
{"id":21643,"date":"2011-10-27T14:38:22","date_gmt":"2011-10-27T18:38:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.carrborocitizen.com\/main\/?p=21643"},"modified":"2011-10-27T14:38:22","modified_gmt":"2011-10-27T18:38:22","slug":"carrboro-upholds-anti-lingering-law-for-now","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/2011\/10\/27\/carrboro-upholds-anti-lingering-law-for-now\/","title":{"rendered":"Carrboro upholds anti-lingering law, for now"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>By Susan Dickson<\/strong><br \/>\n<em>Staff Writer<\/em><br \/>\nCARRBORO \u00e2\u20ac\u201c\u00c2\u00a0Following a Tuesday morning press conference at which concerned citizens called for the repeal of Carrboro\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s anti-lingering ordinance, a motion to rescind the ordinance by Carrboro Board of Aldermen member Sammy Slade failed, 4-3, at the board\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Tuesday night meeting. <\/p>\n<p>The board approved an anti-lingering ordinance for the intersection of Davie and Jones Ferry roads 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.<\/p>\n<p>On Tuesday, a group of residents gathered at the corner at 11 a.m. to unveil a letter to the board signed by 115 Carrboro residents and advocates calling for the board to rescind the ordinance. <\/p>\n<p>At Tuesday night\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s board meeting, board members Lydia Lavelle, Dan Coleman and Slade voted to rescind the ordinance, while board members Jacquie Gist, Randee Haven-O\u00e2\u20ac\u2122Donnell, Joal Hall Broun and Mayor Mark Chilton voted to uphold it, at least for the time being. <\/p>\n<p>The vote came after Steve Dear, who signed the petition, asked the board at its meeting to repeal the ordinance, and said he planned to start eating lunch on the corner next week.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153I find this to be unfortunate that we have to get to a point where we have citizens pointing out the inconsistencies of our application of this law and challenging us,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Slade said. <\/p>\n<p>Lavelle agreed. <\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153There\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not going to be any kind of constitutional argument someone\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s going to make to me to change that vote,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d she said. <\/p>\n<p>The board is scheduled to revisit the issue on Nov. 22, and those who voted against the ordinance\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s repeal said they wanted to wait to consider it then so that neighbors would be aware that they were doing so. <\/p>\n<p>Broun said she felt those who live close to the corner should have been informed that the motion to repeal was going to be raised. <\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153It seems to me to be a lack of due process that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s happening right now,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d she said, adding that behavior at that corner has been \u00e2\u20ac\u0153an ongoing problem.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>In June, the board voted to take another look at the ordinance. Earlier that month, the Southern Coalition for Social Justice sent a letter to the town alleging that the ordinance is unconstitutional on First Amendment grounds and stating that it is \u00e2\u20ac\u0153overbroad and vague\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and has interfered with workers\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 ability to obtain employment during the late-morning and early-afternoon hours.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153What you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re doing right now is actually a crime,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Chris Brook, staff attorney with the Southern Coalition for Social Justice, told gatherers at the corner on Tuesday morning. <\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153It looks like we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re not going to have a problem being here this morning \u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 so we also potentially have a selective enforcement issue,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d he added. <\/p>\n<p>Rafael Gallegos, associate director of the Chapel Hill and Carrboro Human Rights Center, told the crowd Tuesday that the current economic climate makes finding work that much harder for day laborers, whose families rely on them. The ordinance makes obtaining jobs especially difficult for day laborers in the winter months, during which many jobs are completed during the warmest part of the day, after 11 a.m. <\/p>\n<p>Elimination of the ordinance \u00e2\u20ac\u0153will send a message to those individuals that this community is interested in their well being,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Gallegos said. <\/p>\n<p>Angel Martinez, a day laborer who lives in Abbey Court Apartments, said that finding work as a day laborer has become one of his only options as manufacturing and restaurant jobs have dried up, and that the ordinance makes finding day-labor jobs much more difficult. <\/p>\n<p>Elizabeth Haddix, a staff attorney for the UNC Center for Civil Rights, said the ordinance is a violation of both the first and 14th amendments.<\/p>\n<p>It has \u00e2\u20ac\u0153an avert and intentional racial and discriminatory impact, which violates the 14th Amendment,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d she said. <\/p>\n<p>Haddix added that while some argue that the ordinance is needed to address issues of littering, public consumption and harassment, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153state laws and the town code already address these offenses.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d <\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153This ordinance prohibits a person\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s very presence on this corner,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d she added. <\/p>\n<p>Chris Kreutzer, who lives across the street from the corner, said he had no problem with day laborers using the corner to find work, but that \u00e2\u20ac\u0153this corner has a lot of problems unassociated with people looking for work.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d <\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153People come here to drink. Prostitutes use this parking lot,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d he said, adding that people use the bathroom in his yard. <\/p>\n<p>While there are laws in place to prevent such behavior, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153They have clearly failed miserably on this corner,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Kreutzer said. <\/p>\n<p>He acknowledged that the ordinance is \u00e2\u20ac\u0153imperfect,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d but, he added, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Until we find a better solution, I am very much in favor of it.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Following a Tuesday morning press conference at which concerned citizens called for the repeal of Carrboro\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s anti-lingering ordinance, a motion to rescind the ordinance by Carrboro Board of Aldermen member Sammy Slade failed, 4-3, at the board\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Tuesday night meeting.<\/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-21643","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21643","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=21643"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21643\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21644,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21643\/revisions\/21644"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21643"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21643"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21643"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}