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Regulatory Issues

Chatham Commissioners Weighing Transfer Tax and Impact Fees
In a meeting on Monday, Chatham County Commissioners agreed to lower the impact fee on new homes from $2,900 to $1,900 if voters would approve a 0.4 percent land transfer tax. Earlier in the year, the Commissioners considered eliminating the impact fee altogether if the legislature would have authorized a 1 per cent transfer tax. The 1 percent tax did not pass, instead, the Budget approved by the State Legislature authorizes counties to levy a 0.4 percent tax. If voters approved the tax, which would be paid by the seller, county officials estimate Chatham would generate $3.5 million in 2009. Officials say the $1,900 impact fee would generate another $2.5 million. Commissioners are now reconsidering their earlier decision to put the transfer tax on the November ballot. Some Commissioners suggested holding the referendum in May. For full story, click here.

Moratorium Upheld
A moratorium instituted by the Chapel Hill Town Council in May of 2007 was upheld by an Orange County Superior Court judge on Wednesday, August 8th. The CAI Group VII LLC brought a request to the court to exempt its plans for an orthopedic clinic on Weaver Dairy Road near N.C. 86. The judge ruled the town "properly exercised its authority in declining" to exempt the orthopedic clinic from the moratorium which will expire in January of 2008. The moratorium covers land near Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., Weaver Dairy, Eubanks and Homestead Roads. The town’s Northern Area Task Force will continue working on crafting new zoning rules for the area in the meantime. For full story, click here.

Chatham County Considering Larger Lots
As a way to slow Chatham County’s population boom, Chatham’s board of commissioners asked county planning staff to investigate increasing minimum lot sizes in new subdivisions. Planning staff will look at possibly increasing minimum lot sizes from one house per 1.5 acres to one house per 2 to 5 acres in areas outside towns under the county’s planning jurisdiction. Currently, there is a county-wide moratorium prohibiting development of residential subdivisions greater than 26 homes. Commissioners expressed their desire to potentially use the larger lot size to prevent developers from building subdivisions with smaller lots and thus skirting the temporary residential development moratorium. Other commissioners expressed concern that larger lots could lead to sprawl and outprice homebuyers. No deadline was set for the staff to report back to the commissioners. For full story, click here.

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Schools

Stylish Carrboro High School Set to Open
The new Carrboro High School is set to open and will include a number of modern and stylish touches. Each classroom is complete with an LCD projector and spacious desks for students. The school will share three mobile computer labs and was designed to incorporate as much natural light as possible. For full story, click here.

School Boards Try to Avoid Sacrificing Jobs
Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools Superintendent Neil Pederson and the CHCC School Board have sliced the budget by nearly two million dollars in the past two years without eliminating a single job. A potential cut is to reduce clerical staff. However, the School Board is considering several additions at each high school, including a security guard, a day treatment social worker and a tutor for students with mental illness. In all, there will be roughly a $112 per-pupil increase in county funding for the school system. For full story, click here.

School’s Adequate Yearly Progress Released
The preliminary Adequate Yearly Progress results for the Chapel Hill-Carrboro School District were released. AYP, as it is called, measures the performance of schools in each school district. Of the nine elementary schools and four middle schools in the Chapel Hill-Carrboro District, five met AYP. Those schools are: Ephesus, Glenwood, Rashkis, Scroggs, and Seawell—all elementary schools. For more on the performance of each school in the district click here. For a student calendar of the Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools, click here.

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Orange County

Chapel Hill Transit Adds New Buses
Chapel Hill Transit added nineteen new buses to its fleet on Monday. Three of these buses use a hybrid electric engine, reducing energy consumption and pollution. Another three are articulated buses which have double the capacity of one standard bus. These buses will be used on routes with high ridership rates and are the first of its kind to be used in the Triangle. Lastly, the new buses have an updated look that includes curved Carolina blue paint in place of the older straight stripes.
From TOWNweek.

Home Sales Steady
July home sales for Orange County were released by Triangle MLS, Inc. For the month, 229 single and multifamily homes were sold down slightly from the 238 that were sold in July of 2006. Of those sold, the average residential closing price in Orange was $331,239. Presently, there are 856 active residential listings up from 695 in July of last year. For more, click here.

Orange County Tax Base Growing, Ozone Exceedances Down
In 2006, the total assessed value of Orange County’s tax base reached $11.96 Billion, more than double the 1997 base of $5.15 Billion. Much of the growth is due to increases in the residential tax base. In terms of the non-residential tax base, around $925 million comes from Chapel Hill, $215 million from Carrboro, $232 million from Hillsborough and $184 million from the rest of the county. Environmentally, the number of Ozone exceedances in the Triangle declined significantly over the past ten years. In 1997, there were 26 exceedances in the Triangle. In 2006, there was only one exceedance.
From the State of the Local Economy, Orange County EDC.

ArtsCenter Scheduled for Redevelopment
The ArtsCenter, located in the 300 block of East Main Street in Carrboro, is scheduled for redevelopment later in 2007 or early 2008. The entire 300 block of East Main will undergo major redevelopment including a new hotel, parking deck and restaurants and shops. Now, the ArtsCenter and Kidzu, located on East Franklin Street, are in preliminary talks to possibly share space in the redeveloped building. The move would be timely as Kidzu has outgrown its Franklin Street space with more than 29,000 visitors in its first year. For full story, click here.

Orange County Passes Budget
The Orange County Commissioners approved a $173.6 million budget, increasing the county’s property tax rate by 4.7 cents per $100 of valuation for Orange County residents. On a $300,000 home that equals an increase of $141 to a total of $2,850. Chapel Hill and Carrboro residents will also pay a 1.5 cent increase on the special school district tax. The manager’s original recommended budget called for no increase in the special district tax and would have provided about half a million dollars for both of the county’s school districts. The approved budget increases funding for Orange County Schools by $1.4 million while Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools will receive an additional $3.7 million.

Orange County Comprehensive Plan Meeting
Orange County is in the process of overhauling its comprehensive plan for the first time since 1981. The county is aiming to complete the plan by August of 2008. A meeting was held on Tuesday, August 7th to allow for public input. The next public hearing for the Plan will be on August 27th at 7:30 PM in Hillsborough’s Gordon Battle Courtroom. At the meeting, County Commissioners and planning staff will hear comments on the Draft County Profile (Data) and Goals for inclusion in the Comprehensive Plan update. For full story, click here.

Orange County Election Filings
Below is the list of candidates who filed for municipal and county elections in Orange County for fall 2007 elections. An asterisk indicates incumbency. For more information regarding election filings and candidate contact information click here.

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The Triangle

Officials Gather to Discuss Possible Water-sharing Deal
On Tuesday, officials from Orange and Chatham counties got together to discuss the growing need for water resources in Chatham County. With just the northeastern section of Chatham County expected to grow by 83,000 people over the next thirty years, elected officials discussed how they might cooperate regionally over water. Presently, Chatham gets 6 million gallons per day from Jordan Lake courtesy of an intake owned by Cary. The only other land near the lake that could accommodate another water intake site is owned by OWASA, which is hoping not to develop the site single-handedly. OWASA officials broached the idea of an intake project for the region and are already talking with Chatham County. For full story, click here.

Debate Continues Concerning Jordan Water
The North Carolina Environmental Management Commission proposed a new set of regulations to clean up Jordan Lake. High levels of nitrogen and phosphorus in the lake are threatening the drinking water Jordan Lake provides for Apex, Cary, Durham, Morrisville, RTP and Chatham County. The Environmental Management Commission reports that its proposed new rules could cost $710 million to implement, although other sources believe that $900 million is a more likely figure. This cost is likely to be passed on to residents and developers. Although Orange County’s water supply does not come from Jordan Lake, the proposed regulations would affect Orange County because it is in Jordan Lake’s watershed. One of the major policies being considered is for new development to incorporate runoff filtration systems that remove 85 percent of contaminants. For full story, click here.

Durham Planning Commission Rezones for Development
A 61-acre site off of Garrett Road and U.S. 15-501 was unanimously approved for rezoning on Tuesday, August 14th. Prior to the rezoning, this same site was the center of an intense rezoning controversy in 2005 that ended with the Durham City Council rejecting a plan for the property. A new developer, Trammell Crow Residential, brought a new plan to the table that included a 308-unit multifamily complex that would leave much of the property untouched. Now, the development’s future is contingent on DOT carrying out its plans to widen 15-501. For full story, click here.

Foreclosures Up in Triangle MSA
According to RealtyTrac, the number of foreclosed properties in the Raleigh-Cary metropolitan statistical area more than doubled in the first six months of 2007 compared to the same six months last year. The MSA includes Wake, Johnston and Franklin counties and had 2,505 foreclosure filings (one filing per 158 households) from January to June, an increase of 105 percent compared to 2006. Out the nation’s largest MSA’s Raleigh ranked 60th in the number of foreclosures. For full story, click here.

Second Quarter Vacancy Figures Promising
Highwoods Properties released its Second Quarter Market Survey for 2007, stating the office vacancy rate in Chapel Hill decreased from 7.52 percent to 6.68 percent. Similarly, office vacancy rates were down to 13.92 percent in Durham and 9.78 percent in Cary. Overall, the Raleigh/Durham/Cary area added four buildings with 367,224 square feet in the second quarter. On the horizon, twenty-four office buildings and two flex buildings are currently being renovated or constructed in the area.
From Highwoods Poperties, Inc.

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State

New Budget Passed
The 2007 Budget was signed into law by Governor Mike Easley on July 31st. One particular item of note is the Medicaid relief portion of the Budget. Prior to this Budget, North Carolina was the only state requiring financial participation in Medicaid by its counties. These costs have increased statewide by 96 percent since 2000. With the new budget, there will be a three-year phaseout of county Medicaid expenses. The phaseout will begin in October of this year with the State assuming 25 percent of each county’s Medicaid share. In exchange, each county will have to give up ¼ cent of sales tax revenue. Over the remaining two years, the State will assume all 100 percent of the Medicaid share, requiring counties give up another ¼ cent of sales tax. For Orange County that means that by 2011, the State will be receiving 5 cents of the sales tax, up from 4.5 cents. The County and its local governments would be left to split up the remaining 2 cents of tax, down from 2.5 cents.

To make up for this loss in sales tax revenue, the new Budget allows counties to potentially adopt one of two new revenue sources. The first is to increase sales tax by ¼ cent or to increase the deed stamp tax (land transfer) by 0.4 percent. The decision over which tax to potentially levy would be subject to a voter referendum. Currently, Durham is considering putting the taxes on the November ballot while Johnston County has already decided to. Officials in Wake County will hold off on the measure for the time being.

Please click here for more information. The North Carolina Association County Commissioners also has a good summary of the Medicaid relief portion of the budget on their web site.

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Nation

Construction Falls to Lowest Level
New home construction fell to its lowest level nationally in more than a decade this past month, according to a U.S. Commerce Department report. In July, new home and apartment construction dropped by 6.1 percent after rising 2.1 percent in June. For July, the drop amounts to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.38 million units, down 20.9 percent versus last July. Applications for building permits also fell by 2.8 percent in July. For full story, click here.

Nation’s Industrial Centers are Shrinking
Updated 2006 census figures highlight the migration of Americans from industrial centers in the Midwest and Northeast to the South and Southwest. While the country’s population has doubled since 1950, the populations of 80 percent of the largest cities in 1950 have declined significantly. Detroit, Cleveland, Pittsburg and Buffalo have lost over half of their 1950 populations to cities including Las Vegas, Phoenix and Atlanta. Additionally, census figures show a continued national migration to the suburbs. In 1950, nearly a fifth of the country’s population lived in the nation’s largest 20 cities; by 2006 that number fell to one-sixth.