Donna Bell
Blogger Nancy Oates recently raised some questions about my fundraising. I wrote her this open letter in response.
Isn't it nice when politics is easy? When the town council had to make a decision on who to appoint to the vacant seat they had to consider many factors including:
1) Minority representation on the council
2) Someone experienced enough to help come up with real solutions in these difficult economic times
3) Someone who could help begin the healing process after a divisive election
Lucky for them and all of us in Chapel Hill, Donna Bell fit and exceeded these requirements. In a time when politics is all too often made up of making difficult decisions over the lesser of evils (do we fire teachers or shut down hospitals) it sure is nice when there is an easy solution. Good first move Mayor Kleinschmidt!
There has been a lot going on and I can scarcely find a moment to blog about it. Maybe in 6 years when my son starts school and I don't have to work to pay for daycare so I can work so I can... where was I? Oh yeah, so last night three important things happened in local government - we took 2 steps forward and one step back for social justice.
1. The Orange County Commissioners rejected both door number one (a new, expanded landfill) and door number two (a waste transfer station). Instead they will be shipping our trash to Durham, an idea which I never years in literally years of debate about this issue. In any case, this seems to be a huge victory for the historically African-American Rogers Road neighborhood, which has shouldered Orange County's landfill for nearly four decades and which is ready to move on the the next phase of their lives, that is: not being neighbors to any major waste handling facilities.
Here is a commentary I contributed to WCHL last week (it ran last Friday, but I can't find links to their recordings anymore). It was a little too long so the bit in gray was not on the air.
Much has been said about the abrupt departure of Bill Strom from
the Chapel Hill Town Council. Whatever frustrations we may have had
with him, at least we can take comfort in the fact that Strom will no longer have
any influence on Orange County politics.
As they have done with
all other mid-term vacancies in recent history, the Town Council will
appoint a replacement to finish Strom's term. The Town Council also has
a long-standing tradition of using the appointment process to ensure
that there is at least one African-American sitting at the table.
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