Greensboro hoping third time's the charm with noise ordinance

A flyer by Bennett College this week

Knock knock. It's your old friend, the Greensboro noise ordinance.

When the Greensboro City Council meets on Tuesday, there will be a familiar item on the agenda. Councilwomen Nancy Hoffmann, Marikay Abuzuaiter and Nancy Vaughan are bringing forward two significant revisions to the noise ordinance that are likely to pass, several council members said.

After lowering the nighttime threshold from 75 to 65 decibels and switching from A to C weighting (which is designed to pick up bass frequencies better but essentially drops the reading an additional 10 decibels) in July, the threshold level is back on the agenda for a very good reason: the current level is unenforceable. 

Opponents of the July revisions — the second round of changes since council first tackled the issue in early 2012 — argued that ambient noise would be a problem with C-weighted 65 decibel level, and that's exactly what police and council members found out. Vaughan said that readings taken outside of closed venues were crossing the 65 decibel threshold. (Council initially considered a 60 dB limit in July but Vaughan convinced a majority of members to bump it to 65 dB).

To reach an enforceable level, council will now consider raising the decibel threshold back to 75 but will retain the C-weighting system it put in place in July. But before you rejoice or panic, there's more.

Council will also consider — and likely pass — a ban on outdoor amplified noise after 11 p.m. Greene Street Club and Syn & Sky, two downtown clubs with rooftop venues, are the obvious target of the ban. Greene Street's lawyer Norman Klick and Syn & Sky owner Mike Carter could not immediately be reached for comment.

Reiterating her statements from council's discussion in July, Vaughan said club owners did not protect the initial ordinance changes that turned Greensboro into the loudest city in the state and possibly the Southeast.

"I was pretty frustrated with some of the clubs and the way they were managing noise and it just appears they can’t do it," she said. "It really didn’t seem to matter to them. It’s unfortunate that we have to come back a third time but hopefully the third time’s the charm."

Vaughan and Hoffmann said they were responding to feedback from the Greensboro Police Department about issues with amplified noise, and Mayor Robbie Perkins said this round of changes will make enforcement easier because the 11 p.m. ban will be more clear cut. 

"I think the big thing is, do we want our officers out after noise complaints or do we want them out after more serious crimes?" he said. "I’d have voted for this in the first round, we just didn’t have the majority of the council where we needed to be at that time. We’re at the end of a long road."

Hoffmann said she would be surprised if any revisions were needed after this, but added, "I never say never." 

Hoffmann said that part of the issue was that the C weighting hadn't been adequately tested before council's vote in July, but Vaughan said she and Abuzuaiter went out with police to see the C weighting in action before the last round of revisions. Yet after having the rules on the books for several weeks, Vaughan said it was clear that the ordinance wasn't workable based on more experience with the changes. 

The changes are necessary, Vaughan said, but she's disappointed the noise ordinance needs to be placed on the agenda again. So is Mayor Pro Tem Yvonne Johnson.

"I don’t know what I can make of that," Johnson said less than an hour after finding out it would come before council on Tuesday. "I think we ought to do something fair… and we need to stick with it. I just want us to get to a point where it’s a win-win and leave it there. I’m tired of it."

Greensboro council to discuss electronic financial campaign reports

At least one item on the Greensboro City Council's agenda for next week is simpler than it sounds: A resolution brought forward by District 4 Councilwoman Nancy Hoffmann on a "transparency and timeliness in reporting" campaign finances is designed to encourage candidates to file mandatory financial reports electronically.

Hoffmann said the League of Women Voters brought the issue to her, which was timely because she was already planning to use the software to report electronically.

"We live in the 21st century, right?" Hoffmann said, adding that it would be easier to read than scratched handwriting on some reports, easier to transmit and save time at the elections office.

The resolution won't compel city council candidates to file electronically, it would just encourage them to do so.

Speaking of Greensboro City Council, a $1.5 million funding request from the International Civil Rights Center & Museum has been postponed from the council's agenda again to allow museum staff to provide more financial information. The item is now on council's Aug. 20 agenda, and the money would be paid over three years.

The meeting, which is normally held on the first and third Tuesdays of the month, was moved to Monday at 4 p.m. due to National Night Out on Tuesday.

As an aside: Having read through tons of campaign reports, the prospect of not dealing with illegible handwriting is definitely alluring. Numbers and names are frequently difficult to decipher, causing confusion. It may also be easier to search for specific donors or expenditures with a typed, electronic file, increasing transparency and making our watchdog role easier. 

On the other hand, Jordan Green has experienced software glitches with electronically filed reports that provided inaccurate information, which is also a real concern. Either way, candidates can expect to be hearing from us to verify names and amounts when reports are available. I also wonder how some candidates — like Jean Brown who said she doesn't have a computer — will react if it's passed.

UPDATE: Several candidates filed a "certificate of threshold" which means they won't have to provide as strict finance reporting because they expect to spend less than $1,000. Mayoral candidate George Hartzman, at-large contenders Joseph Landis and Marlando Pridgen, District 3 candidate Corey Pysher and Sal Leone and Alex Seymour in District 5 all filled out a threshold certificate. If any of them ends up crossing the $1,000 mark — as Councilman Danny Thompson questionably did in 2011 — they are required to notify the elections board and follow normal filing procedures.

Greensboro council to revisit Black Network Television vote

The Greensboro City Council will hold a special meeting next week to revisit its approval of a $300,000 loan to Black Network Television, the city just announced. The meeting will be held at 3 p.m. on Tuesday, July 2.

Council approved the loan in a 7-2 vote on June 18, with Councilwoman Nancy Hoffmann and Councilman Tony Wilkins voting against the item. Councilwoman Dianne Bellamy-Small abstained from voting, saying that she felt uncomfortable about the decision. Her absention counted as an affirmative vote because sh wasn't formally excused. (YES! Weekly mistakenly reported that Councilman Zack Matheny, rather than Hoffmann, voted against the item. We regret the error.)

The city said this afternoon that the council will hold the special meeting "for the purpose of considering and amending" the resolution for the 120-month $300,000 loan to Black Network Television. The company plans to produce a family sitcom in Greensboro.

UPDATE: The city sent out a press release on the afternoon of July 1 saying the meeting tomorrow is canceled. No information about rescheduling the meeting was provided. 

Greensboro to revisit noise ordinance

SynerG, Action Greensboro's young professionals' organization, held a meeting yesterday to discuss the noise ordinance and issues with its first year of implementation. Councilwoman Nancy Hoffmann (above), City Manager Denise Turner Roth and Police Attorney Jim Clark explained what the city has done and outlined why council will revisit the issue at its June 18 meeting. 

Though the ordinance is citywide, discussions yesterday (and last year when the ordinance was revised) focused on the battle between downtown clubs — namely Greene Street — and downtown residents — namely Roy Carroll and the inhabitants of his Center Pointe condos. 

Kurt Collins, below left, said yesterday that he moved out of downtown because of excessive noise. Clark said that during the noise ordinance debacle last year the city mostly heard from club owners and their supporters but that residents remained mostly silent on the issue. That has changed in the past year, he said, as more downtown residents have contacted the city. 

The number of noise complaints in Greensboro has dropped from 5,195 to 4,726 since the ordinance's implementation, but the number of citations has almost doubled even though the city delayed enforcement during an initial trial period. The number of citations to nightclubs only rose slightly, from eight to 12, though Greene Street was cited three times.

We will have more detailed reporting on the noise ordinance coming soon. Stay posted!

BREAKING: Nancy Hoffmann seeks D4 re-election

Courtesy photo

District 4 Greensboro City Councilwoman Nancy Hoffmann announced in a press release this morning that she will seek re-election. Hoffmann's involvement in citywide and downtown issues during her first term led some to believe (myself included) that she may run for council at-large.

The press release emphasizes her engagement with young professionals ("they are our future"), her work as chair of a council subcommittee addressing a post-RUCO ordinance to deal with safe rental housing and her accessibility to constituents.

Hoffmann also served on the council subcommittee designing a new tree ordinance (which is still in the works) and briefly brought up the noise ordinance again earlier this year. Hoffmann defeated incumbent Mary Rakestraw in the 2011 election. We will have much more detailed coverage of the city council campaigns once filing begins this summer.

District 4 covers the central western and northwestern parts of Greensboro including the Guilford College area and stretching as far north as Battleground Avenue. The district reaches parts of High Point Road and I-40 to the south but does not extend eastward enough to encompass downtown or surrounding neighborhoods.

Not sure what district you live in? Here's a map.

UPDATE: Hoffmann will be challenged by Bill Knight, who served one term as mayor as a political newcomer before being ousted by Robbie Perkins in 2011.

Noise ordinance discussion postponed, Hoffmann explains

A proposed change to Greensboro's noise ordinance that would make the decibel levels lower (and thereby stricter) was removed from city council's agenda last night after it met with opposition from some members prior to the meeting. District 4 Councilwoman Nancy Hoffmann, who had suggested a decreased threshold from 75 to 65 decibels after 11 p.m., said she asked for the item to be pulled but said it may still need to be revisited.

"I think that it’s an issue that we need to reconsider but we may need a little time to work through that," Hoffmann said, adding that some council members liked the ordinance as is while others may be open to revisiting it. "The police chief now is actually looking at some better or more sensitive equipment that can be used."

 Changes to the city's noise ordinance early last year were controversial and was met with fierce opposition from club owners, patrons and other residents. The ordinance affects the city as a whole but the discussion was focused on a rift between downtown clubs and residents, with developer Roy Carroll as the face of those pushing for a stricter ordinance. Carroll, who built Center Pointe on North Elm Street and lives in the building, later said he would back candidates that supported his point of view in the fall 2013 city council elections.

Hoffmann said the issue had been framed as a battle between Carroll — who leaned heavily on the police department and city council before it was put on council's agenda — and Greene Street Club, but that she had received calls from residents throughout the city, including in her district. One even complained about noise from the Greensboro Coliseum, she said, which is exempt from the ordinance. Hoffmann, whose district does not include downtown, said she has heard from several downtown residents who are still unsatisfied with the ordinance.

"In terms of the downtown business area, you have a number of constituencies," Hoffmann said. "What you’re always trying to do is to get to the center so that no group or no constituency is unfavorably or negatively impacted. There’s always lots to learn, you’re always trying to get to the best possible situation and solution to an issue or problem. I think that’s where we hope to get to at some point in time."

Hoffmann said there may be ongoing antagonism between Center Pointe and Greene Street, but said the current ordinance has a decibel threshold that is higher than Greensboro's peer cities, such as Greenville, SC or Raleigh, and that the current method of measuring noise may not adequately address the booming bass tones in some music. Hoffmann said the ordinance may be addressed in the coming months.

Hoffmann: Lower the noise ordinance threshold

According to this city document, which "Greensboro Citizens Against Proposed Noise Ordinance" posted on Facebook an hour ago, District 4 City Councilwoman Nancy Hoffmann is pushing for a stricter noise ordinance in mixed use areas. 

Hoffmann's proposal, according to the document, is to reduce the decibel threshold from 75 to 65 after 11 p.m. in mixed use areas. When the noise ordinance was brought up early last year it was met with fierce community opposition, and Hoffmann was one of several council members who was more willing to meet with ordinance opponents. 

The Greensboro City Council agenda item is listed for council's meeting on Tuesday (Jan. 15). The noise ordinance impacts the entire city, but a YES! Weekly public information request revealed that the source of the issue was developer Roy Carroll and his complaints about Greene Street Club downtown. The ordinance changes were originally brought forward by Mayor Robbie Perkins, who lives in Carroll's Center Pointe condos downtown.

 Club owners have recently been frustrated by attempts to create an entertainment security ordinance that they say would unfairly target clubs that did not have histories of security issues or problems with violence. A three member council subcommittee, spearheaded by District 3 Councilman Zack Matheny is looking into the security ordinance. The noise ordinance has mostly been off the public radar since the summer. 

Taxes and spending: Where Greensboro City Council candidates stand

Assuming a new city council reaches an agreement on what to do about solid waste early in the next term, the budget is likely to be the major challenge in the next two years. Revenues are likely to be lower than hoped for because of the depressed housing market, while services and infrastructure remain in demand. Mayoral challenger Robbie Perkins would like to move forward with the Downtown Greenway. At-large challenger Wayne Abraham wants to repair city roads. District 3 challenger Jay Ovittore wants to hire additional police officers.

No surprise that the four conservative incumbents on council, including Mayor Bill Knight, have pledged to not raise taxes or water rates, as documented in a video clip produced by Conservatives for Guilford County. At-large incumbent Danny Thompson and at-large challenger Chris Lawyer also took the pledge. Mayoral challenger Robbie Perkins has left his options open when asked the question.

“It’s a qualified maybe answer,” said Perkins when asked during a candidate forum hosted by the Greater Greensboro Republican Women’s Club on Oct. 25 if he would vote to raise taxes. Asked if he would raise water rates and if he would cut spending, he responded, “It depends.”

Abraham may be the only challenger that has campaigned against cutting taxes, calling the council vote in 2010 to cut property taxes by a quarter of cent, “a jobs-killing tax cut.” He argues that the reduction had an insignificant impact on taxpayers, but stripped the city budget with the result that council cut funding to the Greensboro Partnership, which works to recruit new businesses to the city.

Only one candidate has expressed active interest in raising taxes.

“I don’t believe we can move Greensboro forward if we keep our taxes the way they are,” District 2 challenger C. Bradley Hunt II told an audience at the downtown public library for a forum hosted by the Greensboro Neighborhood Congress on Oct. 24. “I am a citizen and I believe that everyone wants to keep taxes low. It makes us all comfortable. But in order for us to spur economic development, in order for us to improve our infrastructure and to improve our services we must look for new ways to generate income for the city. So I believe we have to look at new ways that we may increase our tax rate so we can provide services for our citizens. So I think that in order to improve our services and infrastructure, in order to increase our police department, fire services, and also to give small business owners and minority business owners a chance to compete, we must look at ways to raise taxes.”

Incumbent Jim Kee was happy to take the opposing side on the issue.

“Certainly I would not advocate raising taxes,” he said. “Matter of fact, I voted to lower taxes. In this type of economy, citizens could not afford any increase in taxes. The way we can expand the revenue in Greensboro is to bring more businesses, to create more small businesses right here in our city. And that’s exactly what I have been doing.”

Kee, a developer, said he worked with Kotis Properties to open the H&F cafeteria at the corner of Church Street and Pisgah Church Road, creating 60 jobs. He said he has also worked with Kotis Properties to open Pace Medical at the intersection of East Cone Boulevard and Summit Avenue, which employs 30 people.

“That’s the way we keep taxes low and keep services great in Greensboro,” Kee said.

Zack Matheny, a registered Republican seeking reelection to the District 3 seat, told the audience at the Greater Greensboro Republican Women’s Club Forum that he would not vote to raise taxes. One day earlier he gave a somewhat more qualified answer to the Greensboro Neighborhood Congress.

“I don’t know, quite honestly, what’s going to happen with taxes,” he said. “My goal would be to not increase taxes. I’ve said that and we’ve been able to accomplish that by not increasing and actually have a very small, slight decrease for the city. One of our major issues is going to be real estate valuations in the next couple years.”

Historically, home values have appreciated over all, with the result that local governments can cut the tax rate and maintain neutral revenue. Real estate is revalued every eight years, and Guilford County is due for a revaluation next year. If, as expected, property values have depreciated overall because of the foreclosure and housing crisis, then local governments will have to choose between increasing the rate to maintain neutral revenue or cutting spending to compensate for reduced revenue at the current rate.

After the candidate forum Matheny said in an interview that his ultimate objective is to keep the tax bill flat, whatever that requires.

Jay Ovittore, who is challenging Matheny for the District 3 seat, stressed spending needs.

“I don’t want to make promises that I can’t keep, so I don’t want to say that I’m not going to vote to raise taxes, if necessary,” he said. “We need 200 more police officers on our police force. We need more fire people. We need our roads taken care of. We need to upgrade the Osborne water treatment plan so we can handle a capacity that’s almost near full at this point and continue to bring clean water to our communities. So that money’s going to come from somewhere. We can either get creative and do something about the landfill: Keep it closed, make it a regional solution, maybe own a regional solution, maybe cut off some of that as a portfolio, do some waste to energy. And if we spend the money on waste to energy now, that waste to energy is going to make us back millions more. And if I can keep your tax rate flat, I’ll do that. But I simply don’t know until I have the numbers in front of me.”

Mary Rakestraw, the conservative District 4 incumbent, has consistently pledged that she will not vote to raise taxes.

“With the present economy that we have we’ve got to be good stewards of your money and my money,” she said. “And I pay taxes, too. And this is a situation, y’all, that we cannot go the well but so many times. You have a budget in your own home. And you have to look at how you spend your money. And when you don’t have enough money, what do you do?... And, you know, I bet you even if you go home this coming week and you say, ‘What could I cut out that would not hurt my lifestyle, what would it be?’ Surely there is something. And we’re going to have to look at that as we go into the next two years. We have to be smart. We have to be prudent. And again, y’all, I cannot say this enough: We cannot tax ourselves out of this situation that we’re in at the present.”

Like Ovittore, District 4 challenger Nancy Hoffmann emphasized spending needs, prefacing her remarks by saying she is “committed to sound financial stewardship.”

“No one can predict the future,” she said. “So we really have to see what the situation is next year or the following year, but we know that we have possibly deferred some very important maintenance in this city. Those things catch up with you sometime down the road, and when they do the cost may be greater. We bear the cost of training the police staff and the fire staff in this city. And if we lose them a year or two years after we train them, then we have lost the cost of that investment in those people, and they’ve gone to High Point, or to Burlington, or Reidsville for another thousand dollars a year.”

Hoffmann said that a city, like any business, must “drill down” to see what spending items are “not absolutely essential” during difficult economic times, and have an honest conversation with citizens about what services they want to maintain, what they’re willing to give up, and what they’re willing to pay for.

Trudy Wade, the conservative incumbent in District 5, said she would not raise taxes.

“There’s two ways not to raise taxes,” she said. “And no, I wouldn’t raise taxes. Two ways to do that. Either you’re going to have to cut things or you’re going to have to bring in more jobs, more people, and increase your base of people paying in. There’s only two ways to do it. I think we’ve tried as a council to bring more jobs here. And I think we’ve done a pretty good job of that. For 12 of 16 years the unemployment rate’s been going up. This last year it’s started to go down again.”

In fact, data for the Greensboro-High Point metropolitan statistical area posted by the NC Employment Security Commission indicates that the unemployment rate increased in eight of the past 16 years. The rate has been declining over all over the past two years, but has remained at above 10 percent since 2009 after bouncing between 3 percent and 7 percent during the period from 1996 to 2008.

Wade credited the city council’s efforts to keep property taxes and water rates low with what progress has been seen in reducing the unemployment rate. During her remarks the councilwoman linked the tax rate to efforts to reopen the White Street Landfill, which she favors.

“If we were using our own landfill, we could save $8 million a year,” she said. “We won’t talk about the $30- or $40 million we’ve lost over the past four or five years.”

The $8 million figure tossed around by Wade, Thompson and The Rhinoceros Times is at odds with the $3.1 million per year in annual cost savings estimated by the city’s solid waste consultant for the plan to reopen the landfill that was adopted by the conservative faction. The difference can be chalked up to closure costs once the currently permitted portions of the landfill are depleted. Those who cite the $8 million figure argue that closure costs should not be included because the landfill would eventually have to be closed anyway. But under the current arrangement, the permitted portion of the landfill accepts a miniscule amount of screening, allowing it to remain open indefinitely.

Wade blamed a group of citizens who filed suit against the city to prevent the landfill from reopening with scuttling the city’s ability to pursue a regional approach, recycling, waste-to-energy technology, investments in infrastructure and cost savings.

“And we tried to take a regional approach,” she said. “And we tried to take the companies on the cutting edge of waste management and bring them into an RFP, and say, ‘What can you do for this community with technology, with recycling, and do a long-range plan for us.’ This is the first council that really stood back and said, ‘Let’s take a look at that.’ What can we do to cut this $8 million-a-year cost? And, of course, we ended up in a lawsuit, so all that technology, infrastructure, all that additional money we were going to have for the city, of course that won’t be the case now.”

Greensboro primary: District 4 analysis

Color code:

Hoffmann — blue
Rakestraw — red
Collins — purple

By Jordan Green and Eric Ginsburg

Challenger Nancy Hoffmann was the clear winner in early voting in the District 4 race, beginning the night with 50.7 percent, compared to 28.8 percent by incumbent Mary Rakestraw. But as more and more precincts came in on election night, Rakestraw crept to within 50 votes of Hoffmann.

This year’s election is shaping up as an extremely partisan contest although Greensboro City Council elections are nominally nonpartisan, with no indication of candidates’ party affiliation on the ballot. No contest is more partisan or evenly matched than District 4.

Hoffmann, a registered Democrat, performed most strongly in Precinct G48, which includes Lindley Park, a Democratic stronghold that Rakestraw attempted to eject from the district during a disastrous redistricting attempt. Hoffmann dominated a corridor between West Market Street and Spring Garden Street, including high-turnout G14, whose polling place is St. Andrews Episcopal Church. Hoffmann also enjoyed strong margins in a column of affluent, high-performing precincts west of Holden Road.

Rakestraw, a registered Republican, drew her largest pool of votes out of G32, whose polling place is located at Claxton Elementary School. Turnout in the Republican-leaning precinct slightly exceeded that in G14, and gave Rakestraw more than 10 percent of her total vote. Rakestraw also carried a number of Democratic-leaning precincts, including G50, a poorer, more racially diverse precinct with traditionally low turnout.

Tony Collins, another challenger, was eliminated in he primary, finishing a distant third. Collins carried only one precinct, G40A1, a Republican-leaning precinct near the intersection of New Garden Road and Bryan Boulevard. Collins enjoyed his strongest support in Republican-leaning precincts clustered in the northern tier that also delivered strong numbers for Rakestraw. A moderate Republican, Collins contrasted himself with Rakestraw more on tone than policy. While some of his supporters might switch to Hoffmann based on a desire for change or drop out, the numbers suggest they are Rakestraw’s to win over.

Campaign season underway in Greensboro municipal elections

Interactive Resource Center candidate forum, a set on Flickr.

Candidates for Greensboro City Council have been making the rounds to meet groups that make endorsements and lining up financial backing.

Now, the campaign is in full swing. District 4 candidate Nancy Hoffmann met voters at M'Coul's pub tonight. Candidates courting the east Greensboro vote such as mayoral hopeful Robbie Perkins are expected to appear at Presbyterian Church of the Cross on Phillips Avenue on Friday evening. On the same night, at-large candidate Wayne Abraham will be holding a fundraiser at Mack and Mack on South Elm Street, while fellow at-large candidate Yvonne Johnson will be holding a reception at House of Jazz on North Edgeworth Street.

District 2 candidate Jim Kee holds his campaign kickoff at the Nussbaum Center for Entrepreneurship on Saturday, while other candidates will be showing up at neighborhood festivals.

In one of the first public campaign events, the Interactive Resource Center held a lunchtime candidate forum on Tuesday. Candidates or their representatives sat at designated tables and shared lunch with homeless clients at the homeless day center. Afterwards, they stood up and make brief statements, and then answered questions.

The only incumbent who showed up was Mayor Pro Tem Nancy Vaughan, but she left without making remarks after she learned she was being served a lawsuit by a company that has been preselected to operate the White Street Landfill to try to prevent her from voting on the matter.

Candidates that participated in the candidate forum included at-large contenders Yvonne Johnson, Marikay Abuzuaiter, Cyndy Hayworth, Wayne Abraham and Jean Brown; District 4 candidate Nancy Hoffmann; and District 5 candidate Jorge Cornell.

Cornell embraced Abraham as candidates and clients were lining up to be served a meal.

"We need you," Cornell told Abraham, who served on the complaint review committee of the Greensboro Human Relations Commission when Cornell and other members of the Latin Kings filed complaints against the Greensboro Police Department.

Marikay Abuzuaiter: "You do not need to own a home for me to listen to you. If you are at the homeless shelter, I will listen to you. Yes, we need more homeless shelters. We need more jobs."

Wayne Abraham: "We need to create a buy-local campaign. We need to adopt a sustainability plan and restore funding for critical infrastructure."

Yvonne Johnson: "If you think the biggest need in the city of Greensboro is jobs, then I am your candidate."

Jean Brown: "I want to balance the budget. I want to stop excessive spending. Some of the laws are not necessary. I want to change some of these laws that are taking away our rights, like saying you can't park in your front yard. I've got a paved driveway, but not everybody is so fortunate."

Cyndy Hayworth said she has no hidden agendas; reported that she has recently been elected chair of the zoning commission and much of council's business involves land-use decisions; expressed the view that the city should be run like a business; and concluded, "at the end of the day, it's about you."

Nancy Hoffmann: “I’m running because I love the city. I’ve lived here by choice for 14 years. I want it to continue to be a very good city with a good quality of life for all of our citizens, and I feel that I have some background and experience that I could bring that could be helpful to create a new city council that could work together effectively.”

Jorge Cornell: "It's important that we take the money from these nice neighborhoods, nice districts, and take it back for the neighborhoods that need it....

"They call me the quote-unquote gang leader. I'm not a gang leader. I'm just a brother that's striving to improve my community."

Cornell told the audience that he is setting up a temporary labor agency, Community United Staffing, to put ex-felons to work. One client challenged him on whether the agency will be able to provide sustained employment.

"There's no guarantees," Cornell responded.

Candidates learned that Greensboro does not have an adequate number of beds to accommodate all the people who are homeless on any given night.

"My concern is the lack of beds for both men and women in Greensboro, but especially for women at different shelters," said James Reaves, a volunteer. "Every day, we send people from Greensboro to High Point, to Winston, as far away as Charlotte because we can't find a place for them. We are often asked, 'Why are you sending homeless to us? Why aren't you taking care of them yourself?"

A number of candidates responded.

"I did not know the discrepancy was so great in beds," Johnson said. "We have a lot of abandoned houses.... And if we were to give a tax break to those who own the houses, maybe we can use those for emergency shelter. I don't have all the answers. But I'm willing to sit down and try to find a solution."

Abraham concurred: "I agree we are going to have to work with the nonprofits in this city and pull them together.... I will certainly be willing to work on that kind of issue with you."

Hoffmann said, "It's not like we can do anything tomorrow, but you're looking at the candidate you can vote for in October and November that came to listen to you."

Candidate profile: Nancy Hoffmann

Nancy Hoffmann is treating her candidacy for the District 4 seat on Greensboro City Council as a full-time job. The 69-year-old businesswoman has been putting in 12-hour days, which she said are normal for her.

“I don’t need a lot of sleep,” she said during an interview this morning at Spring Garden Bakery and Coffeehouse, “and I have high energy all the time.”

She finished the previous day at about 10 p.m., having met with one set of voters in the afternoon, attended a dinner to honor fellow Greensboro Human Relations Commissioner Maxine Bakeman, and then met a second group of voters.

“I’m a busy and active person who is energized by relationships with people,” Hoffmann said. “That’s the best thing about campaigning. If I had known I liked this so much, I think maybe I would have come to it earlier in life. At the same time, maybe I wasn’t prepared before. When you come to a point in your life like this, you want to be as prepared as possible."

Hoffmann’s campaign slogan and signature image reflect a careful process of considering what kind of candidate she wanted and then translating it into a simple and effective marketing device. The slogan “Creating a city council worthy of its citizens” reflects her focus on drawing on the wisdom, energy and commitment of civil society.

The signature image — people of all ages, including a cyclist in open space with trees depicted in various shades of green — reflects a pluralistic and sustainable vision of community. As she pointed out, her motif is not traditional red, white and blue.

“There is a huge amount of energy in this city, a huge amount of creativity and a lot of smart people,” Hoffmann said. “If we can find a way to harness that energy and direct it, that’s what city council should do.”

She added, “I don’t feel that all knowledge and good ideas are vested in nine people on council so I want to be open to all good ideas, good initiatives and policy proposals. Those can and should come from the people. Elections are always about the future, so I want to hear from the young people. I want to be looking out 10 years to set strategy for the city. I don’t think there’s been any of that for the past two years.”

Hoffmann was recently elected chair of the human relations commission, a position she would have to give up should she be elected to represent District 4 on the city council. Her opponent in the chair election was Marikay Abuzuaiter, a fellow commissioner who is also running for city council but at-large.

“We have big issues that divide us sometimes, but I feel that we have many more commonalities that unite us,” Hoffmann said after assuming the chairmanship from her predecessor earlier this month. “And with that focus, I think we can continue to be strong advocates and to do the work of the commission for this community.”

The tumultuous course taken by the human relations commission to prepare and read a resolution to the city council opposing the reopening of the White Street Landfill has somewhat mirrored the chaos surrounding council’s deliberations on the issue. As a body, the commission has found itself strained by accusations of exclusion among members and barely veiled allegations of political pressure from staff and council members to derail the resolution.

“When I became chair, I made the comment that this commission is just as diverse as the city is,” Hoffmann said. “We got a very strong resolution that was supported by everyone on the commission. That’s a good example of what it takes to reach some consensus on a thorny issue. It’s like the old adage: You might like to eat the sausage, but you don’t necessarily want to see how the sausage is made.”

The commission recommended in its resolution that the city not reopen the White Street Landfill based on inconclusive evidence on whether landfill has caused health problems to neighboring residents and widespread perceptions of racial injustice related to the move.

Hoffmann said in her response to a YES! Weekly election questionnaire that the “municipal solid waste issue has been handled poorly and clumsily,” adding that she favors “a regional approach for the long term” that would “ensure that northeast Greensboro remains available over the next two decades for residential and business expansion and development.” Her response stopped short of saying that she would be opposed to reopening the landfill, even as a temporary measure until a more long-term solution is viable.

Notwithstanding the nuance of Hoffmann’s position, her candidacy has generated significant interest in a district where at least some voters appear to be restless.

Incumbent Mary Rakestraw, part of the conservative faction intent on reopening the landfill, narrowly beat out a more progressive candidate two years ago. Rakestraw antagonized some constituents earlier this year by submitting and a redistricting map that ejected part of the politically active Lindley Park neighborhood, which supported her opponent in the last election. The council rescinded the decision following a public outcry.

Rakestraw and three other council members have also been criticized for appearing unresponsive to citizens’ pleas to keep the landfill closed and for not explaining their adequately decision.

Pledges on Hoffmann’s campaign website to listen to all people, return citizens’ voice to council discussions, explain the rationale for her positions and votes, be accountable and operate independent of faction seem calculated to present a contrast to Rakestraw.

Tony Collins, a general contractor who formerly served on the city’s zoning commission, is also a candidate in the District 4 race.

In her role as a member of the human relations commission, Hoffmann chairs the complaint review committee, which hears complaints about the police department and fair housing. That role gives her a rare vantage point on interactions between citizens and police officers.

Along with Human Relations Director Anthony Wade, Hoffmann met with an executive recruiter hired to undertake the city’s search for a new police chief last year. And Hoffmann and Wade were part of a panel that interviewed the two finalists before City Manager Rashad Young hired Ken Miller for the job. Notwithstanding her familiarity with the police department, Hoffmann indicated she respects a separation between the roles of council and staff.

“It is not my role a private citizen, a commissioner or a council member to try to micromanage the police department,” she said. “We brought Chief Miller here to be a change agent. People are resistant to change…. I’m confident in him to work through [the] issues.

“It’s handled organizationally through the organization,” she added. “If there’s some problem, then it’s the role of the city manager through the department heads to address it. It’s a matter of the org chart.”

Hoffmann indicated that beyond the landfill controversy, she would like to focus on sustainability, economic development and quality of life.

She said she hears from residents “things like we really want to provide opportunities in the future to reduce travel by automobile so people can walk or use an Italian motor scooter and revitalize some of these inner-city neighborhoods so that they’re thriving places like Lindley Park and Sunset Hills.”

Like everyone, Hoffman would like to see the city attract more high-quality employers like HondaJet. Building on Greensboro’s enviable quality of life and promoting diversity is the way to do it, she suggested.

“My gosh, we’ve got a rich history,” she said. “We’ve got diversity and quality of life. There are very different people who come her to be successful. We’ve got seven major institutions of higher education. I will take Greensboro any day over Raleigh and Charlotte. We have all the amenities of a very good city in terms of music and theater.

“I’ve lived in San Francisco, New York and Los Angeles,” the candidate added. “I know what great cities are. We have that on a small scale. I met a couple when I was canvassing a couple weeks ago who moved here from Manhattan. They love it here.”

Hoffmann argued that the turmoil on council is a hindrance to corporate recruitment.

“The first thing businesses always look at — of course, they’re going to do their due diligence — is the schools. Then they’ll look at infrastructure. It becomes a problem if they look at city council and it seems to be dysfunctional. I think we need to fix that so it’s not a negative and it becomes a positive.”

Landfill fight estranges human relations commission from council

Alum Maxine Bakeman welcomed fellow commissioners, including Nancy Hoffmann, Abdel Nuriddin and Marikay Abuzuaiter, to Bennett College.

UPDATE: Assistant City Manager Denise Turner Roth said the human relations department sent out a press release in July stating that the Aug. 3 meeting would be held at city council chambers at 11:45 a.m., adding that the department did not send out a second press release noting that the meeting time and location had been changed to 5:30 p.m. at Bennett College. She said in the past the city's practice has been to have each department independently publicize its committee meetings, but going forward all department press releases will go through the city's public affairs department and be sent to its global distribution list to maintain consistency.

Roth acknowledged that the error defeated the purpose of trying to encourage public attendance at the commission meetings.

"What I am concerned about is a perception, if there is one, that there was an effort to suppress information about the meeting," she said. "That's not the case."

ORIGINAL POST: Giving his final remarks as chair, Abdel Nuriddin told fellow members of the Greensboro Human Relations Commission tonight: “This body has become a very, very dynamic instrument.”

Several members have worked anxiously behind the scenes to ensure that a resolution opposing the reopening of the White Street Landfill was read aloud before city council.

That moment came last month just before a rump majority voted to reopen a limited section of the landfill following a court ruling that the city cannot negotiate a contract for un-permitted sections of the landfill without first holding a public hearing, researching the demographics of nearby residents and considering alternatives.

The task of reading the resolution, three pages in length fell to Nuriddin, as chair.

Mayor Bill Knight told Nuriddin he had three minutes to speak. Midway through the reading of the resolution, Knight told Nuriddin his time was almost up. Human Relations Commissioner Michael Roberto stood up in the meeting and protested: “This is a human relations report.” The chair also looked upset, and the mayor indicated that he could continue.

The 15 members of the commission are appointed by members of city council. Established in 1961 in response to demands by black citizens for equal treatment, the commission’s duties are outlined in the city’s code of ordinances.

The first three duties would seem to be directly relevant to the landfill controversy: “To study and make recommendations concerning problems n any or all fields of human relationship and encourage fair treatment and mutual understanding among all racial and ethnic groups in the city… To anticipate and discover those practices and customs most likely to create animosity and unrest among racial and ethnic groups and by consultation seek a solution as these problems arise or are anticipated… To make recommendations to the city council designed to promote goodwill and harmony among racial and ethnic groups in the city.”

It was unclear at the time why the resolution had not been given its own place on the agenda. Commission members who were anxious to avoid jeopardizing the resolution declined to explain even on background why it didn’t make the agenda.

The mayor interrupted again and asked Nuriddin how much longer the resolution would take.

“The Commission on Human Relations for the city of Greensboro, based on inconclusive health information related to the White Street Landfill, and based on health concerns and fears among residents living near the landfill, and based on shared perceptions about racial injustice by residents surrounding the landfill as well as other residents throughout the city, recommends that city council not reopen the White Street Landfill until there is further study to determine conclusively the health impact on its residents,” Nuriddin told the council.

“We believe that the impact of this decision is citywide and that disregard for he health and well-being of one neighborhood or community in our city weakens our entire city body,” Nuriddin concluded. “We are only as healthy, strong and united in a common purpose to make Greensboro the best that it can be as the aggregate of our individual neighborhoods.”

The gallery rang with applause, and but reaction from the dais was muted.

Then the mayor broke the silence.

“That’s about 12 minutes, I believe,” he said.

District 2 Councilman Jim Kee commended the commission for tackling some difficult issues. He is the city council liaison to the human relations commission, and also happens to represent the district that includes the landfill.

“I asked the mayor to put you guys on the agenda,” Kee said. “The mayor refused.”

Commissioner Maxine Bakeman noted that members of council had been given copies of the resolution before it was read, reasoning that it should not have come as a surprise to the mayor.

“In no way was the commission there to disrupt that meeting,” Roberto said.

The commission is tasked by the council with addressing some of the stickiest of racial issues in a city that is notoriously divided along racial lines. Some might prefer that the commission conduct its studies and then let matters die in quiet obscurity, and the messages brought back to council by the citizen body have not always been embraced.

“This is not the first controversial issue taken up by the commission,” Human Relations Director Anthony Wade said. “Two years ago, you took up the Klan-Nazi killings. The city council signed off on a statement of regret for those killings. The following year, your complaint review committee expanded. This latest stand by this commission is part of a history.”

One hurdle in getting the resolution passed and read cropped up when Wade cautioned the commission during a meeting in May to proceed carefully because he had been handed a memo from the city attorney’s office only an hour earlier. He told the commissioners he did not have a copy of the memo with him and asked them to come by his office to review it in person because he did not feel comfortable releasing it without express permission from the city attorney.

The memo, written by Associate General Counsel Jamiah Waterman, was released within 24 hours. It said that human relations commission did not have the authority to investigate the city over its handling of the landfill, but did not address whether the commission was within its rights to make recommendations.

“That was a rather confusing statement, I believe,” Commissioner Marikay Abuzuaiter said in an interview [today]. “I brought up the fact that if there was a legal memo that would affect our running the meeting that we should have prior knowledge of it. I got the memo and read it as saying the human relations commission could not investigate or make a complaint against the city. I understand that…. There is nothing in there that says you cannot make a resolution and bring it before the council.

“It may have been sent to Dr. Wade at 4 p.m.,” she added. “I didn’t feel that we should stop the meeting because of it.”

While the tension between the council and the human relations commission is not new, the relationship appears to have become increasingly rocky over the past two years, as commissioners appointed by the previous council continued to serve and the new council charted a more conservative course.

Commissioner Marikay Abuzuaiter nearly lost her seat a year ago.

She said she received a letter from the mayor indicating she was no longer on the commission at the time. She requested a meeting with him, and she recounted that the mayor said he had been told that she had resigned. Abuzuaiter and Roberto went to council in July 2010 to lobby for her continued service on the commission. At the end of the meeting, at-large Councilman Robbie Perkins reappointed her. Councilwoman Mary Rakestraw, who had appointed someone to fill the seat the previous month, complained about meeting procedures that night.

Rakestraw, who favors reopening the landfill, and Abuzuaiter are onetime political competitors. Rakestraw edged out Abuzuaiter by only 623 votes to secure one of the three at-large seats on council in the 2007 municipal election. Two years ago, Rakestraw opted to run in District 4 instead.

The commission remains fertile ground for political aspirations. Abuzuaiter is making her third bid for an at-large seat this year. Nancy Hoffmann, who was seated as the commission’s new chair tonight is one of two challengers vying for Rakestraw’s seat representing District 4. And Wayne Abraham, a former commission chair, is running at large.

Hoffmann’s campaign theme plays on a sense that the current majority on council has fallen short on inclusion and sensitivity. Her website declares, “I will respect the citizens and return their voice to council discussions.”

Abraham has spoken out against the landfill on a number of occasions, and his website plainly states his position in an issues bullet: “Dump the White Street dump.”

Meanwhile, members of the human relations commission have struggled to make their work more relevant and accessible to citizens, but the board remains a somewhat obscure outpost in Greensboro’s civic scene.

Tonight’s meeting was held at the Global Learning Center on the campus of Bennett College as part of the commission’s effort to bring its meeting out into the community. It took place at 5:30 p.m. instead of the normal time of 11:45 a.m. so that people would have an opportunity to attend after work. Wade said staff intended that the meeting be publicized by the city.

Yet no press release was sent out by the city’s public affairs office or posted on the city’s website. The audience for the meeting consisted of Kee, former Councilwoman Goldie Wells, two other residents and a reporter.

“One thing we were striving to do is have meetings out in the community,” Abuzuaiter said. “It seems like every step of the way it’s been difficult. It’s been frustrating that sometimes the information doesn’t get out in a timely manner. I believe more citizens would come if they knew about it.”