Full name: Erik Valera
Party affiliation: Democrat
Campaign website: ErikForChapelHill.com
1) In 300 words or less, please give our readers your elevator pitch: Why are you running? Why should voters entrust you with this position? What prior experience will make you an effective member of the Chapel Hill town council?
I moved here 18 years ago to work at the UNC School of Medicine before transitioning to the nonprofit sector, focused on public health research. Even then, it was clear our systems weren’t prepared to experience the growth in population or the breadth of diversity that we require to remain strong and competitive today. Our schools, business environment, public safety, and local governments have been slow to keep pace with the policies, leadership, and the humility needed to respond to our changing demographics. I’m the son of a Mexican immigrant and a Cuban exile, taught that the American Dream is possible—but not promised. It takes hard work, determination, the courage to exercise free speech, and defend each other’s rights to civil liberties. Today, that dream feels increasingly out of reach—even here in Chapel Hill.
That’s why I’m running for Town Council. We face an affordable housing crisis, and while it’s national in scope, our solutions must be local and decisive. The rewrite of our Land Use Management Ordinance (LUMO) is our chance to shape the future. I’ll fight for more missing-middle housing, affordable homes for families earning below 30% of the area medium income (AMI), and protections against displacement for longtime residents. Growth must also mean resilience. Flooding has already devastated neighborhoods. I’ll support nature-based solutions—rain gardens, permeable infrastructure, and protections for our creeks and tree canopy—so we grow with nature, not against it.
Above all, we must restore trust. Meaningful community engagement requires partnership in the decision making process. Outreach and disseminating information merely scratches the surface. I’ll push for —expanding language access, providing childcare, and meeting people where they are. At a time when the Federal and State governments are threatening our way of life, Chapel Hill must be prepared to protect our people, our values, and our economy.
2) What would your priorities be as a member of the Chapel Hill town council? Please identify three of the most pressing issues Chapel Hill currently faces and how you believe the town should address them.
Chapel Hill faces three interconnected challenges: housing affordability, climate resilience, and restoring trust in local government.
1. Planning for Community. Our housing stock has grown just 1% since 2010 while home prices have surged more than 50% since 2020. Over 60% of renters are cost-burdened. If educators, students, and hospital staff cannot afford to live here, our community and economy both suffer. I will advance Chapel Hill’s 2023 Affordable Housing Plan by modernizing our Land Use Management Ordinance: expanding by-right approval for missing-middle housing, supporting nonprofit developers and land trusts to build deeply affordable homes, and preserving naturally occurring affordable housing with strong anti-displacement protections.
2. Grow with Nature. Tropical Storm Chantal showed the danger of ignoring natural systems—flooding that displaced families and disrupted businesses. We must use the Natural Features Model, which maps creeks, floodplains, slopes, and tree canopy, so growth works with our landscape. Guided by this, Chapel Hill should invest in rain gardens, permeable pavements, stream restoration, and culvert upgrades—replacing undersized stormwater pipes with modern systems that handle heavier rainfall and reduce neighborhood flooding.
3. Restoring Trust & Civil Rights. Too many residents feel shut out of decisions. Advisory boards and task forces should reflect renters, immigrants, young people, and working families. That requires feedback loops with Council, expanded language access, and childcare and stipends for participants. As state lawmakers advance anti-immigrant bills, Chapel Hill must remain a place where every family—regardless of income or immigration status—can engage with local government without fear.
Chapel Hill can be a community where housing is attainable, growth strengthens our natural systems, and residents trust their government. That is the future I will fight for on the Town Council.
3) What’s the best or most important thing the Chapel Hill Town Council has done in the past year? Additionally, name a decision you believe the town should have handled differently. Please explain your answers.
Over the past year, the most important actions Chapel Hill Town Council has taken is approving nearly 300 affordable housing units across several projects: 57 units funded in April, a 53-unit development on Homestead Road, and the 190-unit Hillside Trace community on Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard. These approvals mark real progress in addressing our housing crisis, particularly because the homes will be affordable at or below 60% of AMI. Hillside Trace stands out as a once-in-a-generation opportunity: affordable workforce rental housing in a central, opportunity-rich location, steps from downtown, UNC, and the future Bus Rapid Transit line. This is the kind of bold, local action Chapel Hill must continue to take if we want to remain a community where teachers, nurses, service staff, and graduate students can afford to live.
Where council misstepped was in eliminating nine advisory boards and reducing the size of others. While the goal of making the system more equitable and efficient is understandable, the process left many residents feeling sidelined and uncertain about how their voices will be heard. Advisory boards and commissions are among the most direct ways residents—especially those without political connections—participate in local government.
4) President Trump is working to ramp up deportations and curtail visas. At the same time, the state legislature has passed laws requiring agencies to cooperate with ICE. What do you think Chapel Hill can or should do to ensure safe, welcoming communities for immigrants in light of these policies?
Think of this moment as preparing for an inevitable disaster—a warning has already been issued. When deportations ramp up across North Carolina, a smart town prepares the entire community for what to expect and how to respond before the storm hits.
First, household readiness. Chapel Hill should distribute multilingual Safe Families toolkits through CHCCS, libraries, clinics, faith partners, and community health workers so every household is prepared with: (a) a written care plan for children, (b) copies of key documents, (c) an attorney and consulate contacts, and (d) clear scripts for asserting rights (e.g., ask for an interpreter; don’t sign what you don’t understand). These toolkits outline what to do if ICE or police show up at home, how to find a detainee, and how to document abuses. The Chapel Hill Police Crisis Unit can reinforce this readiness by providing trauma-informed support when detentions occur—offering counseling, child protection, and case management, as they already do for victims of violence and emergencies. Embedding the Crisis Unit in this work ensures families are not left isolated when the storm hits. I also support ICE watch programs—modeled on neighborhood watch—that alert the community when federal enforcement operations are underway.
Second, keep people—and the economy—safe. Most ICE arrests still begin in jails, but workplace detentions are rising. Carrboro and Durham have already begun training municipal staff on Fourth Amendment rights. Chapel Hill should do the same and partner with employers to establish Fourth Amendment Workplaces: mark private areas, require a judge-signed warrant before entry, and train staff on identifying a judicial warrant from an administrative order. A Town resolution could encourage adoption across sectors, protecting both workers and businesses.
Third, clear protocols with police, schools, and county. Align on state and federal limits to avoid over-compliance that erodes trust. Under HB 10, obligations are jail-based only, not street stops. Under HB 318, staff must understand which IDs are valid and help residents secure proper documents.
Preparedness saves lives and livelihoods. If we treat this like storm planning—family kits, resilient workplaces, clear communication, and trauma-informed crisis response—Chapel Hill can protect our people, our values, and our economy.
5) Faced with federal funding cuts, rising costs, and a revaluation that saw home values skyrocket, the town council (in a 5-4 vote) approved a $164 million budget funded by the fifth tax increase in as many years. For current council members, please explain how you voted and why. For non-incumbents, please explain how you would have voted and why.
The 2025 revaluation increased average home values dramatically, especially in historically Black neighborhoods like Northside and Rogers Road, as well as in manufactured home communities. Longtime homeowners in these areas have already faced inequitable tax burdens for years. Even with Orange County commissioning a third-party review of the revaluation process, many neighbors feel the assessments were neither fair nor transparent. Adding another Town tax hike on top of that burden risks accelerating displacement in precisely the communities Chapel Hill should be protecting.
For this reason, I would not have supported the Town’s 2025–26 budget as adopted. While I recognize the realities of federal funding cuts, rising service costs, and the need to maintain core services, the timing was wrong. At the time of the budget vote, our next Town Manager, had been selected but not yet onboarded. I would have preferred we waited for the new Town Manager to work with the County to address inequities in the valuation process and then present his own budget for Council’s consideration, rather than approving a fifth consecutive tax increase.
6) The town has prioritized climate action and climate resiliency, but the catastrophic flooding from Tropical Storm Chantal shows that the town and its residents continue to be vulnerable to these disasters. How can Chapel Hill best help impacted residents and prepare for future disasters? How should the council deal with the coal ash at the police station, which has been impacted by separate flood incidents?
Tropical Storm Chantal reminded us that flooding is not an abstract climate issue—it is a public safety emergency. Chapel Hill must approach storm recovery and resilience with the urgency of disaster planning.
First, prepare for the next storm. Growth must align with our creeks and watersheds by applying the Natural Features Model in zoning decisions. That means requiring on-site water retention, tree canopy protection, and green infrastructure in new projects. In the Booker, Bolin, and Morgan Creek corridors, Council should prioritize culvert upgrades, stream restoration, voluntary buyouts of flood-prone properties, and resilient street retrofits such as permeable pavement and bioswales. We also need stronger alert systems to keep residents connected to first responders during outages—multilingual texts, WhatsApp warnings, and door-to-door outreach by paid community liaisons.
Second, support residents when disaster strikes. The Town should establish neighborhood disaster hubs with interpreters to deliver referrals, rental assistance, and mold remediation within days, not weeks. Every flooded household deserves a navigator to connect them with FEMA, state aid, and legal support, while guaranteeing a right-to-return for anyone displaced. Waiving fees and fast-tracking permits for emergency repairs can speed recovery.
Finally, act on coal ash at the Police Station. Flooding has already reached the site. Whether capped or excavated, the Town must act—no more delay. A reinforced, engineered cap could immediately contain exposure and reduce risk during cleanup, while full excavation may be preferable in the long term. Continued inaction only increases the danger of toxins spreading into our air and waterways.
Preparedness saves lives. By centering residents, investing in nature-based solutions, and acting decisively on cleanup, Chapel Hill can become more resilient with every storm.
7) As with most places in the Triangle, Chapel Hill is grappling with a shortage of affordable housing. How should the town address housing affordability over the next few years?
Chapel Hill is at a crossroads. We are in the midst of an affordable housing crisis: housing costs are rising faster than wages, and the people who power our community—teachers, nurses, students, and service workers—are being priced out. The strength of our local economy depends on ensuring that those who sustain it can afford housing that costs no more than one-third of their household income.
First, expand housing choices. Our zoning code should allow more “missing middle” homes—duplexes, triplexes, cottage courts, and small apartments—located near transit, greenways, and job centers. The ongoing Land Use Management Ordinance (LUMO) rewrite is our chance to make by-right approvals the norm for projects that meet clear standards on design, stormwater, and tree protection. This predictability lowers costs and speeds construction, especially for smaller, affordable projects.
Second, invest in affordable homes. We cannot rely on the market alone to provide housing at 30% of Area Median Income or below. The Town should use public land in partnership with nonprofits, community land trusts, and mission-driven developers to create permanently affordable homes. Preserving naturally occurring affordable housing (NOAH) and guaranteeing a right-to-return for residents when Town-owned sites are redeveloped are also essential anti-displacement strategies.
7) Last year, the council voted to eliminate several advisory boards and commissions. How can the town best improve its community engagement process, especially to reach residents who do not have the time or resources to attend town council meetings on weekday nights?
Our ability to tackle the issues in front of us requires the wisdom of those disproportionately impacted by housing affordability and environmental challenges. Eliminating nine boards and commissions, and limiting participation on four others, is not a path to building trust. If Chapel Hill wants to restore trust, we must design an advisory process that prioritizes the lived experiences of our neighbors over the academic and technical expertise that too often overshadows them. Efficiency should never be confused with effectiveness.
I propose creating a Community Engagement Task Force composed of residents—especially renters, immigrants, Black and Brown neighbors, workers, and young adults—who have historically been sidelined because advisory processes were not designed with their schedules, language needs, or priorities in mind. The Task Force should work with the Town Manager, staff, and Council members to design a system that:
1. Builds feedback loops, so residents can see how their input shapes decisions.
2. Expands accessibility by piloting hybrid meetings, childcare, stipends, interpreters, mobile office hours, and neighborhood pop-ups—ensuring participation isn’t limited to those who can attend weekday evening meetings.
3. Develops new leaders by intentionally recruiting renters, students, immigrants, and working families, while supporting them with paid liaisons and facilitators to bridge gaps between neighborhoods and Town Hall.
4. Aligns with equity goals by using the Town’s Engagement Study findings to ensure policies are co-designed with those most impacted, not decided for them.
Advisory tables should strengthen the connection between community members and government. This is our chance to reimagine engagement—not as outreach or an unpaid talent pool, but as a true partnership in shaping a town that works for all of us.
8) The Orange County commission is responsible for levying taxes to fund Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools (CHCCS). That said, what role (if any), should the town council play in supporting CHCCS given the school district’s ongoing budget issues and threatened federal grant cuts?
Our school system, County government, University, and neighboring municipalities are all part of an interconnected ecosystem. Each plays a role in supporting and strengthening the others—especially when it comes to Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools (CHCCS) and the students and families who depend on it.
First, expand affordable housing. Teachers, bus drivers, cafeteria workers, and instructional staff are the backbone of our schools, yet many cannot afford to live in Chapel Hill. By ensuring that new affordable units are dignified, accessible, and located near transit, we can reduce turnover and strengthen the pipeline of staff who keep our schools thriving.
Second, strengthen coordination across governments. Both Chapel Hill and CHCCS have struggled with leadership turnover. Now, with a new Town Manager and Superintendent in place, there is an opportunity for better communication and collaboration between Chapel Hill, Carrboro, Orange County, UNC, and CHCCS leadership. Stronger executive-level relationships will help us identify shared priorities—such as safe routes to schools, afterschool and summer programs, and expanded mental health services—and pursue them together.
Third, align Town action with school needs. The Council should receive direct recommendations on how to better support students and families. I would ask our Town Manager to bring forward proposals, developed in partnership with CHCCS, Carrboro, UNC, and Orange County, that go beyond classroom funding to address the broader student experience: affordable housing, neighborhood amenities, public safety, parks and recreation, and youth leadership opportunities.
By working across systems, we can ensure our schools are not just places of learning, but pillars of a thriving, equitable community.
9) UNC is a major employer and landholder in Chapel Hill. How would you rate the relationship between the university and the town? What would you like to see change?
The relationship between Chapel Hill and UNC is both a strength and a challenge. UNC is our largest employer and landholder, and its students, faculty, and research shape Chapel Hill’s culture and economy. At the same time, institutional growth—UNC and UNC Health together employ more than 40,000 people—has fueled housing demand, driving up costs and displacement pressures.
There is much to value in the Town–Gown partnership. Together, we co-fund Chapel Hill Transit, collaborate through the Chapel Hill Downtown Partnership and Innovate Carolina, and work side-by-side on neighborhood stability through the Northside Initiative and the Good Neighbor Initiative. Our arts and culture also benefit from shared projects like Gallery 109, public art programs, and collaborations between UNC Athletics and Carolina Performing Arts. These partnerships show that when the Town and University align, our entire community is stronger.
But there are also tensions. The UNC Board of Trustees operates independently, with little accountability to the Town. Major land-use and housing decisions on campus ripple into Chapel Hill, yet the Town has no seat at that table. UNC has not built new dorms since 2006, and only recently announced a 700-bed project—far behind the demand created by rising enrollment. That gap forces more students into surrounding neighborhoods, raising rents for everyone.
Going forward, Chapel Hill needs:
– More housing leadership from UNC, including student and workforce housing so the burden doesn’t fall entirely on the Town.
– Stronger executive-level collaboration, with our new Town Manager, UNC leadership, CHCCS, Carrboro, and Orange County meeting regularly to align resources and address common challenges.
– Student engagement as residents, ensuring students who live in Chapel Hill are welcomed as neighbors and voters through advisory processes, Peoples Academy, and community task forces.
10) If there are other issues you want to discuss, please do so here.
In the next term, Chapel Hill’s Town Council will face defining choices—on land use, stormwater, and how we engage the people we serve. We’ll also contend with harsh immigration policies that threaten our neighbors and economy, and we’ll feel the impact of federal budget cuts on programs our community depends on.
Chapel Hill faces interconnected challenges that test our values. I’m running because of the urgency of this moment—and because I believe the American Dream, and equal protection under the Constitution, must remain a reality here. Chapel Hill should be a town where first-time homeownership is possible, where people look out for one another, and where local government is trusted.
I’ve spent my career in public service, advocating for policies that shape our health, schools, economy, and neighborhoods. I’m motivated by doing right by the people who contribute to our community—the people who live here now and the people who want to live here, close to work, schools, and the places that make Chapel Hill home.
I am patient, collaborative, and rooted in community. But I also believe council members must be decisive. I bring a unique lived experience and a different lens on how policy affects real lives—and I’m ready to serve with humility and determination.
I ask for your vote and support to build a Chapel Hill that is truly for all of us.
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