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This Commission's makeup will change very soon. The stated intent in establishing a separate <br /> District Commissioner for Northern Orange County, was to give an effective voice to the <br /> northern part of the County. Where is our voice in this Plan? <br /> Lynette and I ask this Commission to defer any action on the Comprehensive Plan to the new <br /> County Commission taking office in December. <br /> We also ask you simultaneously set up an effective process to meaningfully publicize the Plan. <br /> Gather input during coming weeks and months to revise it to acknowledge and reflect the rights <br /> and recourse of the people whose names actually are written on Orange County property <br /> deeds. <br /> Having a County that harmonizes policy with the rights of its citizens is the best way I know to <br /> plant seeds that flower into community consensus year after year rather than yield bumper <br /> crops of ugly and costly conflict that just won't go away. <br /> Thank you. <br /> Please let me know if there's any other way in which I can help. <br /> Thanks, <br /> Stephen G. Richardson, Ph.D. <br /> Vice President & Board Member <br /> Friends of Lake Orange Civic Association <br /> POB 101 <br /> Cedar Grove, NC 27231 <br /> www.lakeorange.org <br /> Ann Joyner is a resident of Orange County and also President of Cedar Grove Institute <br /> for Sustainable Communities. She has served as an expert consultant for land civil rights <br /> lawsuits against various government entities. She said that Cedar Grove Institute works in land <br /> use and issues of diversity and affordable housing. She made reference to the Housing <br /> Element. Regarding the affordable housing plan put forward earlier, she thinks that this is <br /> emblematic of the County's attitude for the last 20+ years. She has been intermittently <br /> addressing the County Commissioners during those 20+ years. The attitude seems to be, "not <br /> my job." It was pointed out that when values are averaged, the numbers are not really <br /> representative, but the County's table in the Comprehensive Plan gives the median house value <br /> and not the average. The median value from Orange does include Chapel Hill values, which <br /> are high, but it also includes Hillsborough. She said that Orange is still the highest in the <br /> Triangle. Secondly, the remark was made that developers build expensive homes because they <br /> can sell them, implying that the County does not play a role in what gets built. As a former <br /> developer, and as a developer whose 1987 development was used by a former Planning <br /> Director of Orange County as the model for the first flexible development plan in the County, <br /> she can say that the County's subdivision regulations currently make it almost impossible to <br /> develop affordable housing subdivisions. She said that the County has a responsibility to take <br /> direct action to enable, if not create, affordable housing. She does not mean mobile homes. <br /> The current comprehensive plan, not the one being evaluated, did not mention affordable <br /> housing except for mobile homes. She said that mobile homes serve a needed purpose, they <br />