Don’t forget District B is currently represented by a white person 
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That sounds airlifted straight from a Livable Raleigh press release.
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N&O has picked this up as well. Skimmed the article, but it seems to be giving Cox the loudest voice. For those of you who are hitting a paywall, here’s how the article ends:
“These maps were drawn publicly, without influence from the politicians who have to run in these districts,” Buffkin said. “And I’m proud of the work we’ve done. I’m proud of the result.”
It’s a shame, Cox said, that the Voting Rights Act doesn’t directly apply to the city.
Outlets like the Indy are financially motivated to take extreme takes like this. Provocative takes get clicks and social media reactions -not to mention revenue for ads and subscriptions- because that’s how they measure functional and financial success. Modern local news media is incentivized to get people’s attention, even if the underlying content isn’t true or useful.
That doesn’t excuse the Indy (or WRAL, or other news sources)… but it’s a very prominent and nationwide problem with no clear solutions.
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Well that’s funny, because that describes David Cox perfectly.
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Except that this is the daily newsletter. It’s not publicly available, you can’t find it on their website. I responded to the email, and the writer makes it clear that she doesn’t approve of the city council. Here’s her last paragraph in her response to me:
I actually like the council majority’s policies on growth and affordability; southeast Raleigh is gentrifying rapidly, of course, and they have little interest in grappling with that, which isn’t great, but I agree that density = affordability. I’m not calling any of the council members racist; I’m just saying there’s very little they do to show minority communities that they care about them. Here is but another example.
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Newsletters are still the end result of regular engagement. Even if they’re not publicly (immediately) available, it’s still very much a part of their flawed business model. But this is not a media criticism forum, so I digress 
Thanks for posting that writer’s reply. It’s good to know that she personally recognizes the distinctions between policies, symbolism, and the politicians threading the needle between the two. It’s still frustrating that that sort of nuance didn’t make it into her newsletter (or really, the Indy’s editorial stances at large), though.
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For those that support Jonathan Melton’s re-election efforts, he’s having a kickoff campaign at Trophy on Morgan May 4, 5:30-7. Hope to see you there!
Click image for event info:
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Has this been shared yet? Looks like an NC State professor is running against Stormie for her district.
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Looking forward to Indy’s questionnaires for candidates. This is local government - you should have concrete, specific goals and priorities. I don’t know if I love the subtext, from her site:
City decisions must recognize the voices of the most affected groups: historically marginalized communities and neighbors adjacent to a proposed development, for example. We also must consider impacts to our waterways and green spaces.
Edit: though, re-reading the site, I like her more, depending on her answers to specific questions. She might just be trying to find a middle ground that appeases to NIMBYs or critics of the current council, without advocating for bringing back CACs or “banning rezoning” nonsense.
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What’s even better is if we actually get some information out of Stormie to know what she actually stands for. Other than her handling of Devereux Meadows park on the bond (and no proof she’s actually against it), I have no clue what she’s all about and with that, I don’t necessarily dislike her, but I don’t have anything to like about her either.
I’d love a Q/A that has answers from “candidate A, candidate B”, etc so I don’t even know whose answers I like, just that I like more from candidate A. If that turns out to be Stormie, I’ll happily vote for her and recommend her.
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I do feel like Stormie’s record of votes is more valuable than what we currently have from Jane Harrison, but more specific information from both would be useful. I’m in district C, though, so I don’t have much personal stake in this.
I like that idea for a Q&A, though I’ve noticed that incumbents tend to lean heavily on their record in many of their answers, so it might be fairly obvious who is who.
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First impression by what I read sounds like a NIMBY and potential council of NO member.
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Hard to gauge on her high level, not a lot of detail, fluff statement and website. Time will only tell. I’d be interested in seeing a questionnaire posed to these candidates too and see where they actually stand on issues/developments in the city.
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Hey there! I’m the Raleigh/Wake County government reporter for The N&O. It’s still a little early but we do plan on having a questionnaire for the Raleigh City Council candidates. If you’ve got specific questions you think we should include please reply to me or email me at ajohnson@newsobserver.com.
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Hi, @annamjohnson! First off, thank you for everything you do covering both the city council and the county commissioners. It’s incredible the way you handle both of those beats, either of which would be a full-time job on its own, with such thoroughness and aplomb. We are so lucky to have you covering local government for the N&O.
I’m sure you’re probably planning to hit a lot of these topics anyway, but obviously housing prices in the U.S. have soared in the last two years, and the growth in home prices has been especially acute here in Raleigh. I would like to know what specific actions city council candidates would like to take to reduce the cost both of affording to buy a house in Raleigh and affording to rent an apartment in Raleigh.
As you know (but perhaps not everyone on the forum may have seen this yet), last month the city council voted to remove all parking minimums for new developments across the entire city. Obviously the incumbents have their votes to run on, but for the challengers, I’d be curious to know whether they support this change.
Finally (for this post, I mean, I could go on and on with questions I have), I’d love to know what specific actions each candidate would like to take to help make Raleigh a safe place to bicycle for people of all ages and abilities, and what they would like to see done to build a functional bike network for getting around town to complement our existing recreational bike network.
Thanks!
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Thanks for the kind words! I’ll add these to the list of potential questions. Feel free to email me when you think of them!
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We might as well crowdsource more questions, then, if we’re going to end up with an email full of them from the community. Maybe they could use some editing and rewording, but how do y’all feel about these?
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Do you oppose development on principle? What do you think justifies permission to erect new buildings or other infrastructure? (Most of these questions prime the candidates to think about specific issues, so we might as well have open questions to let their implicit biases and/or pet causes peek out?)
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In your eyes, what’s an example of a successful development or rezoning case? (surely, even naysayers have “bright spots” they look to for guidance… right?)
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The City is creating an Office of Community Engagement to engage citizens on local issues in more salient ways than the old CAC system. Do you support this? What will you do to engage and balance your constituents’ priorities in important city decisions? (this is admittedly an obscure-but-potentially-groundbreaking thing; see here for more discussions on the topic)
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Raleigh has not succeeded on its own, but it has grown quickly thanks, in part, due to additional housing and jobs in other cities in the Triangle as well as traffic between them. Do you see this as a strength or a weakness? What will you do as a council member to continue our success as a region as well as an independent city? (we never really talk about the localism-versus-regionalism debate explicitly, even though it informs a lot of decisions like commuter rail or affordable housing)
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You might ask how they would have voted on Downtown South. Would they be for it or against it? They can hedge all they want, but an answer needs to be provided. After all, a city councilperson can’t abstain because “it’s complicated…”
And if someone says they’re not familiar enough with it to comment, then they’re not prepared to deal with complicated development projects. That’s what I think many of us in this community care about.
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I know this is a downtown forum, but I’d love to hear how they plan to address pedestrian and bike safety outside of downtown, as well as access to necessities and amenities within neighborhoods, like corner stores and accessory commercial units.
I’d also be interested in hearing their thoughts on the greenway system. Is it primarily a recreational trail, or is it for transportation too? If transportation, what do they want to do to improve the experience as a bike/ped transportation network?
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