Earlier this year, I asked the Carolina North Leadership Advisory committee to do an environmental assay of the highest caliber. It will be interesting to see this phase of Biohabitats’ research.
And kudos to UNC for scheduling two (2) sessions to accommodate the public. Yes, they’re both on the same day but progress [...]

This Monday (Dec. 4th), Council will take up the composition the Roger Road Area Task Force, I posted on earlier, and the possible future annexation of the eastern side of Rogers Rd.

If you’re interested in working with the Rogers Road community to correct these longstanding problems, Monday would be a great time to turn out [...]

This is still very raw, but I thought I’d put out this demo to stir some thought within the community. Visualization tools like GoogleEarth (GE) can help remove some of the difficulty in assessing the visual impact of new development.
Our town’s planning department has the raw data needed to create a GoogleEarth representation of [...]

[UPDATE] As of November 20 2006 4:45 pm, we’ve had two questions and two comments by “site admin”.
Questions:

Hi, I haven’t seen anything lately that lays out the architectural vision of Carolina North. Could you point me towards any current plans? Thank you.
November 20 2006 9:46 am by Robert Peterson
Is UNC still planning to realign Estes [...]

From Jack Evans concerning housing at Carolina North.

At the LAC meeting on October 19, we agreed that the University would draft some thoughts for the continuation of our discussion regarding housing at Carolina North. The attached file is our response to that request. As you will see, we found a number of issues [...]

UNC trustee and local developer Roger Perry said his sense was that UW-Madison officials essentially tell the community that the university’s mission requires it to do a certain project, and then everyone goes to work on preventing negative impacts, without trying to stop the project in general.
He said he’d like to get to that point [...]

Freelance dissenters?
What an odd turn of phrase, Chancellor Moeser.
From today’s soon to evaporate HeraldSun, a story from the Madison smoozefest.
Alan Fish, University of Wisconsin-Madison’s (UWM) associate vice chancellor for facilities planning and management, describing UWM’s “Good Neighbor” policy:

In many instances, the university now goes to residents to talk before it even begins to design [...]

Fred, one of the Madison attendees, over on OrangePolitics said he didn’t like my suggestion, given the organizer’s professed desire to “build relationships” - establish “synergies” amongst the group, that, for a few folks, there was a bit more to the Madison trip than simple learning or altruistic desire.
Chamber of Commerce director and trip sponsor [...]

Smoozefest or snoozefest, either way this weekend’s (Sept. 24th-26th [correction]) trip to Madison by our local “usual suspects” appears to be more about building relationships at home than abroad.

Most of all, this trip is about building relationships. Not only will participants gain knowledge of what has worked and what has not worked in Madison, but [...]

Fresh in from Kirk Ross’ ExileOnJonesStreet.

Today’s UNC Board of Governors meeting yielded significant raises for the Chancellors in the UNC system, including a hefty $32,000 increase for UNC-Chapel Hill’s Chancellor James Moeser.

Fayetteville State University’s T.J. Bryan(t) [sic: they even misspelled her name] must be bumming as her “paltry” %3.8 increase was not enough to [...]

A third of the way through my second “live” LAC meeting - the second with Evans as UNC’s point man - and a nascent theme from the last meeting has emerged full-blown: “Don’t pin me down…”

Last week [PDF], when questioned on specific environmental goals for Carolina North, Evans dismissed specific language.

Dan Coleman: Can we [...]

Dr. Crawford-Brown claimed at today’s LAC meeting that he feels he does more work on behalf of Chapel Hill’s Town Council than for the University even though he’s a member of the University’s delegation - and the director of UNC’s Carolina Environmental Program.

Trying to clarify his role, Crawford-Brown said he’s here as a scientist, an [...]

One curious reader asks “What is greenwashing?”
From the Center for Media & Democracy’s Sourcewatch project, greenwashing is defined thusly:

“Greenwashing is what corporations do when they try to make themselves look more environmentally friendly than they really are.” [1] (here)
“Greenwash” is defined in the 10th edition of the Concise Oxford English Dictionary as the “disinformation disseminated [...]

The October 1st, 2007 can’t come soon enough for some of UNC’s Board of Trustees. Yesterday, Chancellor Moeser once again disingenuously affirmed the absolutely critical role Carolina North’s development plays.

Important? Maybe. Critical? How can we assess that before we see a real evaluation of its business, educational and community-oriented impacts?

Leaning on previous assertions of [...]

Chancellor Moeser’s main thesis from his September 6th State of the University remarks [via WCHL1360]:

…we can aspire for greatness … move from good to great … and be both great and good…

The speech was replete with references of being good, of moving from good to great both as an University and community member.

We have also [...]