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Board calls for public comment on anti-lingering ordinance

Posted on February 12, 2009 by Staff

By Susan Dickson
Staff Writer

Following passionate pleas from several residents, the Carrboro Board of Aldermen voted on Tuesday to schedule a public hearing regarding the anti-lingering ordinance for the intersection of Davie and Jones Ferry roads.

The board approved an anti-lingering ordinance for the intersection in November 2007 after residents of the surrounding neighborhood complained of public consumption, public urination and garbage in the areas around the intersection.
Day laborers, many of them Latino, often gather at the intersection in hopes that contractors will come by and offer them work. The ordinance prohibits waiting at the intersection from 11 a.m. until 5 a.m.

Carrboro Police Chief Carolyn Hutchison said police had not arrested anyone for disobeying the ordinance since it was put into place and recommended that the board keep the ordinance on the books.

“It seems that people who previously lingered respect this law and comply with this law,” Hutchison said. “Police officers find themselves in fewer adversarial situations.”

However, residents have said people continue to gather at the intersection and cause problems. Others argue that the ordinance infringes on civil liberties.
Emily Scarborough, a resident of Davie Road, said she had seen people urinate in her yard and also has had to clean up human feces from the yard.

“We just want our property to be protected. We want to feel safe,” she said. “I find it really reprehensible that we have to deal with this.”

Board member Randee Haven-O’Donnell said she has driven by the intersection several times recently and seen people loitering in the area in the late afternoon.

But Hutchison said the ordinance only applies to the public property near the intersection and that people gather on the private property around the nearby convenience store.

Stephen Dear argued that the board should find a way to improve the situation without imposing an anti-lingering ordinance.

“I don’t recognize the Carrboro that I so admire in this ordinance,” he said. “It doesn’t encroach on civil liberties – it’s a preemptive strike on civil liberties.”
“It has nothing to do with the very basic rights of American citizens,” he added.

Dear questioned whether concern would be so high if the men were white rather than Latino and encouraged the board to hear more public comment on the ordinance before voting to keep it in place.

“We should be ashamed of this ordinance,” he said. “This is not what we’re about, and we all know this.”

The board will hold a public hearing on the anti-lingering ordinance on March 24.

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