Agenda - 09-06-2022; 8-a - Minutes

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13 1 Amanda Hawkins said she is an attorney with Brooks Pearce in Raleigh. She said she is 2 speaking on the NC Cable Telecommunications Association and one of its members is 3 Spectrum and Charter. She said that a colleague spoke to them previously and noted that North 4 Carolina law only allows counties to award broadband grants to unserved areas. She expressed 5 concern that the NorthState grant service area would include a large number of locations that 6 are already served by Spectrum. She said that after the April 26th meeting, they have worked 7 with the county's legal staff to identify a subset of location from the prior list that are presently 8 served by Charter. She said that these conversations have resulted in the amendment that is 9 before them tonight. She said that there are over 3,000 addresses that need to be removed. 10 She said that this amendment does not solve the legal problem. She said that the law only 11 permits counties to issue grants to unserved areas and this project does more than that. She 12 said that to fix the legal issues, the amount of the grant needs to either be reduced by 36% or a 13 new 3,528 unserved locations need to be identified to add to the grant. She said the 14 amendment attempts to address this by requiring NorthState to serve any unserved locations 15 that it is building to, but the law does not allow a county to overbuild. 16 17 A motion was made by Commissioner Greene, seconded by Commissioner McKee, to 18 approve and authorize the County Manager to sign the amended Network Development 19 Agreement and any amendments that do not exceed the contract amount with North State 20 Communications Advanced Services, LLC to construct, operate, and maintain a fiber to the 21 premises network in unserved parts of Orange County. 22 23 VOTE: UNANIMOUS 24 25 d. Regulation of Gatherings on and near School Property and Public Playgrounds 26 27 PURPOSE: To present for second reading an ordinance regulating picketing on or within 1,000 28 feet of school property and public playgrounds. 29 30 BACKGROUND: The Board of Commissioners requested information on how the County may 31 regulate protests or large gatherings in Orange County. The Board initially received information 32 on this subject at its February 1, 2022 Business meeting. At that meeting the Board discussed 33 many aspects of this type of regulation including prohibiting large gatherings on certain public 34 school properties. The Board further discussed this topic at its May 10, 2022 work session. At 35 that work session the Board determined parades would not be regulated and provided further 36 direction to the County Attorney to be brought back to the Board for future consideration. At the 37 June 2, 2022 work session, the Board determined to move forward with an ordinance prohibiting 38 picketing on School Property. The agenda materials for each prior discussion may be viewed at 39 the links above. 40 41 Pursuant to the Board's prior discussions and input, the County Attorney revised the draft 42 ordinance which generally provides as follows: 43 44 • Only covers Picketing conducted on, or within 1,000 feet of, School Property and Public 45 Playgrounds; 46 47 • Declares violations to be subject to a monetary fine, equitable relief, or trespass 48 depending on the facts and circumstances. 49 50 Recent changes to North Carolina law provide that when a local ordinance involves a potential 51 criminal penalty, the ordinance may not be adopted at the meeting at which it is first introduced.