For the past 26 years the late Moses Mathis was better known as the Bicycle Man in Fayetteville, refurbishing used bikes and distributing them to at-risk children in December in time for Christmas.
The Greater Works Community Fellowship of Wake Forest is one of the organizations continuing the Bicycle Man’s legacy, and on Saturday, June 28, will be the official local drop-off site for new and used bicycles that will be distributed to children in December. There is a possibility that the fellowship will also be the distribution site locally in December.
If you have a bike and would like to help a child and at the same time combat childhood obesity, then deliver it to the Greater Works Community Fellowship at 1428 Wall Road between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. on June 28. If you have questions, you can call Pastor Gordon McKinney at 919-263-1406.
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Town residents are having to learn the new rules for zoning and other land and planning requests and hearing with the new Uniform Development Ordinance. To help everyone understand the rules, the Wake Forest Planning Department has produced three booklets: A Citizens Guide to the Special Use Permit Process, A Citizens Guide to the Rezoning Process and A Citizens Guide to the Major Plan Review Process.
The booklets are available online at http://wakeforestnc.gov/planning.aspx and you can also pick up the printed booklets at the planning department in town hall on Brooks Street. They are, of course, free.
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To earn his Eagle Scout badge, Liam Murray of Boy Scout Troop 5 recently built and stationed two benches for the Loop Bus stops on North White Street near CVS and on East Holding Avenue in front of the Wake Forest Library and the Northern Regional Center. The wooden benches were placed so they will be shaded during the summer.
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The planning department’s Technical Review Committee met on May 15 and reviewed two constructions.
Christian Brothers Automotive wants to build an auto repair shop on 1.75 acres at 1751 Heritage Center Drive. The zoning is highway business.
The Huntington Spring Housing Association plans to build apartments for seniors on 6.48 acres at 1887 South Franklin Street, a tract shaped something like an arrow on the east side of the street adjacent to part of Heritage and across the street from the farmland that will become Holding Village. The zoning is RMX, residential mixed use. Although the association is an LLC, it is not listed with the North Carolina Secretary of State’s office.
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A reader wondered why the town requires residents to bag their leaves and grass clippings in the spring and summer. He thought it was much more efficient to use the town’s vacuum truck because that is a one-man operation whereas collecting the bags requires a two-man crew.
Public Works Director Mike Barton sent an email with the answer. “The current ordinance requires it and too much wear and tear on equipment for year round use. When leaf season officially starts the equipment will be ready instead of being in the shop for repairs which has happened many times in the last five years!”
This is what the town requires:
From Monday, March 17, through Friday, Sept. 26, all leaves and grass clippings must be bagged for collection or placed inside a garbage receptacle marked ‘YW’ (yard waste).
Wake Forest residents are urged to adhere to the following guidelines to help improve the collection process:
- Bags can be clear or opaque but they must be at least 13-gallons in size – the size of a standard kitchen garbage can liner;
- Do not put yard waste in grocery store shopping bags or inside town-issued rollout garbage or recycling carts;
- Do not mix in sticks, trash, rocks or other debris;
- Place your bagged leaves and grass clippings at the curb by 7 a.m. on your normal yard waste collection day.For complete information about yard waste, go to www.wakeforestnc.gov/leaf-collection.aspx or call 919-435-9570.
Loose leaf collection will resume Monday, Sept. 29.
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Recently the new leadership of the DuBois Alumni Association requested that the Town of Wake Forest vacate the ag/shop building on the DuBois campus. After it was renovated – resurrected, really – several years ago with the help of county funds, part of the building was used as a police substation and office space for lieutenants while the rest of the building held office and meeting space used by the alumni association.
A note in the town manager’s monthly report to commissioners says the town has most recently been using to the space for storage. “As of May 28 we are out of the building and have informed the association they will now be responsible for all costs of operating the building, including utilities.”
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It was the town giving notice in another instance, this time to Wake Forest Arts, which has been using the small house on Brooks Street that was formerly the planning department annex for offices. The group has until about July 6 to find a new space, and there is no word if they have found anything suitable. The town plans to remove/abate the asbestos and remove the house.
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The Wake Forest Rotary Club is selling tickets to a special benefit concert at 2 p.m. Saturday, June 28, at Wake Forest Baptist Church which will benefit the Tri-Area Ministries Food Pantry. Tickets are $15, $12 for students and seniors.
The concert will feature harpist Jasmine Hogan, a Wake Forest native and an international prize-winning harpist who has won acclaim worldwide as a soloist and performer with orchestras, opera companies and chamber musicians. She was a Rotary Ambassador Scholar to China and won a U.S. Fulbright Award for Chinese music.
See a Wake Forest Rotary Club member for tickets or pay at the door.
