From Mark Binker at the N&R:
RALEIGH – The protest petition is back.
Greensboro residents will be able to fight unpopular land-use cases with that tool after a vote in the Senate on Wednesday.
The city lost the right in 1971 and until this week remained the only North Carolina city without it.
Senators restored that right on a pair of voice votes. The House voted Tuesday 116-0 for the bill.
Because the measure affects only one city, it is a “local bill” and does not need to be signed by the governor. Instead, it will go directly to the Secretary of State’s office and become law.
My sources indicate the editors were up half the night over this:
The issue of whether to ask to have protest petitions rights restored was a hard-fought issue before the City Council this year.
Maybe Binker was just tired. Anyway, no mention of HP’s Keith Brown and his Protest Petition for Greensboro.
Uh, the “issue” was hard fought on one side and obfuscated to death on the other. I had no idea the developers had so much smoke and so many mirrors. And Cowncil just lapped it up. They told the parties to get together and come up with a compromise.
Keith was seeking to REPEAL A LAW PROSCRIBING THE RIGHT for the citizens of GSO. Brown merely sought to have it repealed.
And we didn’t “lose the right.” It was fucking taken away.
Binker, Binker, Binker: the N&R’s version of Fat Bastard.
It just breaks my heart. KB even graduated the Citizen Journalism Academy. Of course, he shaded them plenty hard with their 10 Questions.
This all my fault. If he hadn’t been hanging out over here, things would be much different. When will KB learn to clean shit off his shoes?
sometimes fec the shit don’t stink but needs to be planted in the garden to blossom into a flower.
I will follow you into Hell with a muddy Bic lighter and a dirty glass half full of pond water.
Make sure the pond water is from Jordan Lake
I can’t believe Cowncil is about to start their version of American Idol, when we should be promoting from within.
fec you say this
And we didn’t “lose the right.” It was fucking taken away
That is why I fought hard for the citizens of Greensboro ,this was a total injustice either way you look at it and it was great to point out that no one could come up with a explanation as to why this happened.
It was also great to expose the fraud that they are in TREBIC
I tried to find who our legislators and council members were at that time, with no success. I seem to remember Jim Melvin came to power a few years afterward.
don’t know if you read jordan green’s piece but the city attorney back in the day called me out here is that post, http://protestpetitiongreensboro.blogspot.com/2009/02/protest-petition-company-politics-in.html
From reading Jordan Gren’s article it seems that the city attorney took it upon himself to take this away from the citizens with some backdoor politics going on. As you know there wasn’t much transparency in 1971 but to see the city attorney and I am sure the backing of the whole bunch they took it upon themselves for this exemption. Well I am glad to reverse this total injustice and it will be fun to watch council meetings if they play the protest petition card.
THe great part of Protest petitions is the way to use it in the process of meeting with the applicant , the informal part of this is great to see because our neighborhood was a part of using Protest Petitions and had them meet our conditions then the applicant got names off to be under the threshold.
On a post on protest petition tonight I saved the best for last hope you enjoy.
FEC, i think Melvin was a part of all of this, it is amazing that nobody has wanted a quote from melvin on this issue. I am sure he was a part of it and you can add king zoning stud henry isaacson to the list back in the day. Which lawyer over the past 37 years has benefitted the most from this exemption , it happens to be Henry Isaacson, trebic cartel member
Thanks for the link. Look forward to your post.