Fiona used to be a staff writer for The Independent Weekly, and frequently covered new and emerging media as well as the on-going demise of the old media dinosaurs, so she had a head start when she set out to explore and evaluate the state of our information ecosystem. I recommend reading the entire report - it's 45 pages, not including references (download the PDF) but here's her summarized conclusion:
While the Triangle has weathered the economic downturn better than much of the country, cutbacks at the region's major newspaper have led to shrinking coverage of suburban and small-town communities just as the population of those communities continues to grow. As a result, the number of boots on the ground providing accountability coverage of the dozens of local government bodies, regional planning issues and impact of state government politics on local communities has diminished.
I just heard that longtime Chapel Hill police officer Chris Blue has been selected as the new chief, as of December 1st. I've known Chris for many years as he used to patrol Northside and really got to know the people and issues there. He's very grounded in Chapel Hill, and although he has a long history with the CHPD I think he's also generally open to new ideas. He's even on Twitter!
While it's disappointing to see the Town continuing the longstanding tradition of white male leadership, I think Chris Blue is emminently qualified and will make a great chief.
Pardon the commercial at the beginning, here's my run down of the results in David Price's return to Congress and the 1/4-cent sales tax referendum's narrow loss. I meant for it to be short, but it's 13 minutes long. Sorry! I need an editor. ;-)
Did you vote early, did you vote today, what did you see? Any candidates at the poll sites? Any rude campaign workers?
And most importantly, where are the candidates' parties tonight?
I won't be attending any of them as I'll be glued to the computer watching results, phoning it in to WCHL occasionally, and then recording my customary election wrap up video. (Should I use Ustream again? http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/6682869 It's so full of ads.)
UPDATE: The polls just closed, and I'm adding this widget to show tweets about the election results:
I was surprised to read on the OrangeChat blog this week that Democrat Earl McKee, running for an open County Commissioner seat in District 2 (northern and western Orange) has raised and spent well over $10,000. He already won the primary in May, in which he narrowly beat Renee Price, and promises to be the kind of (relatively) conservative voice that the not-so-new-anymore county commission districts were designed to elicit.
McKee is running against a Republican who has raised less than $3,000, most of which is a loan to his campaign. Oh, and did I mention he's a Republican? He is not going to win a county-wide seat around these parts. Like that fact or or not, it hasn't happened in decades, and even if Karl Rove's PAC starts buying ads on WCHL, it's not going to start now. (I'm not saying never, though.)
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