Orange County NC Website
and how can we address while we're still in the process and not at the end go, “oops, you know, we didn't have 199 <br />an opportunity.” 200 <br /> 201 <br />Leigh Anne King: Yeah, I think that's a really good point. So Emily mentioned there's some specific groups 202 <br />that we identified from the data that we were not getting the representation in terms of the participation and so 203 <br />I think now that we know that we do have, Tate will continue to do, they continue to have some a role in the 204 <br />community engagement in this next window where they can maybe be a little more targeted to some very 205 <br />specific groups. So the database I think had over 200 different contacts. I think there were a lot to connect 206 <br />with, which is great to have that many groups and organizations and businesses in the County to reach out to. 207 <br />It also makes it a little difficult to have personal conversations with all of them. But I think that now we can kind 208 <br />of narrow that down a little bit more and have some more targeted discussions and maybe push a little bit 209 <br />harder to have those discussions so that we can make sure that those different community groups are 210 <br />represented in the second round of engagement. 211 <br /> 212 <br />Chris Johnston: Last comment, Cy, have you all looked into how the Health Department can be a place to 213 <br />contact the more diverse communities and populations? 214 <br /> 215 <br />Cy Stober: We have not. That's very constructive feedback, thank you. 216 <br /> 217 <br />Whitney Watson: I have two questions. One is if Clarion can drill down a little bit through the kind of 218 <br />economic development options that might be developed. So, it's one thing to sort of go, “we'd like to see 219 <br />renewable energy.” I don't know what that really means. Does it mean a lithium mine like out by Charlotte or 220 <br />does it mean something else? It would be nice to know what people think those different kind of job categories 221 <br />would be. And along with that, what education requirements there might be as well as transportation and 222 <br />training? And then my other question has to do with drilling into what people think about or the community 223 <br />thinks about affordable housing. Maybe it's great to say, “we would love ADUs or tiny home villages 224 <br />everywhere, but not in my backyard.” So perhaps presenting some alternatives in one of these engagement 225 <br />sessions might help people tease out what they really mean about that. 226 <br /> 227 <br />Leigh Anne King: On the economic development-related land uses, I think that it's a good question. I would 228 <br />be very surprised if a mine would be supported by this community. But I could be wrong. I think that what we 229 <br />want to do with the land use scenarios that we're going to be testing in the fall is to start to, like you're saying, 230 <br />drill down a little more specifically, particularly looking in the economic development districts and potentially 231 <br />other places, if that's where this drives us to. What are the types of land uses that should be accommodated 232 <br />within those areas? What types of employment are we wanting to support? I think that's important. We have 233 <br />the Economic Development Commission and staff representation as part of the staff working group that are 234 <br />helping us to kind of understand what their goals are, what they're working on. I think we might not have a 235 <br />specific piece of feedback that was shared in this but one of the pieces of feedback we received in the 236 <br />community engagement is there's an interest in small businesses and local businesses in particular. One of 237 <br />the questions I have as a consultant kind of thinking about this stuff is not to say that that's not a good thing to 238 <br />support, but what are the, in Orange County, generally speaking, what are the wages that those employees 239 <br />make and are those wages that would actually allow people to kind of both live and work in this community? 240 <br />It's an important question to consider. If we are, if one of our goals is to try to reduce the amount of people 241 <br />that are working elsewhere and driving in every day or cross-commuting. So, I think that that's definitely 242 <br />something, I don't have an answer to your question about what those land uses will be. But I think that's 243 <br />something that we're going to be working through as part of those land use scenarios. You know, solar farms, 244 <br />that's one that a lot of communities are looking at. Is that a type of use that we want to be supporting and 245 <br />where does that make the most sense? 246 <br /> 247 <br />10