Media

Kudos to the Daily Tar Heel for their recent investigative piece about obtaining public records. In addition to asking for copies of correspondence of local elected officials (which I summarize below) they include tips for making public record requests and highlight how this kind of information is used in their reporting.

Having served on several town advisory boards in the past 15 years, I can't even count how many times our volunteer work has been stymied by the inability to collaborate online between meetings. The Town has prohibited discussion through e-mail because of a valid concern that it would violate the open meetings law. However, the Town has also consistently turned a blind eye to the obvious solution of a publicly-archived listserve that could both facilitate intra-board communication and improve public access to our conversations.

Guest post by Robert Dickson & Kirk Ross, The Carrboro Citizen

Hello friends at Orange Politics,

Last October, a group of community journalism students interested in the idea of a Carrboro newspaper interviewed roughly 100 residents of the town. One of the questions asked whether residents would prefer an online only publication or would prefer a print edition as well. Only one person who responded said online only, and everyone else said they wanted a newspaper they could hold in their hands.

Since November, we have been diligently researching and pursuing such a possibility. We got some great advice and a lot of support and can't thank enough everyone who offered counsel. So, having assembled a business plan we can live with and a working office, we're willing to roll the dice and on March 21 The Carrboro Citizen makes its debut.

Kudos to the News & Observer for using their blog to expand the information in the paper, and vice versa.

While all they had time to write was a "staff report" (excerpted below), they also encouraged readers to Learn more about Lot 5 before the Town Council takes action by including a link to their blog at the end of the story and posting the Town of Chapel Hill's full summary of issues document for download from the blog.

The town has released a draft copy of its contract with Ram Development Co. for a $75 million downtown redevelopment project.

The town is partnering with Ram to build an eight-story condominium and retail complex on the site of a municipal parking lot along Church Street between West Franklin and West Rosemary streets.