By Taylor Sisk
Staff Writer
A meeting of the Rogers Road Community Enhancement and Monitoring Taskforce was held Tuesday night at the Faith Tabernacle Oasis of Love Church with approximately 30 people in attendance. Frustrations were many, and some small agreements were reached.
The proceedings began with a demand that action be taken to keep a solid waste transfer station out of the community. “The consensus at the neighbor-to-neighbor meeting was that there should be no transfer station,†said Neloa Barbee Jones, a task force member and Rogers Road community member, referring to a June 19 meeting that was open to community members only. (The transfer station site, on Eubanks Road, was approved by the Orange County Board of Commissioners in April. As part of that development plan, the board agreed to form the task force to address community concerns and recommend enhancements to the neighborhood.)
County commission chair Moses Carey – a member of the task force and the meeting coordinator – pointed out that halting the placement of the transfer station in the Rogers Road community was beyond the task force’s power.
An interim report submitted by county staff drew criticism, with several task force members saying it failed to reflect their activities throughout June and was drawn up without reflecting their input.
A lengthy discussion then ensued regarding the boundaries that would properly define the Rogers Road community, with frustrations again coming to the fore. A consensus was reached that a broader “heritage overlay area†would be defined – recognizing the historical significance of the community, which includes both home sites and graves of former slaves. Within that heritage overlay area, a much smaller “landfill-impact area†was delineated. It’s this area that potentially will receive some or all of the quality-of-life enhancements the task force will be recommending to the county commission as a result of that community having abutted the solid waste landfill for the past 30 years.
The list of proposed enhancements –including providing water and sewage and bus service to the community – was then discussed. Once again frustrations were expressed, with several of those in attendance saying that a similar list was drawn up in 1997 and that few of those objectives have been achieved.
“It seems to me that ten years later, we’re worse off,†said Jones. “Nothing has been resolved.â€
Carrboro Alderman Jacquie Gist proposed reviewing the 1997 list to assess what’s been accomplished. Commissioner Carey indicated that action would be taken to do so.