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A few different interesting things from around the news today...

The Chapel Hill News says Eastern Federal Theaters, the owner of the vacant hole in the Elliot Road shopping center, is perfectly content to let it stay that way. Somehow they are blaming the Town for the fact that they had a dispute with the neighbors over who was responsible for the driveways. Since both sides were greedy bastards, they had to come back to the Town Council to resolve the matter last year. And what's the hold up now? Eastern Federal says they won't even start building unless the Town gives them a one-year extension on their permit. One of the things the town will usually look at in making that decision is whether they have actually been working on the project in earnest. Oops.

The Herald reports that the schools are considering starting later one day a month to give teachers more time to plan. Could they possibly think of a solution more disruptive to kids and working parents than this? What are they thinking?

Chapel Hill Herald, Saturday May 14, 2005

It is certainly reasonable for parents, community leaders and officials to want to work to curtail underage drinking. But red flags go up when self-styled "vigilante mom" Dale Pratt-Wilson, organizer of the Committee for Drug and Alcohol Free Teens, makes wholesale charges of communitywide complacency and rails against our misguided "norms." That sounds a lot like the culture war rhetoric of Pat Buchanan and the moral values posturing of George W. Bush and company.

Consider the Kinahans, who were recently charged with contributing to the delinquency of a minor. The incident occurred when police, responding to a noise complaint, discovered some teenagers drinking in their back yard during their son's birthday party. Before the party, these parents had talked with their child and his friends about rules and expectations. They stayed home to be available as an adult presence. They greeted guests at the door.

So said Aaron Nelson on announcing the creation of the Chamber of Commerce's latest in a series of high profile “councils” to further its work. What he meant was that the power of saying who comprises “everyone” is worth grabbing. As is the power to identify by omission the multitudes who are not part of everyone even if a place is reserved for a few of them to observe the goings on at “the table.”

What the Chamber fails to understand is that a self-interested organization like itself cannot identify an inclusive group. It is hamstrung by its reflexive assertion of its own narrow interests. Nelson is no more able to overcome this problem than Jim Heavner was with the Public-Private Partnership a decade ago. Nelson has benefited from years of Chamber experience in refining how to make a council look inclusive. Hence, the likes of Bernadette Pelissier, Robert Dowling, and Rick Edens in the current edition.