This has been a week of few meetings but a week of significance as I changed my position on public speaking regarding schools.

Monday started with a regularly scheduled meeting with the town attorney. We reviewed current and likely litigation. The town is in good shape in all current and potential law suits.

Monday evening I spoke to the school board in public for the first time. In the past I had a personal policy of not speaking in public because I didn’t want to give people false hope since we weren’t the decision makers. In addition, I didn’t want to damage relationships since we were and are in a lobbying position. But after years of witnessing the harm of constant reassignment I decided it was worth the risk of speaking in public. Without saying more I will just copy my planned written comments below:

Thank you for the opportunity to speak to you tonight.

Since I have been mayor I have had a personal policy of not speaking in public to the school board. I took this position because we are not the decision makers and we are lobbyist. I wanted to make sure I didn’t damage any relationships with school board members. Over this past year my citizens have pleaded with me to reconsider my policy saying that to them it was worth the risk of negative perception. I have re-evaluated my policy and have decided that even though it is a good policy it is not having the desired affect and in fact may be causing more harm than good. Therefore, I am here before you tonight.

First, I have come tonight to ask you to reconsider the reassignments of nodes 383.3 and 384.4 for reasons I am sure you have already heard. I want to thank school board member Eleanor Goettee for agreeing to meet this week and discuss these nodes further.

Second, I have come to talk with you about your economic diversity policy. I believe the intention of this policy is wonderful. But unfortunately the implementation of this policy is causing too much pain and disruption.

Many parents have reached a tipping point when it comes to the implementation of this policy. Almost every parent I talk to values economic diversity but they believe there are better ways to implement it. After hearing numerous horror stories for years I tend to agree. In fact this policy is now causing many families to leave the school system because it is not worth the yearly struggle. Reports say the number of children in Cary outside the public school system is three times the national average (20%). This trend is very disturbing.

From experience I can tell you that policies should always be revisited and studied especially when it is viewed by the public as causing more harm than good. While the intentions of this policy may be great, the real impact of its implementation is huge.

I believe it is time to work with the parents and elected officials to come up with a better solution. I believe as public servants it is our duty to listen to our citizens, after all we work for them.

In closing, I want to thank you for your service and dedication. Please understand we all are in violent agreement that we want what is best for the children. Please consider revisiting and studying the economic diversity policy and know that I am here to help you any way I can.

Tuesday’s only meeting was the weekly meeting with the town manager and Mayor Pro-Tem.

Wednesday I had two TV interviews on the5 PM meeting with school board members Eleanor Goettee and Ron Margiotta. The first interview was with NBC17 during the lunch hour and the second was with ABC11 after the meeting occurred.

The meeting with the school board members was also attended by council members Don Frantz and Gale Adcock. During the meeting the school board members and council members discussed several nodes that were being reassigned especially nodes 383.3 and 384.4 which are the MacGregor Downs nodes. I was very impressed with the school board members who were very supportive and seem to being all they can do to help. They pointed out how the school board as a whole is looking at the reassignment of these two nodes. The main fact regarding these two nodes is that Apex is overcrowded and Athens is not. The premise that Apex nodes assigned to Athens might come back in three years may not happen in that time frame because the new high school H7 might be delayed due to lack of funding. These are just some of the issues they are dealing with in their decision. I think for some of the school board members the F&R (low income students) is the main factor in their decisions. Fortunately, Mr. Margiotta and Ms. Goettee are looking at many more factors. Regarding low income students, currently Apex is less than 10%, Athens is around 28%, and Cary is around 40%.

Another topic discussed at the meeting with school board members is the situation at Panther Creek. That is, the school board needs a certificate of occupancy (CO) from the town before the mobile classrooms can be used. They plan to begin using these classrooms on January 21st which is the beginning of the new semester. They are required to do $1.4 million dollars in road improvements before they can get their CO. The town has voted to give them up to 18 months to begin road improvements (basically come up with $1.4 million). So if they sign an agreement that says they will begin these improvements in that time frame then they will get their CO. The discussion on Panther Creek lasted for a while and we all left with a plan to try and get this done before the semester deadline. It should be pointed out that Cary taxpayers have helped the Wake County Public Schools with $65 million since 2000. We also provide them hundreds of thousands in revenue each year through our red light camera program. I am hopeful and optimistic that this issue will be resolved before the deadline.

Saturday night was the official beginning of Dreamfest which is a 9 day celebration of the life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. I briefly spoke to a sold out crowd of over 500 and then read a proclamation officially starting Dreamfest.

The State of the Town began airing this week. You can see it at http://www.townofcary.org/med/video/stateofthetown2009.ram . Here is the text of the address:

Cary is fortunate to begin 2009 as one of the most desirable places to live, even in the midst of a world-wide recession. Your town government is fiscally sound due to excellent planning and a conservative approach to budgeting. Cary continues to be one of the safest places to live in the United States, ranking third safest in the nation for a municipality our size. We have the lowest tax rate in Wake County and the highest quality of life. Our carefully planned communities and office parks combined with beautiful natural surroundings, world class and nationally-recognized sports venues, and top notch recreational facilities make Cary an enviable place to live, work, and raise a family. This year will be a critical time in Cary’s history as we redefine our vision for the future, increase our emphasis on being environmentally friendly, and encourage more citizen involvement.

One of citizens’ crucial concerns during these tough economic times is the financial status of the Town. I am very happy to report that we are financially strong and will be able to continue to maintain our high standard of living. The Town’s expert staff recognized potential economic problems as we prepared this year’s fiscal budget, which took effect in July 2008. As a result, we have taken proactive steps to strengthen our financial position by cutting operating expenses, delaying non-vital projects, and putting a permanent ceiling on debt. To date, we are on target or slightly better with a forecasted surplus of $3.5 million.

Although the Town is not currently experiencing any significant negative impacts from the recession, we are closely monitoring two areas that are directly impacted by the economy: sales tax (20 percent of our revenue) and permit fees (3 percent of our revenue). While we expect both of these to be down, we believe our actions will more than make up for those potential losses.

Another significant measure of our Town’s solid financial health is our approach to managing debt. During this past year, we took two important actions related to debt management. First, we put a ceiling of 15 percent on our general fund debt, which means no more than 15 percent of the Town’s general fund operating expenses can be spent on debt service. Since our debt is already close to this point, the Town will have very little to spend on general capital projects during the next three years. Though the budgets will be tight, there will still be enough to allow flexibility to address small projects and some road improvements. For example, this year we will spend more than $8 million in improvements for Cary Parkway and another $2 million for road maintenance.

The second action we took was to address the utility debt created by the future Western Wake Water Treatment Plant, which will provide us with much needed sewage capacity, some of which we now buy from other counties. This plant’s construction costs could cause our utility bills to increase by as much as 18 percent in one year. To lessen the impact of this debt service, we decided to spread this cost out over several years. While this may mean that our utility bills will increase up to 5 percent a year, it does prevent a single year increase of 18 percent.

Cary’s population growth is another concern for many citizens. As recent as this past summer, we were recognized as one of the fastest growing communities nationwide, based on 2007 data. But the nationwide recession significantly affected Cary’s housing market by the second quarter of 2008, causing a drastic decline in housing permits for the year. While this will cause a slight reduction in the Town’s revenue, hopefully it will allow the Town time to catch up with some infrastructure projects.

Looking toward the future, Cary has reached a point where the Town’s vision needs review. Approximately 80 percent of Cary’s land is accounted for or developed, which means that we will need to rethink how we plan to grow in the future. Therefore, beginning early this year we will start a process to define a new vision for Cary’s future. Citizens will be invited and encouraged to participate in defining the future of their town. I believe we need to protect the beautiful neighborhoods that make Cary great while beginning to urbanize and revitalize older areas like downtown.

Town employees will play an important role in implementing the vision for years to come. Cary’s town manager now administers to more than 1,000 employees. Long-time town manager Bill Coleman retired last fall, leaving the leadership position vacant. Hiring a new town manager will be one of the most important decisions this council makes. In 2008, the council defined a process to select the ideal town manager. We are currently doing a national search for the best possible candidate and hope to name a new town manager within a couple of months. We look forward to the new town manger leading us into this new era.

Cary made huge strides in environmental planning and preservation in 2008 that will carry over into this year. We launched our turf buy back and toilet rebate programs, initiatives designed to help reduce our water consumption. Since the toilet rebate program began in June 2008, 492 toilets have been replaced with high efficiency models for a water savings of almost 4 million gallons per year. Our turf buy back program attracted 78 participants who replaced more than 225,000 feet of traditional landscaping with natural areas or warm season grass, for a possible water savings of over 750,000 gallons per year.

Other areas of environmentally-friendly progress include our recycling program. We increased what citizens can recycle and starting this year, citizens will have roll out carts for easier recycling. Cary also began using alternative energy by using solar panels to power a wastewater facility. Moreover, during the past year we created a team of staff members who are working together with our new environmental advisory board of citizens to look for additional ways to make Cary greener. With their help we hope to continue to lead the state in environmental initiatives.

Schools are still a major concern for Cary parents. While the Wake County Public School System is recognized as a premier school system, its reassignment policies can cause great hardship for many Cary families. As representatives of Cary, the council was very active in 2008 representing our concerns to the school board and to the Wake County delegation of legislators. We partnered with the school system to provide greater resources to the school system and the town such as shared parks and land. Since 2000, Cary has provided over $65 million in support for schools. This year the council will look for new opportunities to be greater advocates for our parents and partner with the school system whenever possible.

Finally, we made great strides this past year in opening up our government and improving citizen involvement. First, we created a new TV program called Cary Matters that runs three times daily to inform our citizens about major issues and answer questions they may have. While this program has been moderately successful in its infancy, it is my hope that citizens will start using this program more to find out about what is important to them and what the Town is planning for in the future.

Next, we moved forward on our initiative to establish Citizen Issue Advisory Groups. This allows a group of five to 15 Cary citizens to come together, study and make recommendations to the Town Council on a specific issue. To find out more about this process, go to the Town of Cary’s Web site at www.townofcary.org<http://www.townofcary.org/> and read about our Citizen Issue Review Commission.

For our third task, we revamped our process for appointing board and commission members; in the past, it was perceived by some as being political appointments. Appointments have been moved from right after elections to the middle of the year and the entire process of nominating, discussion, and votes are open to the public. The first implementation of this new process will be done this year.

Additionally, in December 2007 I created a weekly journal so that citizens can review the work I perform as your mayor. In 2008, Councilman Don Frantz also started a journal to provide information about his service as a council member. The information in these journals not only gives the status of what we do but why we make the decisions we make. I believe we have made great progress in making our government more transparent and hope to continue with new initiatives this year.

While 2009 promises to be a challenging year, our financial position and our excellent Town staff have Cary in great shape. I believe 2009 will be a year of more open government, more citizen involvement, and significant improvements to our infrastructure, all with a significant focus on the economy. It will be a year in which our award-winning environmental initiatives will help our community become even greener. I believe the potential for our town to achieve great things is vast despite the challenges before us. I appreciate your trust and faith in me as your Mayor and with your help we will make Cary even greater than it is today. And as always, thanks for calling Cary home.

Well that is about it for this week. I will hopefully post again by Sunday, January 18th. Please feel free to leave a comment on my post.