Agenda - 10-07-2008- 7b - Laserfiche WebLink

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DST' ®l~1YfY-I®1®T 1~~'P~~VE~3 YET ~Y ~®CC 1 '2 We also ask you simultaneously set up an effective process to meaningfully publicize the Plan. 3 Gather input during coming weeks and months to revise it to acknowledge and reflect the rights 4 and recourse of the people whose names actually are written on Orange County property 5 deeds. 6 7 Having a County that harmonizes policy with the rights of its citizens is the best way I know to 8 plant seeds that flower into community consensus year after year rather than yield bumper 9 crops of ugly and costly conflict that just won't go away. 10 11 Thank you. 12 13 Please let me know if there's any other way in which I can help. 14 15 Thanks, 16 17 Stephen G. Richardson, Ph.D. 18 Vice President & Board Member 19 Friends of Lake Orange Civic Association 20 POB 101 21 Cedar Grove, NC 27231 • 22 23 www.lakeorange.org 24 25 26 Ann Joyner is a resident of Orange County and also President of Cedar Grove Institute 27 for Sustainable Communities. She has served as an expert consultant for land civil rights 28 lawsuits against various government entities. She said that Cedar Grove Institute works in land 29 use and issues of diversity and affordable housing. She made reference to the Housing. 30 Element. Regarding the affordable housing plan put forward earlier, she thinks that this is 31 emblematic of the County's attitude for the last 20+ years. She has been intermittently 32 addressing the County Commissioners during those 20+ years. The attitude seems to be, "not 33 my job." It was pointed out that when values are averaged, the numbers are not really 34 representative, but the County's table in the Comprehensive Plan gives the median house value 35 and not the average. The median value from Orange does include Chapel Hill values, which 36 are. high, but it also includes Hillsborough. She said that Orange is still the highest in the 37 Triangle. Secondly, the remark was made that developers build expensive homes because they 38 can sell them, implying that the County does not play a role in what gets built. As a former 39 developer, and as a developer whose 1987 development was used by a former. Planning 40 Director of Orange County.as the model for the first flexible development plan in the County, 41 she can say that the County's subdivision regulations currently make it almost impossible to 42 develop affordable housing subdivisions. She said that the County has a responsibility to take 43 direct action to enable, if not create, affordable housing. She does not mean mobile homes. 44 The current comprehensive plan, not the one being evaluated, did not mention affordable 45 housing except for mobile homes. She said that mobile homes serve a needed purpose, they 46 depreciate, further exacerbating the wealth gap between the haves and the have-Hots. She 47 said that, directly because of that circumstance, 11 % of the County's housing is in mobile 48 homes right now. She said that she does not see anything in the Comprehensive Plan that 49 assures her that there is understanding of this gap. Instead, there are mansions on two-acre 50 lots. She asked the County Commissioners to put something concrete in the Comprehensive 51 Plan for the next 20 years that will improve the situation. 289