?

Or do we oh, this is it. And so I mean, I believe what I'm seeing here, I believe it will be laid out in just this way where there will be continuing opportunities for community to weigh in. And so to me, that negates the need to delay the vote tonight. I mean, for me, it does because nothing is being closed off to the public. And so I did want to say that, ahead of the vote. If there's anything you want to say, Duncan, go right ahead.

Yeah. Thank you, Madam Mayor. Just a couple procedural, notes here. I just want to be clear. Resolution A1 is not an adoption adoption resolution. Resolution. It is essentially a direction to us to Okay. To and it is for the opportunity for some of the larger revisions that you all have been discussing about the movement of the renderings of, you know, things like that. And so, I just wanted to be clear.

If I could, it is intended with my That's edit the to be an adoption resolution.

That's the intent.

So we can make resolution. We can add actual notes to resolution a and make an amendment to attachment a, sorry, which because to adopt the plan tonight, there are three pieces of the resolution that needs to happen. One is the adoption. The second is the consistency statement that finds it consistent with the comprehensive plan. And third, that it is reasonable within the public interest. The key difference is that substantial changes that you all would like to see in the plan may the benefit of using A1 is that those changes can be made, then the plan is brought back as a consent item potentially in February 2026.

You've already worked from attachment A?

If you would like to adopt it tonight, then the attachment A should I'd be the one that like to

withdraw my resolution and file an amendment to Right. Attachment

And if it is helpful for the council, I do have word versions of those files that it's for the clarity of what council members are voting on for adoption. That's not necessarily the practice that we have been using. But if you would like to do that, I I can pull those up.

The that good old free WiFi here is toggling slow between these attachments. So if you have it, I'm happy I'm happy to have it. What is the union? Unified development ordinance.

Madam Mayor, may I?

So I do appreciate the questions from the audience, but please respect that the public hearing is closed. But I, you know, I will allow this question to come forth. We're, you know, we're just kind of out of process here, and I get it. I get the anxiety. I get the need to know answers, but I clearly ask the question if there were others or so yes, you may, Councilmember Frey.

Thank you, Mayor Fuschi. I'll just note for the interest of including anyone at home, that we've been talking about a UDO. That is the Unified Development Ordinance. You may have also heard it called the LUO or Land Use Ordinance. It's the law that Carrboro is allowed to establish about that governs what can be built where and how things have to be built in the process of building.

So it includes our zoning, our development processes, our land use map, and all those other things are part of the UDO. We're in the middle of a project to rewrite the UDO to align with the Carrboro Connects comprehensive plan that started back in 2022. We've been doing workshops this fall. We've had a variety of outreach sessions related to that. And there should be we're expecting a first draft of that, let's say, early spring.

So the point being that this plan, as I think Danny mentioned, is there's funnel where we started with the Carrboro Connects plan as a visioning document. Now we've got a local area plan for the downtown. And then at the bottom actually is the law that actually changes how things get built. And that process is still ongoing. And we want all of your participation in helping us arrive at the right language for that. Because when we adopt the new UDO, that's when the law changes.

So as just as a procedural note here, so you can make a motion to provide such revisions in Attachment A, and where it would go would be underneath now therefore be it resolved. So it would say something like now I can zoom in it's a little

so that's where we can put my language.

Yeah. It could say now therefore be it resolved that the town council adopts the Carbara area plan with the following you know revisions. You know, the replacement of plants and landscaping with green infrastructure, the striking of PR 10 and PR 14, the protect historic properties and protect the Mill Village, or the Mill Village, and then the third one, I apologize I have written down here, which is the removing the renderings or moving the renderings to be listed with the other engagement as part of the appendix. And so we could type that up here in the language that you want, and you could adopt it. You can make a motion to adopt the resolution with amendments.

I am moving that we strike those. As per our conversation with Chad, they are not the Mill Village in particular cannot be considered an historic district since it has not functioned as an historic district. It is full of new development. The concern with those is what it does is it puts this document in a position of invalidating what we're talking about in our UDO workshops. So those are consistencies with our discussion from last Wednesday and Chad's guidance.

Colleagues, can we Okay.

Great. I would like pass or I would like to propose a resolution attachment A with those edits. Then finding it consistent with the comprehensive plan, reasonable and in public interest, and effective upon adoption.

You'll have to forgive my ramp. My typing speed is more important than my typing accuracy. I could never be a stenographer. Stenographer.

Yes. While we wait for the changes, I would request a five minute

gonna get that as soon as we got through here.

Oh, he's he's pointing. You wanna put While he's typing. Well We

could.

And then council mayor Proton, now you wanna make sure that the language is correct so when they come back

In the in the midst of the recess. Grab it. We're gonna call a recess. We will come back in ten minutes. We're in recess.

If everyone could get back in their respective places, we are going to reconvene the meeting. It's 09:03 p. M. We are on attachment A, and we do have the items added that the council has agreed to. This is a resolution adopting the Carrboro Downtown area plan.

I believe there was a was there a motion and a second? No, there wasn't. That was on attachment a one. So if we want to kind of do we need to go over these? It looks we've been going over It

great to me. And and the new language, it reflects number four, the items from the memo that were in our packet. So thank you very much, Duncan, for catching that. That was thoughtful. So I would like to move Attachment A with these edits.

Seconded.

It has been moved and properly seconded that we move Attachment A again, a resolution adopting the Carrboro Downtown area plan with the four items that have been added. And are we doing each section separately? Is this all this is all in one swoop, right?

Do you wanna walk us through the consistency?

Yeah. I feel like it's section one, two, three.

You you can just move to move in one swoop of full motion, which is a movement to adopt that that you find the plan consistent and that you find the plan in the reasonable and public interest. You can separate them out if you want to, but

No. No. Thank you. Yeah. I would like I would like to move attachment A with these amendments and that we find the plan consistent and in the public interest.

All right. Seconded.

All right. So it's been moved and properly seconded. Council members, are you ready for the vote? All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed?

Nay.

Motion carries. Six to one, the Carrboro Downtown area plan is adopted. Thank you so much, council members and the community, for your engagement. Town staff, our consultant, Danny Wilson, we just appreciate it. And we look forward to great things here. Thank you so much.

Thank you.

Town Manager Tony, next item. I'm sorry.

The next item, the purpose of this item is for town council to receive public comment on a request for the voluntary annexation of the 36.7 acre property located along Ode, North Carolina 86 and known for the Jade Creek development. An ordinance annexing this property until the town limits is provided for the town council's use.

Thank you so much for that introduction, town manager Tony. So this is a public hearing, so I am going to go ahead and open the public hearing. And I see Tina at the podium. Welcome, Tina, for a staff presentation.

Thank you. Good evening, mayor, members of the town council. I just have a short couple of slides just to kind of walk you through the process, and I will just note that the applicant representatives are here tonight if you want to if you'd like to hear from them. Again, typical order of procedure, brief staff presentation, public comment, deliberation, and as the manager noted, an ordinance for consideration of adoption is in your packet as Attachment A. Here's a vicinity map so you can see.

I think a lot of you are familiar with the Jade Creek property at this point. Just a quick kind of understanding of process. So for rezonings, as you may recall, the public hearing for annexation occurs right before the consideration of a rezoning project for conditional rezoning. For special use permits, the permit is considered. And then prior to the final plat, the annexation comes forward.

So that is the process that we're at tonight. So the petition for voluntary annexation is in your packet, and you've seen the materials included in that, the plat and so forth. As noted, the property is a little bit more than 37 and a half acres. The permit, special use permit a to develop the subdivision, residential sub subdivision, about 72 dwelling units was approved about a year and a half ago, and the annexation is before you. So as as required, public notice was provided in the newspaper as well as sent to the, to the property owners, KB Homes.

And so that's that's really the conclusion of the the staff presentation. I'll pause if there's an interest for members of the public to speak.

Thank you, Tina. And so the public hearing has been opened. Are there any members of the public here to speak on this item? All right. So this is gonna go kind of quick.

So there are no members of the public. So I will go ahead and close the public hearing and see if council members have any comments or questions about this process. There is a draft ordinance, which is attachment a, included within our packets. I would entertain a motion from anyone.

Madam Mayor, I move attachment A.

Thank you so much. Second. All right. So it's been moved and properly seconded that we move attachment A for this request for voluntary annexation of a property contiguous to town limits, specifically associated with the Jay Creek development. Council members, all in favor, say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion carries, seven-zero. And that is that agenda item. And thank you, Tina.

Thank you very much.

Town Manager Tony, next item.

The next item is the first general agenda item. This is an update from Owasa. Executive Director Todd is going to give an update.

All

right, mayor and council, thank you for the opportunity to come and share some updates about what's going on at Owassa. I'm Todd Taylor, Owassa's executive director. And as always, it's my pleasure to be with you all tonight. I know the council has some important business to discuss, so I'm going to briefly touch on each item on this list. You all are always so engaged.

I don't think I need to say this, but you can feel free to interrupt me or ask me any questions during the presentation. And if there's anything that's not on the list or something that I didn't cover, I'll try to do my best to answer those questions as well. So we'll jump right in here. The first item I wanted to give you an update on are the projects that we have with our regards to our wastewater or to our water treatment plant at Jones Ferry Road. As you like to know where we've got a a number of projects going on there.

We need to replace our clear well. The clear wells have been a part of the plant since 1948, and it's starting to show some signs of deteriorating. It's a very important piece of the, overall water treatment plant process, and we're working on plans to to replace that. We also have updates that we need to do to our electrical system for the water treatment plant, as well as we need to address PFAS that were in our drinking water. So those those are the the big projects that we're working on, and and all of these are fairly large facilities, so therefore, they're having an impact on the parking capacity we have available on our campus.

The design of these projects is currently on hold as we work with the OASA board and our consultants to revisit some of the assumptions that we made in the preliminary planning of these facilities. This conversation is very important because we want to make sure that these critical and costly investments are made with the best available information and are supported by our customers. This was an important lesson we learned from the feedback that Owasa received on our initial plan to develop a parking lot on Glossen and Fidelity. We paused and we took some time to meet with community members and listen to their concerns and we gained a better understanding of the Carrboro Connects plan and recognized we need to work more closely with the community on future development of our Jones Ferry Road campus. Once some of the major design requirements for these projects are determined, we will resume the engineering work and if necessary, we will reengage the community and our employees in an evaluation of the alternatives to mitigate the loss of parking.

So I'm going pause right there and see if anyone has any questions about that before I move on to the next topic.

You're moving from this slide?

Yes.

I think I, you know, am concerned and continue to be concerned about the path ahead for the parking. But it is also good to see OWSA engaging with the community, as well as the employees, as you try to work that out. Yes. Do you have any idea, or just ongoing conversation you don't know, when maybe a decision will be made? I was looking at maybe it's the next slide. Do you have slides with I've

got the next slide to talk about rates.

Oh, that's what It it might be something that I saw somewhere else. But I am encouraged about the conversations, and I think that'll be really important going forward. So thank

Yes. You for And I don't exactly know when we will resolve these issues, but we're working with our board on that. And once we've kind of decided on what facilities we're building, we can kind of circle back to the parking because then we'll know the extent of the impacts on our parking.

Because the build is gonna impact how much parking you have. Correct.

This is why you're looking for basing our parking need off of an original set of plans that that now may be changing.

Got it.

We don't know exactly what the parking need might be as a result of some of those changes. So we're working through that with our board. And like I said, if we do have to if we do need some parking, we're gonna re reengage and revisit all of that with the community. But we did get a lot of good feedback, got a lot of good ideas. We have almost 30 different potential solutions to consider that we work with the community on. So we've got a lot to get through if we get to that point.

Okay, thank you.

You're welcome. All right, well we can't talk about Owasa without talking about our bills. So we're here looking at those projects that we were just talking about and they are expensive and they're very important, but they are having an impact on the bills that our customers are going to have to pay. As you can see there in the green numbers, that was the rate increase that actually went into effect at the October, so that 7% increase. And we've got several more years of rate increases projected due to those projects and you'll see they're fairly significant too.

But what I'll say about that is that take those projections with a grain of salt because that's something that we reevaluate every year as part of our budgeting process and they are subject to change. One of the other things I would note is in September, we started we kicked off a rate study. And so that's a study of our rate structure to make sure that all of our customers are being charged equitably. And this is a good practice for us to do probably about five, ten years to make sure that our rates are the allocation of our costs across our customer classes are in line with where we need them to be. It's also an opportunity for us to update, refine those customer classes and there might be some potential changes that come out of this to the blocks.

The rates have a block structure. Those may change, the seasonal rates and some of our other rates could be impacted. What I will say though is the calendar that we're looking at right now, it's unlikely that by this time next year, in October year, that we'll have these changes in place. So don't expect that to happen. But maybe the year after that, if there are any changes, that's when customers could expect that.

And we'll certainly want a lot of time to engage with our customers about these changes and so they'll know what to expect of how their bill might look going forward. I believe that's all I had on this slide. If anyone's got any questions about the rates, I'd be happy to answer those.

I don't have any questions about the rates, but you did receive, IWASA received some money, right?

We did.

Are you expecting more?

We are expecting some more. We did get we've gotten a couple payments from the settlement for three ms on the PFAS front. And we've got about $2,000,000 so far. We're probably expecting to get maybe another $1,000,000 Most of that was from three ms. There were some smaller settlements as well that we were involved with. So we did get we were able to get some money, and that helps us avoid costs coming out of our customers' pockets. So that's great.

Yeah. That's great. Thanks. Oh, I'm sorry. There's two. I see Councilmember Posad Orozco and then Councilmember Fred.

Thank you, Madam May. I just wanted a quick question just to get things clarified in my head. For the rate changes, does that differ for when it's like an apartment complex that they Yes. What does that look like?

It's a it's a different rate structure. They they're charged uniform rates where our single family homes are charged an inclining what we call an inclining block rate. So the more water they use, the higher higher the rate that gets charged. We used to have something similar for multifamily developments, but what we found was it wasn't encouraging because a multifamily development, usually the way those charges are dispersed over the entire complex, it wasn't really encouraging conservation in the way you would think because somebody might be using more, somebody might be using less. It wasn't sending a strong signal to the folks that were using more.

So we went to a uniform rate several years ago to address that concern.

Thank you.

I have a question about your forecasting process. So am I right in assuming that it's not that you expect the increases from these large capital projects to subside after 2030. It's that that's how far out you forecast. Is that right?

That's correct. That well, the when we take the debt on for the construction of those projects, then we're making those payments over time. So we would expect that to level off because we've met the need that we have to service that debt. However, we're only projecting out so far and we can only see so far into the future. So are there other expenses that come up? It's a good possibility. But as far as we can comfortably see into the future right now, this is what we're expecting to have happen.

How does this forecast relate to the one you brought us last year? So what is if you follow me, what is the trend of your trend?

This is actually less. These rate increases are projected to be less. I'm

trying

to remember last year, but I believe the first couple years were maybe 9%, something like that. So we've been able to to work with this, and and we we're constantly trying to keep the rates in check moving forward. But we learn more and our estimates get better as we move forward in time and that helps us refine these as we go.

Can you tell us a little bit about what led to the forecast coming down a bit?

Yeah, I think it was several things. I think I'm gonna phone a friend here. Winters is gonna help me. He seemed to have an answer.

Hi, I'm Steven Winters, deputy executive director. Last year at this time, we were contemplating doing two of these projects at the same time. We thought that it necessitated that. Learned some more things, and we're able to spread those out, shift one of those big projects further out in the future. So, that let us smooth those out.

I've got you up there, do you know what the run rate annually is for the PFAS treatment right now, using the method you're using?

The That might be

Like how much you're spending annually to treat for to treat PFAS in the water?

About a million dollars, I think.

About a million dollars.

It's like what he's saying.

We're we're a team.

We're a team.

Yeah. Yeah. I thought that would help folks put the the settlement money in perspective, which is that it's enough to help sort of keep us going for a little while, but doesn't actually

Solve the problem. Yeah.

Every every bit helps, but yeah, it's it's it's a small percentage.

Thank you so much, that's all my questions.

Thank you. Any other questions, council members? Go right ahead.

I do, but I don't know if this is the right slide. I'd go back to the, if you would, Todd, go back to that first slide.

This one?

With, yeah. Okay. First of all, I want to thank not only you and Alison and Mary and the board, the staff for Thursday, last Thursday's meeting. It was excellent. I really appreciated the conversation about PFAS, PFOA, and the challenges.

And one part of the conversation I didn't expect that I was delighted that came up was the question of PFAS filtration waste. And that's something that I'm really hoping there'll be deeper, challenging conversation about because we certainly don't want to create waste that will be trucked off to some, you know, low economic, you know, community. You know, I also appreciated the part of the conversation looking at potential advanced treatment of PFAS. There are several models out there now that are looking at zero waste and I appreciate that the AWACA team is having that conversation. I would like to just tease out one other point that I want to be clear about.

Was the date certain for the PFAS filtration pushed out to 2031? Was that correct?

That is what the EPA is saying. Our maybe our new deadline to be below their maximum levels. Originally, that date was 2029.

Mhmm.

And they have indicated that they may extend that. Of course, with the government shutdown and things kinda got a little murky there, but, hopefully, we'll we'll get some more clarity. But we were expecting maybe next summer they would announce that that was the they were moving that out further.

How does that help if it's moved out to 2031? How does that help in the further exploration for advanced technologies or certainly looking at the waste disposal issue?

I think it helps just us having the time of not necessarily having to worry about compliance. The good part in all this is that we are providing water today that meets those future regulations. So we're in compliance with that, but you're exactly right. There are concerns about in doing that. It didn't just disappear.

It's it's being captured and we need and we now have this waste that needs to be you know, we need to talk about how to responsibly handle that waste. And I think it gives us more time to explore options in that regard without the specter of having we've got to meet these drinking water requirements right now. So it's kind of give us a little breathing room to kind of run around a little bit and look at different options. So I think we're hopeful that we will get a lot of time. And I think just from us, for all the communities out there that are dealing with this, we're hoping that that gives them time to implement strategies to remove this from their drinking water.

So three other points. Let me make sure to do this in order. So I appreciated the conversation about engaging community and learning more about PVAS, PFOA issue because I know that a lot of folks are aware, but really have no information. And I think the fact that Cane Creek Reservoir has a higher quantity of PFAS, PFOA than Jordan Lake is pretty shocking. I had to get my head around the fact that, well, know, Cane Creek Reservoir is tiny and Jordan Lake is huge, but it's also coming from different sources.

So I think that in any way that we in Carrboro can help, you know, broadcast transmit, work with Owasa to get community to understand. And I'll tell you why it's important because some folks in the Carrboro community are fortunate enough financially that they can put in their own filtration reverse osmosis systems. And they have. But not the rest of us and certainly not folks who are in multi family housing, etcetera. So, there's an equity issue that's at hand that I'm sure, you know, in CARBRO folks are mightily concerned that, yeah, you know, those who can will put in those protections and everyone else is going be exposed.

And so, think Ive made those three points. But I really appreciate Awasa's continued willingness to question and to follow where the potential leads them. So, thank you that and I thank the board and the team. Like I said, such a good conversation, I may come back.

Well, you're welcome anytime and we always appreciate the collaboration with the town.

Thank you, Councilmember Haven O'Donnell. Are there any comments or questions? You have more?

Yes. Okay.

We've a couple more slides. Of course

Oh, yes.

Yes.

Oh, yes.

Oh, yes.

We we continue, and we heard some of that earlier tonight. I hear a lot of questions and concerns from the community regarding, you know, what's just the tragedy of that natural disaster that was Tropical Storm Chantal. And on November 20, this Thursday, at 4PM, we're actually hosting a blue sky meeting at University Lake Dam. And what we were hope and we would encourage you all to come to that as well. And what we're hoping to discuss there is, you know, kinda show folks the dam, what it looks like, how it works, talk about how it was designed.

And then hopefully we can clear up any lingering questions and concerns about how the dam functions now. And then we do anticipate getting questions about floodwater management strategies, which is a broader consideration that would ultimately need to be discussed by the community as a whole in that regard. And then finally, I just wanted to point out, I know it was brought up earlier tonight too, that a Wassa strategic plan has an initiative to develop a climate adaptation plan. And flooding is certainly one of the risks that we're going to assess in the climate adaptation plan and among some other climate related impacts on our infrastructure. So we're looking forward to that.

And hopefully, in the near future, maybe I can give you all an update on where we are with that. We're just kind of getting started on it right now though. Any questions on this before I move on?

Madam Mayor? Go ahead. Todd, could you please give us an update on your continuing work on flood alert?

Yes.

You mean

about your climate adaptation plan, right?

Well, not necessarily something as an initiative that we would undertake, but we're certainly willing to support that effort. And I know there's been some conversation with Orange County Emergency Management as well as Urals Emergency Management folks about some kind of warning system being implemented. And certainly if our facilities can be used to house any of that equipment or there's any way that we can work with you on that system, we're happy to do it and want to be a partner to you in that.

So would it be fair to describe that as you have no concrete action yet, but you're continuing to have the conversations with the other parties and you're happy to play the role in that that you can?

Correct.

Okay.

Anyone else? Ready

to move on? Okay.

All right. Well, last thing I wanted to talk about was our West Rosemary Street waterline replacement project. Earlier this month, we began the replacement of about 4,000 feet of deteriorating water main to improve water service reliability on West Rosemary Street. I know it sound like a broken record, but this is a older pipe. It's been in the system for a long time.

We've started having a few breaks on it, so it's time, the warning lights are flashing, it's time to replace this. This project is complex and it's going to take a while to get done. It's gonna be about eighteen months to get this done and it's gonna be in eight phases. We're currently starting or we started earlier this month on the section from Merritt Mill Road to Robeson Street, and we'll keep working up kind of a a block at a time. Most of this work's gonna happen during business hours, so from seven in the morning till seven at night.

And while pedestrian access will be maintained throughout this, there will be times that both lanes of traffic will be inaccessible through there and detours will be implemented. We're going to maintain a lot of close coordination and communication with the town of Chapel Hill staff to address any parking and access challenges as they come up. We've held two community meetings since July and this allowed us to learn a lot from the community on their concerns about the project. The the main things we've heard are we need to maintain pedestrian and vehicle access to businesses and parking. We need to maintain water service throughout the project and, obviously, the traffic impacts that these that this project's gonna have.

And so to ensure timely and accessible communications about the project, Awasa is sharing weekly updates via email, social media, and on our website at owasa.org. Our project webpage provides maps, community meeting summaries, contact information, the most up to date information about the project. And if you scan that QR code that you see there, you can sign up for the weekly email update or you can go to our website and and go to the project page. So is there any questions about the Rosemary Street project?

It's already started, hasn't it?

Yes, it has.

All right. I ran into it Sunday. Thank you.

You're welcome. And as always, if there's any other questions I can answer, you can reach out to me at any time. And I do really appreciate the opportunity to come and provide you all with these updates.

All right. Thank you so much.

Thank you.

It doesn't look like there are any more questions. Everybody looks content. So thanks for the presentation.

Thank you.

Time manager Tony, next item.

The next general agenda item is an item it's information item. Our management analyst, Steven Wright, will present a new partnership that we have for the Center for Policing Equity. This is the initial stage of the partnership. And so Steven's going to give an overview and then talk about potential future partnerships with this entity.

Yes. Lamar, is it possible to pull up attachment a? I know it's not a presentation, but it is a PDF that will show off the data gap analysis.

Awesome.

Okay. Well,

in that case, I do believe it is attached in the agenda packets. So if you will turn look at the Carbara PD data gap analysis. To give some context, the town manager's office embarked several months ago on a project of researching ways to improve the equitability of our policing practices by backing it up with scientific driven data solutions. And so as part of that, we researched potential partners, whether it was nonprofits, whether it was contractors, to find solutions that would give us the actual concrete data that we needed in order to draft future policy. So in that, we found the Center for Policing Equity, which is a national nonprofit composed of both former law enforcement professionals, excuse me, scientific data analysts, and nonprofit partners through through various social justice initiatives that have come together to take a scientific approach to policing and how to adopt police reform.

As part of this, Carrboro has collaborated with their data analyst team to begin with a data gap analysis, which approaches how we collect data and what data do we not collect in our policing instance. So if you look at the first page of the data gap analysis, what you'll see is the use of force measurements and the vehicle stop measurements amongst all the data sets that the CPE has collected in its years of operation, about three to four dozen as as of November 2025. Carbara rank Carbara has an 86% data completion over an average of 63% in use of force incidents. And when it comes to vehicle stop data, we have 93% of all data that they measure relative to an average of 54%. So respectively, Carbara ranks second in use of force data completion amongst all of CPE's partners, and we actually broke the marker for first when it comes to all vehicle stop data collection.

So what this tells us is that the that Carbara is collecting a significant portion of the data that the CPE measures when doing these data gap analyses. They, in multiple conversations, were very complementary to Carrboro's approach to data collection. If we go to the actual breakdown of the use of force analysis, the PD and the CPE set a time scale of 2020 to 2024 for which we have the most complete data. The scale here is that anything from 90 to 100 is in the green. Anything in the yellow is nine 90 to 80%.

And then anything that is simply not collected is at zero in red. So going into some of these specifics on these items, most of those that you see in yellow or in red are items that are simply not collected due to data constraints, to outdated equipment, or that are not applicable to Carrboro due to its very small size. We are the smallest partner that the CPE has partnered with. This is an organization that's typical partners range in the size of San Diego, both the county and the city, Sacramento, West Hollywood, Carrboro at six six and some change square miles, and about 20,000 people is a microcosm compared to compared to those. And we can get into some further questions on specific data gaps whenever the council wishes, but we can move on to the vehicle stop data.

As you can see here, 93% complete. The only outstanding red point we see here is the latitude and longitude. And as I was told by the CPE, we either collect the latitude and longitude data of calls or we collect the street address, and it's typically one or the other. And in the case of street address, we have 85% of data complete there. Moving on to the CAD data.

This is largely reflective of older systems, some of which are in transition both at the town and county level. Most of the data here reflects the reflects the transition that we are currently going through. I believe that PD at Orange County level is transitioning to a new platform called Hexagon within the next year or two. And then if we go to crime data, the last page, again, almost almost complete. Once again, with the latitude and longitude versus street address, it's simply either one or the other most of the time.

The only reg you'll see here is not applicable due to the largely circumstantial nature of incidents, as in we cannot predict how an incident will pan out from beginning of call to end of call, and we also account for it in the item eight there, which is a separate NIBRS classification. So the overall goal of this presentation is to show the council that we are taking a scientific data driven approach to our policy solutions moving forward. The CP has made it clear that this is the beginning, not the end of our partnership. The data gap analysis and its recommendations, which you'll see in attachment B, are the first research product, not the last. We're hoping that as we move forward with the CPE, they plan on using us as a test case of their new socioeconomic analysis model, given Carbara's significant achievements in data completeness, as well as our focus on racial equity.

So we plan on bringing forward additional CPE research products and updates as they come through. As of right now, we plan on looking at the data recommendations they have given in attachment b and seeing where we can apply those recommendations, most of which regard the specificity of incidents, whether it's what what kind of use of force is used, whether it's a shove, whether it is a arm restraint, so forth, as well as going into replacing antiquated or outdated equipment. So with that, I will happily open the floor for questions on the CPE partnership.

Is that Steven? I see you, Steven. Oh, such a great presentation. Thank you so much for the information and for this new way to look at policing equity. This is pretty great. Council members, are there any questions for Mayor Pro Tem, no?

I just want to say thank you and thank all of the staff that brought this to us. This is sorely needed. As we head into the new year and do our looking ahead, I know that policing and public safety is one of our key priorities for getting right. And I think that stabilizing the way that we examine this report to report, we've enjoyed a good relationship. And I think we have a lot of shared values and buy ins. And we've over time struggled report to report to track like to like and measure over time. So this is just such a critical piece. I'm really grateful for it. I'm impressed with the work. Thank you.

I'm eager to tell our residents that we have this. The foundation for the decisions that we'll be making here will be much stronger for your efforts. If I might add, I

forgot to include this in the presentation. All of these services are offered free of charge.

We saw FREE. We're all over it.

They were very happy to partner with Carrboro, and we are very happy that all of this is brought free of charge to the team.

Yes. Yes. Yes.

I have just a really quick question, which is when should we expect an update on adoption of the recommendation? So you've brought us the recommendations. This is very helpful. We've had a chance to look at it. So for instance, here for general recommendation number one about having a control ID, this is really helpful, right? Letting us link incidents in different data sets together accordingly. What kind of timeline should we expect for learning more about how we're going to implement the recommendations?

Thank you, Councilmember Frey, for the question. We plan to use the recommendation operationally. This would not necessarily require a council action. You know, since police reports to me, and what I'm doing is hearing from you all, and from the report from the Community Safety Task Force recommendations, and just making sure we're staying on top of some policy decisions around policing, and using this third party just to make operational decisions for the police department, in particular. So, this wouldn't require just more information, so you all are aware of how we're taking your policy directions and actually implementing to our operations.

All right. Thank you. Yeah,

I just thank you, Steven. Thank you, administration. Thank you, police department. This has been a long time coming. We very slowly moved this way, I think.

You know, so the just seeing being able to see the data that the community safety task force had hoped to have and to be able to have it ground truth is really significant. It also, I think it's interesting if we're the smallest municipality that's been part I think that it just shows, you know, Carrboro likes to play with the big dogs. But it also says that we value the kind of forward thinking and thought leadership that this data gives us. So, again, thank you.

Thank you, Councilmember Hagan O'Donnell. Any other comments? Questions for Steven? Thank you, Steven. Of course. Great presentation. Really, really good. Timely information.

Okay. Last item is also I have Steven on He's my management analyst. He's doing a great job. This is also a data gap that the town has. Our vehicles do not have AVLs, which are automatic vehicle locators.

It is a best practice among most municipalities in the state and the country, and we don't have any to be able to track our data and our vehicle, their locations. And it's really, this one is more in alignment of our climate action goals. And so, we can track better on our vehicles idling and their location and how far they're driving each day. So, Steven has taken this on and can give us an update about the pilot that we've launched.

So going off of of not not being able to initially pull up the PDF, is it possible to give control to this to show the dashboard for our AVLs? Alright.

Is it just the website? Yes. So You can just start maneuvering. Do you have the mouse?