Julie Lapham, activist and meditation leader — 1944-2013

Julie Lapham

She managed political campaigns, taught English to refugees, worked to bridge cultural divides, served on boards, consulted with nonprofits, led meditation groups and otherwise touched hundreds of lives, but when her time came, Julie Lapham wanted to go quietly without public recognition or accolades.

The Greensboro community leader, who managed Yvonne Johnson’s successful campaign for mayor in 2007, took her own life on Dec. 11 while visiting in Virginia. She was 69.

“She was so dedicated to a number of causes in the area and basically watching out for those who were downtrodden and didn’t have a voice,” said the Rev. Julie Peeples, the senior pastor at Congregational United Church of Christ in Greensboro. “She was very serious about being a mentor to younger women. She was passionate. She was a fighter. I just always knew that at certain causes and certain efforts I would see Julie there. She had a really deep sense of justice and watching out for the rights of everyone.”

As news of Lapham’s death trickled onto Facebook last week, civic leaders, friends and other acquaintances reacted with stunned disbelief, trying to make sense of her passing and to figure out the best way to honor her legacy.  

“It was an absolute shock to me, and I deal with it the best I can,” Mayor Pro Tem Yvonne Johnson said today. “We’re going to bury her on Saturday, and I’m going to go to Virginia to do that.”

Lynne Robinson, the executor of Lapham’s estate, said her friend left a note that said, “I do not want a ceremony whereby I am remembered nor do I want to be pressed into a box with a marker. Let me be free to fly and swim in rivers.”

Lapham was born and raised in England, and emigrated to the United States to work in polymer chemistry, according to a biography posted by the UNCG Center for New North Carolinians, where she was recently employed. But a severe industrial accident halted a promising career in chemistry, and sent Lapham on an altogether different path. The experience led to a lifelong study of consciousness states and a life devoted to social justice causes to empower women, immigrants and other groups.

“She already knew about death and dying, and I think that she had planned to do this for years, and it was time,” Robinson said. “She was determined that she wouldn’t be a burden to anyone and that ‘when the time comes I’m going to know.’ When you listen to that, you slough that off. I will never, ever slough that off again. It’s important that we need to sit down and think about what that means. Not you’re going to change their mind.”

Lapham had been planning to have her hip replaced at the time of her death

Lamar Gibson, a fundraiser for the Renaissance Community Co-op, said when he saw Lapham recently at a community meeting at Holy Trinity Episcopal Church she was experiencing a lot of physical pain, but was in good spirits.

“Julie, she will usually say a joke about something crappy happening and say, ‘I’m all right,’” Gibson recalled. “This was, ‘I’m in a lot of physical pain.’ She did describe the drama and the messiness around waiting for a specialist to do the surgery and there were only two in the state, so there was logistics of whether she would go to Charlotte or some place else.”

Raleigh Bailey, director emeritus at the UNCG Center for New North Carolinians, said Lapham had recently been working in an English-language program for newly arrived refugees as an AmeriCorps member.

“She was very concerned about he refugee population and how they adapted once they got here,” Johnson said.

About two years ago, Bailey said, Lapham served with the UNCG Women’s Health and Wellness Center through her AmeriCorps position. Susan Danielsen, spokesperson for the Greensboro Police Department, said Lapham worked with the department on its child response and violence against women initiatives.

Lapham abandoned her chemistry career in 1979, after her accident, and went to Washington, DC to work on the Equal Rights Amendment campaign. She later served as executive director of Common Cause Virginia, where she advocated for tougher state laws to regulate campaign finance, and earned a doctorate degree from Union Institute in Cincinnati, Ohio.

Johnson recalled that she met Lapham before running for mayor in 2007.  

“She came to my office and introduced herself, and said she had heard a lot of things about me and wanted to help me,” Johnson said. “She had been involved in campaigns in Richmond, [Va.] and other places. She had worked with the National Organization of Women. She was an organizer.”

Lapham became Johnson’s campaign manager.

“She was very good at that,” Johnson said. “She was able to analyze, for example, where I got the most votes, and where I didn’t get so many votes. And then she would come up with a strategy for improving that.”

Johnson won the election, and became Greensboro’s first African-American mayor.

Two years later, in 2009, Lapham traded her behind-the-scenes role for the spotlight as an at-large candidate for Greensboro City Council. She said in an e-mail to an anti-racist working group that she perceived a local echo of racially-tinged attacks on President Obama in criticism of Johnson, and said for that reason she had “decided to step up and become a candidate for city council.”

“We have to know where to go to listen to people,” Lapham said in a 2009 candidate forum. “That’s not easy in this town. This town has got a lot of little bubbles all over the place…. Listening is an absolutely crucial piece for what happens on city council. Otherwise we would have done it all by now. Basically, we don’t like change. We like to talk about it, but it’s mighty hard to adapt to. We’re in a world today where we need to adapt to change.”

Both Lapham and Johnson lost their elections that year, but Lapham helped Johnson regain a seat on city council in 2011 and 2013.

Johnson appointed Lapham to serve on the Greensboro Commission on the Status of Women.

Friends remember Lapham as determined, smart and outspoken.

“She had a way of saying the thing that people needed to hear,” Gibson said. “Sometimes it was tough things that needed to be heard. If she disagreed with you and she was your friend, she would let you know. Julie wasn’t born in the South and into our Southern system of manners and politeness and I don’t feel like she ever showed up to anything that I was at that she felt like she had to show this façade.”

Parallel to her involvement in civic affairs, Lapham also emerged as a peer leader in more spiritual pursuits.

“She helped a tremendous amount of people with her meditation workshops,” Robinson said. “It changed me completely.

“What a leader: If I ever had a problem I would call her and she would talk me through it,” Robinson continued. “She was my psychologist, my mother, you know, she was my go-to. She was my voice in my head. But she always kept you at arm’s length. That’s why she was so effective.”

Lapham’s many friends in various arenas are coming to terms with her loss in different ways.

“A lot of people are struggling with — ‘What could I do?’” Gibson said. “From talking with each other and sharing our memories of her together, that will at least help us through it. It’s hard not to do that when someone close to you takes their own life. I’ve dealt with this before when I was much younger. There’s that thing of, ‘Why didn’t they reach out to me?’ I think the only way we can increase the chances of people reaching out to us is reaching out to other people more.

“We internalize a lot of the suffering,” he continued. “We really don’t want to burden people with our pain and suffering. The other side of that is, can I trust you with my pain and suffering? Can I trust the community to help me get through it? So I think every chance we get, we should reach out to each other.”

Robinson said she doubts anyone could have talked Lapham out of her plan.

“She was of sound mind and was a determined person,” she said.

Robinson will remember her friend by a passage for the Tao Te Ching, which Lapham taught: “Thus the master is available to all people and doesn’t reject anyone. He is ready to use all situations and doesn’t waste anything. What is a good man but a bad man’s teacher? What is a bad man but a good man’s job? If you don’t understand this you will get lost, however intelligent you are. It is a great secret.”

Robinson said that one of Lapham’s meditation groups will continue at Presbyterian Church of the Covenant in Greensboro. The group meets every Monday from 6 to 8 p.m.

Bailey said Lapham’s AmeriCorps friends will honor her in a small, private gathering in January. He added that a larger, public event might be organized through UNCG at a later date.

Lapham will be buried in Virginia on Saturday, according to her wishes, wrapped in a shroud and placed in a shallow grave on a hillside so that her remains will go back to the earth. A handful of friends will be there.

Julie Lapham didn’t want a ceremony.

Donations in memoriam to Julie Lapham can be sent by check to the Women to Women endowment, c/o Community Foundation of Greater Greensboro, 330 S. Greene St., Greensboro, NC 27401.

Julie Lapham transcript

The following is a transcript of Greensboro City Council at-large candidate Julie Lapham’s answers at a Guilford County Unity Effort forum on Sept. 22:

Introductory statement
Good evening, everyone. I’d like to take a couple seconds just to thank Sharon Hightower, Ralph Johnson and the gang for putting these forums on. This is a great thing. And I’d like to thank all of you, who came out here in the rain and attended. Because ultimately all of us tonight, including the mayor’s race, you’re going to choose three at-large members and one district rep. We’re here to represent you, the people, not us. So we have to be good listeners. We have to know where to go to listen to people. That’s not easy in this town. This town has got lots of little bubbles all over the place. There’s lots of little — professional folks, business folks, all over. Listening is an absolutely crucial piece for what happens on city council. Otherwise we would have done it all by now. Basically, we don’t like change. We talk about it, but it’s mighty hard to adapt to. We’re in a world today where we need to adapt to change.

If elected, what would you do to ensure that there is balanced economic growth and development across the various segments of the city?
If elected, I would simply pledge to you that I would do just that. The question, then, becomes how do we do that? And the how part has to do with whether there are economic development opportunities presenting themselves. It has to do with asking the people who live in the 1st, 2nd districts what exactly it is that they want, and listening to them instead of telling them what they need, which I think is a kind of unique and different way of looking at things. But basically, economic development is going to be required in this area, in this region, across the region. We have lost thousands of jobs. This recession is not going to come back quickly. We’re going to be looking at three, four, five, six years of step-by-step process to do some really smart thinking and smart, responsible growth.

Members of the sitting council have recently clashed over the proper relationship between the council and the city manager. What, in your view, is the proper role of each of these important entities?
Greensboro, along with many, many other cities, not only in North Carolina, but across the country of this size — 250,000-350,000 people — generally has a manager-city council form of government. I believe the transition number is somewhere around three-quarters of a million when a mayor becomes full time, and that changes the entire structure. But at the moment we have a city manager as being the individual who responds to city council, and listens to the policy, and gets the things done. I think if we did things that way we might be better off today. Micro-managing is not something that I believe city council should be tinkering with. It’s in opposition to the policymaking body that they are designed to be part of. I think that’s added to our friction over the last couple of years, not made it go away too quickly.

Would you vote the way your constituents want you to or would you vote your conscience?
My hope would be that the two would be in one accord, but I’m sure there will be examples when they wouldn’t be in one accord. As a city council representative, that’s exactly what I believe I am — a representative. I represent the people, and that’s all the people of Greensboro. And so it requires me to, number one, listen to the people of Greensboro to find out precisely what they want on any particular issue, but then to carry that into the city council and into the voting process.

Do you feel the city should have a public campaign fund so that candidates who are less wealthy and less well connected can still afford to consider public service?
The short answer to that question is, yes. The long answer is, that’s not all we need to do to level the playing field. When you talk about leveling the playing field, it’s not all about money. It’s also about endorsements. It’s also about groups. It’s also about who you know. It’s how you know. It’s how to get the trainings, how to get good leaders and expose them to all the elements that are required to move up the ladder into becoming maybe a board member at the beginning, go through the [City] Academy, as Marikay Abuzuaiter mentioned. But there are many things to do to get, quote, political training to come into city council. We need to look at a broad brush stroke of what citizens need to get themselves ready for city council. Money’s not the only piece, but it certainly goes a long way towards it.

The complaint review committee investigates complaints against police officers. Would you be in favor of giving this citizen panel subpoena authority to interview witnesses? Why or why not?
Yes. There’s absolutely no reason to have a citizen review board without having subpoena power, period.

Would you be in favor of reopening the White Street Landfill to household waste?
The short answer to the question is, no, I would not vote to reopen the White Street Landfill. It amazes me how quickly issues get developed and why. I think that’s the bigger question. Where do these questions come from, who says them and why, and what’s the timing about. It seems to be more political mumbo-jumbo than anything else. I think it’s atrocious to upset the group of people deliberately and intentionally. You can tell I’m getting excited about this. I don’t like it. It’s not necessary. But let me say something else about White Street. Because I think greening technology has gotten us to a point where we can look at some alternatives in terms of how to deal with trash. Production of methane and bio-fuels are being explored by lots and lots of other cities around the country. And I think we need to do that. Whether we need to have a trash entity in White Street or whether we need to move something out, say, near the airport. How’s that? Start a campaign to move it out near the airport. Move it someplace else. And let’s see what happens in terms of discussion. But basically, there are many, many opportunities that we can enact to not only get rid of that trash, and maybe convert it into a park, but also it might be a cost-saving feature as well.

Closing statement
I’d like to thank you all for staying with us all evening. And I’d like to say that there’s a report that was issued from a company called Discovery Learning. They’re actually from Greensboro. And what they said in that report was that the top 10 in-demand jobs were not on the drawing board five years ago. That’s how fast we’re changing. Think about that. The top 10 in-demand jobs — that’s in nanotechnology, community health, logistics and transportation — were not even thought of five years ago because our world is changing so fast. We’re not even ready for what’s coming next year, or the year after, or five years from now. And change is something that’s very difficult for us to handle; we like things the way they were. But we kind of have to accommodate both ends. We’ve got to deal with the change. We’ve got to look for our future. I hope you’ll vote for me.

Vaughan leads money race for Greensboro council

Greensboro City Council at-large candidate Nancy Vaughan leads the money race with $9,710 in cash on hand, according to 2009 mid-year campaign finance reports filed with the Guilford County Board of Elections. Vaughan, who previously served on the council between 1997 and 2001, has so far raised 10 times more than any other candidate.

Since opening her campaign committee in late April, Vaughan has raised $10,971 from an array of contributors, including former mayors Jim Melvin and Carolyn Allen, protest petition activist Keith Brown, former Councilman Tom Phillips, civic volunteer Betty Cone and Cemala Foundation Executive Director Susan Schwartz.

Other at-large candidates with campaign cash going into the primary election include, in order of their balance, Marikay Abuzuaiter ($1,738), incumbent Robbie Perkins ($1,419), Ryan Shell ($928), Julie Lapham ($695) and DJ Hardy ($45).

Only one District 1 candidate reports cash on hand: Daron R. Sellars, with $8.

District 3 candidates with cash on hand are incumbent Zack Matheny, with $385, and challenger George Hartzman, with $100.

District 4 candidate Mary Rakestraw reports $1,331 in cash on hand.

District 5 incumbent Trudy Wade reports $4,555 in cash on hand, compared to challenger Art Boyett, with $432.

After Vaughan, Shell has raised the most money, with $1,015 garnered from an array of sources. Other at-large candidates, listed in order of their receipt totals include Lapham ($695) and Hardy ($180).

In the district races, Boyett has contributed $552 to his campaign. Rakestraw has raised $100. Hartzman has contributed $100 to his campaign.
Sellars has loaned his campaign $38.

Vaughan also leads campaign spending, having plunked down almost two grand to cover the cost of invitations, food, music and bartending for her campaign kickoff. Rakestraw has spent $313, mainly on printing letterhead and buying stamps. Hardy has spent $135 on paper, envelopes and photography. Shell has spent $110 on online media services. Boyett has spent $52 on a post office box and stamps. Sellars has spent $30 on his filing fee and a checking account. And Abuzuaiter has spent $25 on a domain registration fee.

Greensboro campaign finance

Some early campaign finance information from organizational reports received by the Guilford County Board of Elections from April through July:

In the at-large race, DJ Hardy has received $180 in contributions from unidentified individuals, Julie Lapham has raised $695 from contributors hailing from locales ranging from Loughton, England to Apex, NC, and Nancy Vaughan has contributed $500 to her campaign. Ryan Shell's most recent campaign report, filed in January, reflects that the candidate had $20 in cash on hand. Incumbent Robbie Perkins reported $1,419 in cash on hand in his most recent report, filed in January.

District 1 candidate Daron R. Sellars has contributed $38 to his campaign.

District 3 candidate George Hartzman has contributed $100 to his campaign. Incumbent Zack Matheny reported $385 in cash on hand in his most recent report, filed in January. Matheny topped district candidates in the last election with total receipts for the election cycle of $46,358.

District 5 candidate Art Boyett has contributed $552 to his campaign. Incumbent Trudy Wade reported $4,555 in cash on hand in her most recent report, filed in January.

Meanwhile, a new industry political action committee has organized. The Greensboro Landlords Association Political Action Committee reports a $100 contribution from Sandy Sandler of Sandler Properties.

Julie Lapham files for Greensboro council race

Julie Lapham has made it official as a candidate for an at-large seat on Greensboro City Council.

Abuzuaiter, Landau, Hayworth, Jobe in city council race

Joel Landau confirms that he plans to run in District 4. Mike Barber says he currently plans to run for reelection in District 4, but doesn't rule out a bid for mayor. Teresa Jobe confirms that she plans to run for council, but hasn't decided whether to run at large or for the District 4 seat. Cyndy Hayworth plans to challenge Zack Matheny in District 3. Marikay Abuzuaiter plans to run for an at-large seat. Julie Lapham is considering running at-large.

Full story here:

Sandra Anderson Groat, Greensboro’s mayor pro tem, observed that many of her colleagues seem to be running for reelection, even though filing doesn’t take place until July 3 and the municipal primary won’t happen for another nine months.

Preoccupied with settling affairs for her failed homebuilding business, Groat said jockeying for November was far from her highest priority.

“If I don’t feel like I can make a difference, I don’t need to be up there,” she said. “It’s the second year of the term. I’m supposed to be doing the job I was elected to do, not running for reelection.”

As Groat expresses circumspection, other council members are openly declaring their campaign plans and a host of insurgents convinced that something has gone significantly wrong with city council stand poised to enter the fray. Some of the loudest complaints are lobbed at the council’s fractious conduct and its perceived deference to real-estate and development interests.

“I know my phone rings off the hook because I was Yvonne’s campaign manager, with people saying, ‘What on earth is going on with city council? They’re like a bunch of kitty cats playing in the sandbox,’” said Julie Lapham, a health researcher who managed Yvonne Johnson’s successful 2007 bid for mayor.

She sat in a Jan. 21 city council meeting, shaking her head at a decision to table a rezoning request for a self-storage facility. Her disgust only rose when the council deliberated at length over a decision to restore the protest petition to Greensboro.

“Why on earth do we have to wait thirty years for this?” she asked. “This should be a no-brainer.”

Lapham said she is considering a run for one of the council’s three at-large seats. Lapham currently serves on the Greensboro Commission on the Status of Women.

One person with definite plans to vie for one of the three at-large seats is Marikay Abuzuaiter, who was edged out in the 2007 general election by Mary Rakestraw by 623 votes.

“What I would like to see on council is more professional demeanor,” she said.

The sitting mayor announced plans to seek reelection at a press conference on Jan. 13. Three days later, District 4 District 4 Councilman Mike Barber led his own press conference, feeding speculation that he would challenge Johnson for the seat.

Reached by phone on Jan. 23, Barber said he is currently running for reelection in District 4, but had not ruled out a run for mayor.

“Since I live in my wife’s dictatorship, she will decide sometime in March,” he said. “I’m honored and humbled that people have shown interest in my candidacy. Years down the line, I will be proud to tell my children that people considered me worthy of the office.”

One sitting council member has announced her retirement. District 2 Councilwoman Goldie Wells said she will not seek reelection in November. So far one person — Ray Trapp, interim executive director of the Triad Apartment Association — has announced plans to run for the seat. Trapp was in the audience on Jan. 21 when Wells led the charge on a vote that saw council request the restoration of the protest petition. Trapp did not speak on the issue. Instead, Triad Real Estate and Building Industries Coalition President Marlene Sanford spoke on the apartment association’s behalf, arguing in favor of maintaining the city’s exclusion from the protest petition.

District 3 Councilman Zack Matheny, a one-term representative, has said he plans to run for reelection. Cyndy Hayworth, who ran in 2007, told YES! Weekly she plans to challenge Matheny for his seat this year.

Hayworth is the president of Junior Achievement of Central North Carolina, and serves on the Greensboro Zoning Commission. Matheny and Hayworth served together on the commission until Matheny was elected to city council. Hayworth has developed a reputation for taking a tougher line against developers than her rival.

Teresa Jobe, a self-described “stay-at-home mom” who serves on the Greensboro Commission on the Status of Women with Lapham, confirmed recently that she plans to run for council, but said she had not decided whether to run at large or in District 4.

Jobe applauded Barber’s press conference, but said, “I don’t think that because of where they are and how long they’ve been on council, they’re able to come up with fresh ideas, and we need more youth and more ordinary people on the council.

In a Dec. 8 post on her Teresa Talks blog, Jobe took a critical stand against the council’s decision in favor of rezoning land for Kotis Properties at the intersection of Spring Garden Street and Holden Road, allowing the developer to put in a Dunkin Donuts store. Although Barber cast the lone vote against the rezoning, Jobe faulted him for not effectively advocating for his constituents interests.

“Mike Barber did not address the council in opposition to the zone change,” she wrote. “He did not go to bat for the people in his district. Mr. Barber’s vote was merely a political move, designed as a half-hearted pitch to his constituents.”

The protest petition represents another arena in which Jobe suggested the sitting council is motivated more by political calculation than principle.

“The ones who are against it know that if they didn’t vote for the protest petition, they would get voted out of office next time,” she said. “I think that was purely political — especially Robbie Perkins.”

The District 4 contest is shaping up as a crowded field.

Joel Landau, co-chair of the Greensboro Sustainability Commission and a progressive standard-bearer in municipal politics, confirmed Sunday that he plans to seek the District 4 seat. Landau was eliminated in the primary in 2007, but redistricting the following year moved him from District 5 to District 4. He said he enjoys a strong base of support and good name recognition in the district, and would offer voters a meaningful alternative from Barber.

“I’m more working with people and working together to find solutions, where he throws stuff out there on his own and let’s everybody deal with it,” Landau said. “Also, I’m more attuned to neighborhood groups and their concerns. Mike’s more aligned with the developers.”