From the blog of Don Frantz, member of Cary Town Council representing District B.
Cary, NC – The council held a worksession this past Tuesday to discuss the downtown park and Academy Street improvements.
I am pleased to report that a majority of council endorsed much of the 2009 plan as shown below. Read more
Story from the blog of Lori Bush, At-Large member of Cary Town Council. Photo by Todd Klassy.
Cary, NC – I love technology. I do. That’s why I was so disappointed that none of the recommendations of the Technology Task Force were included in the 2014 Town of Cary Budget. Read more
Cary, NC – Code for America (CfA) started in 2009. It’s a non-profit, non-partisan organization that brings together programmers, designers, data analysts and other web-industry professionals to work with municipalities to promote openness, participation and efficiency in local government. Now, Cary has it’s own Code for America Brigade. Read more
From the blog of Don Frantz, member of Cary Town Council representing District B. Photo by Hal Goodtree.
Imagine Cary – or imagine what Cary could become if we let the new-urbanists ruin it. That was my take from the Summit on the Future event held at Embassy Suites. Read more
From the blog of Cary Mayor Harold Weinbrecht.
Cary, NC – This week was another busy week for me. This is the toughest time of year for me with event upon event combined with preliminary budget meetings and regularly scheduled council meetings. Read more
Story and photos by Lindsey Chester.
Cary, NC – Nearly 700 people filled the Embassy Suites grand ballroom at Cary’s “Summit on the Future” Thursday night (May 2)- the largest gathering of its kind ever to take place in Cary’s history. Read more
Story and picture from Cary Mayor Harold Weinbrecht.
Cary, NC – This week was full of events and speaking engagements. A busy week with speaking engagements is tough for me since the talks require figuring out what to say and in some cases practicing.
Monday the town staff received a call from the White House staff asking me to participate in a mayors’ teleconference. While these requests are not unusual, they usually come by email only. So to get a call was different.
Usually these calls are advocating for a federal issue and asking for support from the mayors. This was no different. It announced the nomination of Charlotte Mayor Foxx for the Transportation Secretary and asked mayors to contact Congressional leaders.
Hosting the call included Director of Intergovernmental Affairs – David Agnew, Senior Advisor to the President – Valarie Jarrett, and outgoing Transportation Secretary – LaHood. After their comments mayors from various cities commented and included mayors from Philadelphia, Atlanta, Niagara Falls, Columbus Ohio, Durham, and Carrboro. The call lasted about 20 minutes.
Monday night I joined council and several staff members for a tour of West Cary. This included driving in Chatham County towards Jordan Lake. We looked at current and future developments, trail sites, future parks sites, future community center sites, and fire station number 8. Our tour lasted about 2 hours. We are thinking of taking a tour of district B next quarter.
Tuesday started by meeting briefly via telephone with the town manager. We mostly discussed the announcement about downtown manager Ed Gawf announcing his retirement. It is important to understand that this was no surprise and that Mr. Gawf has been talking about this since last fall.
Tuesday night I gave welcoming remarks and handed out awards at an event sponsored by Advocates for Health in Action. The event included a film released by HBO and a follow up panel discussion with experts.
The film, released about a year ago, was in conjunction with the Institute of Medicine, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the National Institutes of health, and in partnership with the Michael & Susan Dell Foundation and Kaiser Permanente. There are actually 4 one-hour films in the HBO series “Weight of the Nation”, which can be watched online.
The film shown for discussion was the third film and was called “Children in Crisis”. It detailed issues about childhood obesity and showed how Nashville, Tennessee, is making some very positive changes as a community to improve their health. This was a very thought provoking film and really emphasized issues and problems related to the United States having over 63% of its population overweight or obese.
Wednesday morning I visited Lexis Nexis to welcome and hear Senator Burr speak.
Lexis Nexis serves four primary customer segments: Corporate Legal, Large Law, Small Law, and MicroLaw. They help customers to: manage legal matter workflow, track time, billing and legal spend, leverage relationships and knowledge to drive growth, use data to improve decision making and firm performance, and elevate the value of the legal department.
We started with a short meeting that included the Senator and me and several management folks from Lexis Nexis. In their initial comments about the companies work environment they noted that no one usually wears ties. Senator Burr said he had to wear a tie but not socks (he really wasn’t wearing socks). Cool!
In the small group setting we were shown a brief demo of one of the Lexis Nexis products. Then we discussed a variety of issues from the national financial situation to human trafficking. Next we took a tour of the facility. It has changed a lot since I was there a year ago with the governor. It is my understanding that they have put over a million dollars in upgrading the facility.
One of the interesting work environments was a laptop connected to a treadmill set at a 2 mph pace. They lady using it says she works at that treadmill about two hours a day.
After the tour we headed to an area of about 100 employees for a town hall. The Senator gave a short opening and then answered questions for about thirty minutes. He was an impressive speaker and handled the questions very well.
On our way out we signed a visitors’ wall which had hundreds of signatures. The entire visit was a little over an hour.
Wednesday night I had the honor of being one of the judges at the Healthy Snack Challenge held at Oak Grove Elementary.
One of their initiatives was to bring a healthy atmosphere to the school and to get students involved in making healthy choices. The students participating in a Healthy Snack Challenge submitted delicious, creative healthy snack recipes. The 6 finalists presented samples of their snacks to the judges and we selected a winner (though all were winners in my mind).
I am grateful that the Oak Grove Health and Wellness Committee held this event and believe it will reinforce positive nutrition to the staff and families at Oak Grove.
Thursday started with a brief meeting of the chaperones for Le Touquet’s Culinary Student, here as an exchange with Wake Tech. I have known one of the chaperones for over a decade and my wife and I have hosted numerous students in the past. It was great to catch up before they left town.
Later Thursday I gave opening remarks at one of the largest crowds in town event history. The Imagine Cary event had 950 sign up but there were probably 700 in attendance. Here is an excerpt from my opening remarks:
…As we embark on this journey of planning Cary’s future I wondered about Cary’s past. Recently I was provided a document from former Cary Mayor Waldo Rood’s son written about 60 years ago in the form that is similar to a state of the town. Waldo Rood was mayor of Cary from 1949 to 1961. In that document he says:
“In 1950 the census showed a population of 1458 and rapid growth has been in progress since that time. There have been many new homes and places of business built in the last few years and the town has experienced its greatest era of progress. There are a number of reasons for this progress. The people of Cary are cultured and friendly and make other people want to live here.”
Mayor Rood finished by saying:
“Of all the things said about Cary the one that describes it the best is that it is a good place to live.”
I wonder if Mayor Rood could have imagined Cary as it is today. I wonder if he could have imagined Cary would be a place where people from all over the world would move to. And I wonder if Mayor Rood could have imagined Cary would be national recognized as one of the greatest places to live, work, and play in America. …
The rest of the summit involved three sections. Each section had data, trends, and other information provided by the speaker. The attendees were then given a series of questions on a topic. Each attendee had a handheld selector to choose from a range of responses from strongly agree (to the statement or question) to other or none of the above. The summit was scheduled to last about two and a half hours but ran about twenty minutes long.
At the conclusion I stood by the door to greet people and receive feedback. Attendees that spoke to me unanimously said it was an outstanding event. Of course I did receive emails from attendees that believe our entire planning process is a conspiracy to bring in urbanism and change what Cary is today. That is absolutely, 100% ridiculous. I KNOW that this council wants to have a process that will involve the citizens and take their feedback into account as we move forward.
This event was the kickoff of a two year process that will include several events next month. If we all work together on this plan I am sure it will be a guide to a Cary that builds on what we have today and makes us an even greater town in the future.
Saturday morning started early for me as I made remarks at the start of the Purple Cloth 5K held at Bond Park. This was a fundraiser put on by Genesis Methodist Church to raise money for Dorcas ministries. Many know Dorcas Ministries for a place to drop old clothes and goods for the needy. What you may not know is that Dorcas has an outreach ministry that includes a Crisis ministry, a food pantry, adult education, job training, and childcare. We all need to support Dorcas year round. To find out more go to their website at http://dorcas-cary.org/.
Sunday I headed down to Fuquay Varina for the annual Wake County Preservation celebration sponsored by the Capital Area Preservation and the Wake County Historic Preservation Commission. I was joined council member Yerha who gave remarks on behalf of Cary as we received a plaque designating Cary First Christian Church cemetery at 300 West Cornwall Drive as an historic landmark. It is the only historic landmark for African Americans in Cary who played a big part in our history.
In email news from staff the Black Creek Greenway finished another section. It now starts at the Fred G. Bond Metro Park and continues northeast to connect to Wake County’s Lake Crabtree Park and Umstead State Park. The project involved completing about a half mile of paved greenway and a 30-foot pedestrian bridge. Work began in summer 2012 and construction costs included federal grants.
Emails this week included several requests and invitations to events. May is a VERY busy month for that.
Other emails from citizens included a concern that our 911 calls have increased dramatically and wanted to know if that was because of crime. This is an item that has been on the news several times. Apparently people accidentally call 911 instead of the 919 area code which is now required for all phone calls. If you do happen to make that mistake, stay on the line and save our 911 staff from having to track you down and make sure you are OK.
The remainder of my emails was from the conspiracy theorists that our Summit for the Future was a farce.
This week will be another busy week for me and includes a council meeting, several meetings, and numerous events including National Night Out which is Friday. BTW, please come to National Night Out on Academy Street and talk with us and the heroes from our police and fire departments
Well that is all for this week. My next post will be on Sunday May 12th. Although I have Facebook and Twitter accounts those are not the best means of communications with me. Please send all Town of Cary questions or comments to Harold.Weinbrecht@townofcary.org and email personal comments to augustanat@mindspring.com.
Story and photo by Frank Strong for CaryCitizen.
Cary, NC – U. S. Sen. Richard Burr visited the Cary office of LexisNexis as part of a three-day tour which included stops at Ft. Bragg, the NC Ports Authority in Wilmington and other area businesses and government agencies. This visit was a chance to conduct a pulse check with constituents from the local business community, tour the office facility and conduct a question and answer session with employees.
Cary is home to a division of LexisNexis which makes software that helps lawyers run their businesses. It signed an agreement with North Carolina in February 2012 to expand its presence to create a “software center of excellence” in the Triangle and promised to add 350 new jobs to the local economy over five years.
The company is on track to meet those objectives having added a net of 56% new jobs since signing the deal. The company currently has 18 open positions listed on its careers site including roles in law, human resources, finance and technology.
LexisNexis business of law software division CEO Michael Lipps, alongside Town of Cary Mayor Harold Weinbrecht, facilitated the visit which lasted about 90 minutes.
“I take questions from five-year-olds,” said Burr with a disarming smile to an audience of about 200 employees gathered to greet him. “You can ask me anything.”
Employees, all constituents from the local region including Cary, took him up on that offer: the Q&A which was scheduled for 30 minutes stretch to 45. During the session, the Senator fielded questions ranging from the deficit and economy – to political term limits and the local school system.
Throughout the visit, Burr seem to have one overarching message aimed at both the leadership and employees of the company: businesses need to start caring about what their government is doing all of the time as opposed to just caring when polices impact their business.