"Once in a while my id simply takes over, and it speaks to me with a voice of its own."*

"You see, my id doesn't realize I am a product of a conservative lox and bagels upbringing."

*All dialogue quoted verbatim. 

Want to know more? Read our story in Wednesday's Chapel Hill News. 

It appears the federal government is investigating a housing discrimination complaint in Orange County.

The complaint was filed by Robert Campbell, a Rogers Road-area resident and outspoken opponent of the county's solid waste operations at the nearby landfill. The complaint was filed against the County and Town of Chapel Hill.

A letter about the complaint was in the publicly available correspondence of County Manager Laura Blackmon. It's dated June 17, and says only that the Department of Housing and Urban Development hasn't completed its investigation within 100 days of the filing of the complaint.

There are a series of checkboxes for various reasons, and there's an 'x' next to "conduct more investigation because the information gathered so far shows a need for more investigation and analysis."

The letter also says the investigation should be finished in December, but it doesn't spell out what HUD is investigating. 

Campbell and other area residents have also filed a complaint about the county's solid waste operations with the Environmental Protection Agency.  

 
Staff photo by Samuel Spies

A pair of (presumably) wild turkeys on a rainy day in Hillsborough on July 14, 2008.

SAY IT AIN'T SAL'S: After 28 years  Sal's  Pizza has closed in Eastgate Shopping center. Federal Realty wouldn't talk to us, but Fillipo and Sylvia Tornetta did. Read what they and their customers have to say in Sunday's Chapel Hill News. 

INSURANCE SOLUTION: Not really, but small-business workers in Orange County might soon be able to purchase affordable health care if a plan between Piedmont Health Services and the Chapel Hill-Carrboro Chamber of Commerce works out. Read how these groups are trying to bridge the health insurance divide.

HOTEL ON HORIZON: The market for office space is soft, so developers at the old Vilcom campus off Weaver Dairy Road have told the town they'd like to turn their next building into a four-story hotel. 

All that, your letters on Glen Lennox and Carrboro High School, local sports and more in this Sunday's paper.

(Am I having too much fun with this? Probably, but this scene made me laugh out loud at 4:30 in the morning:) 

"Do you think it possible for a woman to be both Jewish and psychedelic at the same time?"

"Uh..."

"Neither do I actually."

If you've been following the string, you know this comes from the 1968 flick "Three in the Attic," which the Preservation Society of Chapel Hill is showing on the lawn of the Horace Williams House next Friday night.

What's a Sixties sexploitation flick have to do with historic preservation in Chapel Hill? We'll tell you in Wednesday's Chapel Hill News.   

Those trips to other college towns that Chapel Hill-Carrboro community leaders take every few years have always drawn criticism as elitist. In response, the Public Private Partnership, now the Community Leadership Collaboration, created scholarships to help nonprofit agency leaders attend along with the politicians and more prominent local business leaders.

Past trips to cities such as Madison led to the creation of the Downtown Partnership and encouraged Chapel Hill Town Council members to pursue the 8-story condo/retail project going up on parking lot 5 downtown. But now criticism of the CLC's upcoming trip to Ann Arbor is coming from another town's elected leaders.

Carrboro aldermen Dan Coleman, Randee Haven-ODonnell and Joal Hall Broun all say with gas prices at record highs and the economy in the tank (is that a mixed metaphor?), now is not the time for local leaders to be traveling to other cities to solve local problems.

"This is the wrong time to be spending on non-specific, untargeted items," said Haven-O'Donnell. "I do not think the Ann Arbor trip is a sound investment. Having continued o work with my Madison intercity visitation workgroup, I do not see that the Chamber has maximized the potential return on Madison's huge investment."

"I am not interested in going at this time given the budget and the cost of travel," said Broun. "I think we should be very mindful of whether we should send any Board member given the state of the local, state, and national economies."

OP THREAD:

Just saw the thread on OrangePolitics about this. Here's an excerpt of Ruby Sinreich's post, which summarizes some of what she's said about these trips. And here's a link to the thread itself where you can read what others have to say.

Four Advanced Placement course have been added to the Carrboro High School curriculum after parents complained the new school was being shortchanged.

AP biology, AP chemistry, AP French and AP Latin all will be offered next year, Chapel Hill-Carrboro Schools Superintendent Neil Pedersen said Thursday.

The classes will have lower enrollments than their counterparts at Chapel Hill and East Chapel Hill high schools. AP Latin, for example, only has six Carrboro High students signed up, Pedersen said.

“These are stretch in terms of numbers, but we do recognize the school has to go through sort of a transition period,” Pedersen said of the school now entering its second year.

Jenny Kopczynski, the parent of a rising Carrboro High sophomore, was pleased. Her son now will get to take AP chemistry.

“I think the school board and Dr. Pedersen have a difficult challenge,” she said.

“The definition of educational equity does not mean the course selection is identical. But it needs to be roughly similar across the board.”

William Ilgen, the grandparent of a rising Carrboro High junior, still is unsatisfied. His grandson wants to take AP physics, so the additional courses won’t help him.

Ilgen said parents were told that Carrboro High students would be given the same opportunities as students at the other two high schools.

School administrators didn’t say “that the consequences of having a smaller school are going to be that is that students at upper levels are not going to be able to count on courses that they absolutely need for college," Ilgen said.

Barry Jacobs, chairman of the Orange County Board of Commissioners, has responded to a letter from Carrboro Mayor Mark Chilton about recent cuts to the Carrboro Branch Library. Read his letter below and the mayor's letter below that.

Dear Mr. Mayor:

Thank you for your letter, and for sharing your concerns.

As you noted, and as was doubtless true for your board, the commissioners did our best to suppress the rate of increase in the property tax. We cut $5 million from the manager's proposed budget, most by delaying or deferring costs associated with county facilities and operations.

Our efforts included significant reductions in the use of temporary labor, which had become a mechanism by which department heads indirectly filled positions that were not formally funded by the Board of County Commissioners. We did convert individuals who were perpetual temporary employees filling already-identified positions to permanent employees, thereby extending benefits and ending an unfair situation.

Reductions in temporary funding, which were made in the final days of the budget process, were across-the-board but had more impact on some departments than others -- public transportation, libraries, and recreation come to mind. The commissisoners made adjustments to accommodate rising service demands facing OPT. We did not hear concerns raised by staff about impacts on library services.

My understanding is that all three branch libraries -- McDougle, the Cybrary, and Cedar Grove -- experienced nearly identical reductions in temporary staff, and therefore in the ability to remain open.

I will try to get an answer as to why the cuts were not more evenly distributed to include the central library. I understand that the county manager also is looking into the possibility of using some of the remaining temporary monies to augment library services. Library patronage is highest in summer and, as you doubtless recognize, access to libraries is particularly valued during bad economic times, given the entertainment, educational, community, and air-conditioning resources they provide.

Thank you for your leadership in trying to resolve differences amicably, and to address the fiscal, historical, and jurisdictional difficulties and prejudices that continue to complicate the provision of excellent library services in Carrboro and throughout the county.

Barry Jacobs

 
MAYOR CHILTON'S LETTER

Dear Mr. Chairman;
 
First let me say thank you for exercising the discipline necessary to limit this year's County tax increase.  As difficult as the budget year has been for our local governments, it has been even harder for many local families.

That said, I am concerned about the cuts to library service in Carrboro.  It seems that the cuts to the Carrboro Branch hours (which were already quite limited) are a good deal more drastic than the cuts to the main library.  This seems unfair given that many more Orange County residents live near the Carrboro branch than the main library and given that public transit access to the Carrboro Branch is much better than access to teh main library.

Could you or the county staff explain on what basis this decision was made?

Sincerely;

Mark Chilton
Mayor of Carrboro

"You're not playing with children, young man. ... You two have been playing house up here all summer, hmm?"*

"Yeah, I suppose so."

"Suppose, Mr. Quigley, what the hell does that mean? Here, why don't you have a drink."

"I don't need it."

"Crap." (He leans in.) "What kind of man are you?"

"Well, I think I know where it's at."

"You think you know what?"

"I know my way around."

"Are you one of those potheads?"

"No."

"A pansy?"

"No, and..."

"Understand, my daughter may sleep with anybody she cares to ... as long as he's a man." 

*All dialogue quoted verbatim from "Three in the Attic" (1968) starring Yvette Mimieux and Christopher Jones.

What's this got to do with historic preservation? Come to the Horace Williams House in Chapel Hill July 18 and find out.  

Orange County just got another estimate on its landfill lifespan.

But it didn't gain any time. The landfill is still expected to fill up and close in April 2011, says a consultant's estimate released this week.

Solid Waste Director Gayle Wilson said he'd hoped to gain a few months, and that the landfill bought a new compactor to try and squeeze in more trash. But a change in state regulations about what can go into construction waste dumps means more construction-type trash has to go into the municipal landfill, he said.

The county is in the middle of a search to find a transfer station site for a building where trash will be collected to be shipped out of the county.

There's a possibility the transfer station won't be ready in time, Wilson said. The county may need an interim solution, possibly an open-air concrete slab that would serve as a temporary transfer station.

The Orange County Commissioners had originally decided to put the transfer station where the landfill is now. But neighbors say they've lived next to the solid waste operations for long enough, and the board decided to reopen the search process late last year.