A recent change in how the amount of buildable land in the state’s 20 coastal counties is calculated may go down as one of the briefest water quality efforts in state history. The short-lived clarification of stormwater-runoff rules, which caught even environmentalists by surprise, lasted only three weeks before pressure from developers in the hot […]
Kirk Ross
Bio: Kirk Ross is a freelance columnist for INDY Week and founded the online news and feature publication The Carolina Mercury. He lives in Chapel Hill.Link: http://www.exileonjonesstreet.comEmail: [email protected]: http://twitter.com/ExJS
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Reform school
In the back of the room gathered lobbyists of every stripe, some quite literally so: It’s seersucker season in the capital city. They were there to hear the outline of new changes to House Bill 1849–lobbying reform 2006–and take their turn in grinding out reform this session. “Come to see what a terrible person you […]
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Smoke-filled rooms no more
Quick, name a public building where there are ample numbers of ashtrays scattered about. In another sign of the shifting fortunes of Big Tobacco, senators spent more time last week debating how to spend settlement money from tobacco lawsuits than they did whether to ban smoking from the halls and offices of the legislature. Time […]
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A whiff of nostalgia about hog lagoons
Remember when pig manure was all the rage? Specifically, how the elimination of hundreds of lagoons filled with millions of gallons of hog excrement from our flood-prone coastal plain was a huge priority? Remember when politicians measured their virility by how tough they were going to be on polluters, tossing around words like “befoul” and […]
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High tide on the sound side
You don’t have to tell Carolyn Mason there’s a land rush Down East. She lives in Bettie, near the bridge to Harkers Island and not far from an area that’s seeing a surge in subdivisions along what was once a dynamic coastline of creek channels, shellfish beds and spartina grass. “Things have shocked all of […]
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Trash talk ain’t cheap
Already with the trash talking. The N.C. House got rolling last week on its version of the budget, and right out of the box there was disagreement over a key provision in the Senate budget calling for a statewide moratorium on new landfills. The provision is aimed directly at five private mega-landfills, most of which […]
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Blue light special
On Jones Street last week there was a lovely, upbeat atmosphere as the state Senate, on an accelerated timetable that’s warp speed compared to years past, brought a budget to the floor in record time. It was proof of how much easier the conversation goes when you’re divvying up a couple of billion dollars rather […]
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Cheaper gas or healthy kids?
Maybe it makes sense to you here, in this time of economic recovery, for folks to get a little relief in filling their tanks. Or maybe it makes more sense to give the corporations and the wealthier among us a break and let ’em keep more of what conservative pundits and talk-show hosts like to […]
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Blogroots
Several years ago a small group of Web visionaries who saw what the Web was becoming put out a document called the Cluetrain Manifesto (www.cluetrain.com). The opening statement summed up a belief they held that the Web was fast becoming a place where people would form their own communities of interest and leave traditional ideas […]
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Lip service
I had a good laugh not too long ago when I read a story about a local condo company that hired a couple of folks to lounge around the model unit in bohemian fashion to show how cool their new development will be. Trust fund kids aside, I’ve met few bohemian types who can afford […]