As we noted earlier, it's City Council night, Durham's cheapest source of free entertainment. The dramatis personae for the evening contains a number of issues that should be of interest to Bull Citizens everywhere--
First up, the Tuscaloosa-Lakewood neighborhood protection overlay (NPO) proposal comes before City Council for a vote tonight, having received a 9-1 nod of support from the City/County Planning Commission this past February. There'll be a public hearing on the proposal -- the details of which we discussed here two months ago -- and a vote by the Council.
The TLNA is doing its best to drum up publicity and attendance, so expect to see quite a few speakers on the docket for this one.
The Council will also get two progress reports this evening: DPD Chief Lopez will present the end-of-year crime report, while Deputy City Manager Ted Voorhees will provide an update on the city's development review/streamlining process. Expect there to be some interesting questions on both; we suspect Lopez may be asked if there's been any noticeable impact to date from the higher bond rates for persons arrested on suspicion of criminal activity, while the development review process is always likely to stir up questions and grumblings from the local development community.
Bill Bell hinted at as much in a recent City Council meeting during the debate over impact fees, when he noted scuttlebutt among the developers he'd talked to implied that not much had changed. Expect to see Voorhees address that sentiment tonight.
Personally, I'm just curious to hear whether there's been any drop-off in building permit requests or site plan applications down at City Hall -- and whether, if that's the case, there's been any attrition (voluntary or involuntary) in the size of the City/County Planning Department. These organizations have a tendancy to be what economists might call 'sticky upward' in their staffing in most municipalities.
One of the more intriguing items sits on the consent agenda, though, and likely won't get much discussion tonight -- but look for more on this in the weeks to come. The City's transportation department, through Patrick Baker, is looking for support for the administration to lobby the state's 21st Century Transportation Committee to modify a proposed bill on public transit that that group is working on at the governor's behest.
The City's concern? The draft bill proposes allowing a local-option half-cent sales tax for transit needs -- a model that's been used quite effectively in Charlotte for its new light rail system. But the City notes that the taxing authority in our area would be the Triangle Transit Authority, not individual counties and cities.
County commissions would have to OK this tax going forward as a referendum item, and the local voters would have to approve it before it went into effect. And, the TTA would have to agree to spend the funds in an "equitable" way, which we presume means that Wake dollars would have to be relatively spent on transit in Wake, etc.
But the financial plan that TTA would come up with to spend these dollars, the City notes, wouldn't have to be approved by cities and counties. And cities like Raleigh, Durham and Cary wouldn't get any of the revenue for themselves to help pay for DATA, CAT and other local bus systems.
Which, we suspect, may be the real sticking point here. I haven't
been close enough to any of the discussions on transit to really have
an opinion one way or another here -- but as a general theme, part of
the problem in general with transit planning in the Triangle has been
that no one wants to envision a Triangle-wide plan. Witness the
cleavage proposed by some Wake County leaders before the STAC
committee, under which Wake might have gone its separate way with a
Raleigh-centric system, Orange-Durham with theirs, and we'd connect
them someday. Maybe.
Fortunately, cooler heads prevailed there. But at the end of the day, a big-bang commuter rail or light rail system will never fly in the Triangle if we don't take a Triangle-wide view of it.
Until we get a real regional consensus on the roles of the TTA and
local governments, we're going to have a hard time moving anything off
the starting blocks.
"These organizations have a tendancy to be what economists might call 'sticky upward' in their staffing in most municipalities."
Kevin,
There is information out there on this. The teams that were put together last year to consider ways to improve the planning and permitting process were given the results of a polling done of other planning departments in the State. While the methodology for developing the supplied table may need greater scrutiny, a quick glance showed that Durham City-County Planning had the highest work-load per planner among regional peers.
The general consensus was that Planning is overworked. Unfortunately, there did not appear to be a good chance of gaining quick political support to fix this problem. Thus other (so called "low cost/no cost") remedies to the current complaints were given greater attention.
Staff levels are a complicated issue and one that the politicians cannot duck forever as these same politicos continue to advocate for greater degrees of review and complexity in development regulation.
Posted by: Tar Heelz | April 21, 2008 at 01:36 PM
"But at the end of the day, a big-bang commuter rail or light rail system will never fly in the Triangle if we don't take a Triangle-wide view of it.
Until we get a real regional consensus on the roles of the TTA and local governments, we're going to have a hard time moving anything off the starting blocks."
Hogwash. We're going to have a hard time moving anything off the starting blocks as long as the regional leaders insist that everything has to be done in sync between Durham and Raleigh.
Come up with a plan for a lower frequency train between the cities. Then let the two sides of the Triangle figure out what they need. Quit expecting TTA to solve all our problems.
Posted by: Michael Bacon | April 21, 2008 at 06:45 PM