By Patrick Barnes and Mike Cross
In the mid-1980s, Dare County’s leaders saw a housing boom coming and didn’t know how to pay for it.
Higher property taxes were a touchy issue in the coastal county. The rich didn’t want them and the poor couldn’t afford them. Taxes on hotel rooms and other purchases wouldn’t raise enough.
Their [...]
Echoes from Blacksburg
Grief is immediate and lasting at the same time. In Blacksburg, a community much like our own, it has settled in while the town and the world stands in shock.
The echoes sounding on a survivor’s cell phone had barely faded when the conversation veered from anguish to politics and what to do about [...]
By Louisa Warren
North Carolina lawmakers deserve great praise for passing a substantial lobbying and ethics reform package last year that will truly help change the pay-to-play culture that ruled in the General Assembly. But unfortunately there’s a fundamental flaw to the legislation that threatens to stain their good work and further erode public confidence.
When lawmakers [...]
Help Wanted
With the race for the Democratic nomination for governor tightening, it’s looking less and less like either Richard Moore or Beverly Perdue are going to blink and veer onto the federal side of the ballot to take on Sen. Elizabeth Dole.
With the two most well-funded and visible Dems not inclined to take on Liddy, [...]
By Frank Heath
You wake up on a beautiful Tuesday morning, but the power remains out in half of Chapel Hill, and 33 people are still dead on the campus of Virginia Tech.
Sometimes we make sports out to be as important as the things that go on in real life; but they’re not. Sports become like [...]
By Jim Warren
Power company influence – including suppression of criticism and public relations smokescreens – continues to damage our democratic process and threaten regional safety.
Last fall, NC WARN, the Union of Concerned Scientists and others began legal action to compel the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission to enforce its rules after allowing Shearon Harris to violate [...]
Mayor Mark Chilton posts an invitation on Orange Politics to reduce your carbon footprint. From the mayor:
Now, in collaboration with the UNC Institute for the Environment, I am inviting area residents to participate in project based on my personal experience. Here’s my proposal: If your family would like to sign up for the Mayor’s Carbon [...]
Hazardous weather today:
Wind and wet ground leads to downed trees. Lots of power glitches. Downtown went out for a moment when I passed the stoplights at N. Greensboro and Weaver Street.
Posted this update from Susan Dickson on last night’s school board vote.
UPDATE:
After more than three hours of public comment and discussion, the school board voted to revise plan 9D and remove all other plans from consideration. Board members Mike Kelley, Lisa Stuckey and Jean Hamilton will work with Steve Scroggs, superintendent for support services, to [...]
The Chapel Hill-Carrboro school board is scheduled to settle on a redistricting plan Thursday that would move roughly more than 1,000 elementary students.
The plan (above), 9D, has been recommended to the board by school officials. Click the map for a larger image.
By Susan Dickson
Staff Writer
Nearly 500 Chapel Hill-Carrboro elementary school students, mostly from [...]
Orange County Secret Clown Dick Gordon refuses to take another loss to heart–playing the game is about building community. Photo by Isaac Sandlin
By Taylor Sisk
Staff Writer
Whether Dick Gordon is a different guy when outfitted in hockey gear seems to be a matter of debate. According to at least one associate, in everyday life he [...]
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