
{"id":18432,"date":"2011-05-26T08:00:14","date_gmt":"2011-05-26T12:00:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.carrborocitizen.com\/main\/?p=18432"},"modified":"2011-05-26T09:31:06","modified_gmt":"2011-05-26T13:31:06","slug":"rural-fire-departments-ask-for-tax-increase","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/2011\/05\/26\/rural-fire-departments-ask-for-tax-increase\/","title":{"rendered":"Rural fire departments ask for tax increase"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>By Joshua Lucas<br \/>\n<\/strong><em>Staff Writer<\/em><\/p>\n<p>CHAPEL HILL  \u00e2\u20ac\u201c Fire protection, waste disposal and schools were the hot topics Tuesday night at the Orange County Board of Commissioners\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 public hearing regarding next year\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s proposed budget.<\/p>\n<p>Tuesday\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s meeting, held at the Southern Human Services Center, provided county residents the chance to weigh in on the county\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s proposed $177 million budget. County Manager Frank Clifton presented the budget to commissioners at their May 17 meeting. In keeping with commissioners\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 directives, it keeps funding largely flat and does not propose to increase property taxes.<\/p>\n<p>That last point was the cause of several rural volunteer fire departments\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 concern. Leaders from several of the groups spoke at the meeting to urge commissioners to allow an increase in the ad valorem fire tax in those fire districts to pay for capital needs and to cover shrinking revenues.<\/p>\n<p>Bill Waddell of the Orange Grove Volunteer Fire Company told commissioners that his firefighters had two basic needs \u00e2\u20ac\u201c a new roof for the fire station and new radios \u00e2\u20ac\u201c that would increase the safety of both the fire company and the residents it serves.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153I plead with you to allow us to improve safety for our firefighters,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d he said.<\/p>\n<p>In all, four volunteer companies \u00e2\u20ac\u201c New Hope, White Cross, Orange Rural and Orange Grove \u00e2\u20ac\u201c expressed interest in discussing increased revenues with the commissioners, Clifton said. He said such discussions would be appropriate and expected during upcoming public work sessions.<\/p>\n<p>Other county residents spoke to commissioners about the county\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s solid-waste convenience centers and the recent decision to use a tipping-fee surcharge to fund improvements in the Rogers Road neighborhood near the county\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s landfill on Eubanks Road.<\/p>\n<p>While they praised remediation efforts, the speakers from Orange County Voice, a group that advocates for rural communities, urged commissioners not to commit county money to expanding compacting and other site improvements at the convenience centers.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Send a message that we are no longer investing in our out-of-date solid-waste infrastructure,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Voice\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Stan Cheren told commissioners. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Everything on the county\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s plan can wait.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>Other Voice members urged the commissioners to look to other options \u00e2\u20ac\u201c including residents\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 requests to keep the centers open on Sundays. Norma White told commissioners that some convenience centers are unsafe because of crowding on Saturdays.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Except for the hours, the convenience centers are not broken,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Steve Graf, of Cedar Grove, said. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153There\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s no rush for these improvements.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>And several speakers lined up to urge the commissioners to continue funding public education in the county, or even increase per-pupil funding. They also urged commissioners to back the proposed quarter-cent increase on the county\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s sales tax that will be on November\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s ballot.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153I would love for Orange County to be nationally recognized, and distinguished from that other Orange County in California,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d said school activist and parent Tiki Gwynne.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Fire protection, waste disposal and schools were the hot topics at the Orange County Board of Commissioners\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 public hearing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18432","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18432","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18432"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18432\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18493,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18432\/revisions\/18493"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18432"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18432"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18432"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}