Advisory boards may be cut

At least two town advisory boards may be disbanded and several others reorganized, according to the recommendations of a committee made up of Assistant Town Manager Candace Davis, Chief Financial Officer Aileen Staples, Director of the Parks, Recreation & Cultural Resources Department Ruben Wall and Director of the Downtown Development Department Lisa Hayes.

The town now has 14 advisory boards. The recommendations would cut that to eight.

Davis said there would be no major changes to the Board of Adjustment, Historic Preservation Commission, Human Relations Advisory Board, Planning Board, Public Art Commission and the Technology Advisory Board.

The Design Review Board will be repurposed because of changes in state law. Also repurposed if the town commissioners approve will be the Senior Center Advisory Board, which will become a function of Resources for Seniors, which provides the programs at the Northern Wake Senior Center. The town, which owns the center and paid for the recent extensive renovation, will continue to provide maintenance.

The Greenway Advisory Board and Cultural Resources Advisory Board would also be repurposed, absorbed by the Parks, Recreation & Cultural Resources Advisory Board, which will also shrink to nine members.

The largest advisory board is Youth in Government with 20 members. Davis said those 20 teens, appointed annually, “. . . need a purpose.” The committee is recommending they be assigned to the Historic Preservation Commission, the Human Relations Council, the Public Art Commission, the Technology Advisory Board and Parks, Recreation & Cultural Resources Advisory Board. The committee recommended appointing them as ex officio members, nonvoting, but the discussion Tuesday night suggested the town commissioners might make them voting members.

The Cemetery Advisory Board and the Urban Forestry are slated for removal, according to the committee’s recommendation. Bertha Harris’s will left $250,000 to the Wake Forest Cemetery on North White Street. “All funds have been spent,” Davis said. She added that the walking tour is now online “and in the future could continue in person” with an ad hoc committee planning the event.

The Urban Forestry Board was established to promote tree planting and to receive annual awards. Now the town has an Urban Forestry Program in the Public Works Department with a qualified urban forester, Luke Devores. In 2013 the town adopted an Urban Forest Management Plan which includes replacement of street trees, tree trimming and programs to halt or contain tree diseases.

Davis, Wall and Staples said there are many other ways than advisory boards for town residents to volunteer and serve, including Adopt-A-Stream, Adopt-A-Trail, street tree maintenance, Tree Stewards, special events such as Arbor Day, coaches for youth recreation leagues, park volunteers,  Dream League baseball “Buddy,” the food security program, and guest services volunteers.

The committee is also recommending revising the ordinances for the parks and recreation and public art boards.

If the commissioners approve the recommendations or part of them, the changes will require adjustments of the terms of office for people now serving on various boards.

Hayes told the commissioners that the town now has 94 annual events, all of which require staff involvement ranging from a few hours to hundreds of hours, usually from multiple town departments.

The committee is recommending Music at Midday, Mardi Gras and the film festival be eliminated; Good Neighbor Day be reconfigured; the cemetery walking tour be moved to an online format; and Trails Day and Family Fitness Day be combined.

Commissioner Bridget Wall-Lennon argued that the film festival, which has been on the calendar for only two years, the last during the beginning of the COVID pandemic, should not be cut.

Wall-Lennon also asked why the town does not have an environmental board when so many towns and cities do. Davis agreed the town receives many comments about runoff and erosion control. “We have hired additional staff to help with those concerns,” she said. Those include two environmental engineers in the Public Works Department.

Town Manager Kip Padgett said the town needs volunteers with Adopt-A-Stream. “We are trying to get other people involved.

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Forrest Westall Sr., the executive director of the Upper Neuse River Basin Association, spoke at length about the Neuse River basin and the ways in which the association is working to reduce the amount of nitrogen and phosphorus in the river water even as development proceeds apace in and near the basin.

One nutrient reduction program has been shelved because it was deemed too expensive and not feasible. Since 2011 the association has been working to develop “a science-based evaluation of Falls Lake” with recommendations for a more workable plan.

Right now the local governments in the Falls Lake basin are required to submit their nutrient reduction programs to the state before January 2021. The association has prepared a joint program for all towns and cities which will cover the period for this requirement until 2025 or later when the Falls Lake rules are adopted again.

The cost to the town will be $68,460 over five years or $13,692 each year and the cost can be offset by procedures or programs the town has in place that reduce runoff and erosion. If the town does not join this program it will have to submit its own plan to the state.

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At the end of the meeting about 7 p.m., just before the commissioners and mayor went into a closed session to consult with their attorney about an unspecified subject, Mayor Jones said she had had several people ask about the town sponsoring the Juneteenth celebration now sponsored by the Northeast Community Coalition.

“I think the town should add to that and make it a much bigger event,” Jones said. She asked the board to consider that question.

She also said the town should provide $50,000 annually in a new Juneteenth fund to “give ongoing assistance to those who are having difficulty maintaining their homes” to such an extent that some are being forced to sell their homes. She said ChurchNet could administer the funds.

The town board had to go to the closed session and then join the planning board at 7:30 for the regular joint meeting for public hearings.

Two agenda items were not discussed: an overview of the Glen Royall Mill Village zoning map and amendments and an overview of upcoming Unified Development Ordinance text amendments pertaining to state legislation.

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The town and planning boards will meet again at 6:30 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 3, for a quasi-judicial hearing about the subdivision and master plan for Wake Preparatory Academy, a proposed K-12 charter school on about 35 acres on Harris Road. The hearing will be aired on Channel 10, and it will be an in-person meeting.

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