Frustration, thy name is weather, snow and rain in particular, if you want to open the new Wake Forest Town Hall. Town Manager Mark Williams had frustration all over his face and in his voice Tuesday night when asked about the move-in date.
“We can’t even get the ground thawed out, and here we go again with the rain and the snow.” Until the crews can complete the plaza between Brooks Street and the main door of town hall, he cannot open the new building. Maybe a big tent and some heaters would work? As Elizabeth Gardner pointed out Wednesday in her weather update and forecast, we have had snow around here as late as April.
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This is an update on the county zoning ordinance the Wake County Planning Board approved 8-1 and recommended to the county commissioners. At the commissioners’ meeting Monday, Lacy Reaves, a Raleigh attorney reportedly representing Jim Goldston and others, argued for the change while representatives from the City of Raleigh and the Watershed Protection Council as well as others said it would be a bad idea.
The change would have allowed owners to develop some nonconforming uses, uses that were there before the county zoned the areas around Falls Lake and other water-supply watersheds to restrict development and runoff. Specifically, the change would allow Goldston or a developer to whom he sold the property to develop the former Goldston lumber yard and building supply business, most recently a Stock Building Supply, as a shopping center. Shopping centers are specifically banned in the county’s water supply watersheds.
Reaves said the change would be beneficial to the lake as new stormwater controls and other measures would reduce the present runoff. The environmental groups and Raleigh said the change would undercut the county’s credibility in the effort to clean up the lake as well as add more impervious surfaces when part of the cleanup will be their reduction.
Instead of voting, the commissioners referred the proposed change to their Growth, Land Use and Environment (GLUE) committee for further discussion.
None of the county commissioners, who control the land use around Falls Lake, were at the forum in Raleigh Saturday where N.C. State’s Dr. JoAnn Burkholder graphically described the pollutants and problems she has found while monitoring Falls Lake. The state and federal agencies describe most of the lake as impaired, and Burkholder’s figures showed the lower part of the lake in Wake County is becoming more polluted and may be or soon will be impaired. Almost half a million people, including Wake Forest residents, draw their drinking water from the lake. Raleigh pulls the water from an intake near the dam.
Also on Monday, the state Division of Water Quality released its proposed plan to clean up the lake with draft rules that call for a 10-year program to reduce the algae in the lower half of the lake below N.C. 50 with a 20-year plan for the more polluted upper part of the lake bordered where stormwater and agricultural runoff as well as wastewater plant discharges account for most of the pollutants. The affected counties are Durham, Franklin, Granville, Orange, and Person. None of them draw drinking water from the lake.
State Sen. Neal Hunt was in the audience, and Sens. Floyd McKissick and Josh Stein were on the panel.
To see the draft Falls Lake plan, go to www.fallslakestakeholder.org and click on resources. The draft plan is labeled Final Draft March 1, 2010.
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If you are in the mood for some reminiscences, you might be interested to know that 20 years ago, 1990, Carolina Telephone and Telegraph, until then headquartered in Tarboro, had just purchased about 70 acres along what was then U.S. 1 for $1.289 million. The company has since serially transformed itself into Sprint, Embarq, and now CenturyLink, though there may have been a couple more names along the way, and is now has a smaller staff than the regional or national headquarters once envisioned.
In the same clipping from The Wake Weekly we learn that 30 years ago, 1980, the state Department of Transportation had identified a possible route and two alternate routes for the Wake Forest bypass. Athey Products – the company which built what is now The Factory – was going to make one of its street sweepers available to the town one day a week every three weeks. The Wake County Board of Education had renegotiated the contract for the new media center at Wake Forest-Rolesville High, cutting $24,458 to bring the project down to the $590,448 available. That may have been the reason the roof on the building leaked like a funnel the first couple years.
Forty years ago – 1970, the spring before county schools were integrated – three boys’ basketball teams were competing in the state finals. Wake Forest and Youngsville were 2A and 1A schools respectively, and DuBois was competing in the NCHSAC.