There was a small but interested audience in the Wake Forest Town Hall last Thursday night for WakeUP Wake County’s community conversation, Growing Pains, highlighting the present and future problems for our transportation, our drinking water and our schools.
There are one million of us in Wake County now and 62 people move into the county every day, Karen Rindge, head of WakeUP Wake County, said, and there could be two million here by 2045, not that far away. Plus the population’s makeup is changing with more seniors and more young millennials than previously with a growing Hispanic segment, now at 10 percent.
Rindge said the county’s need for drinking water will exceed the supply by 2060. Both current large drinking water suppliers, Falls Lake and Jordan Lake, are impaired and must get remedial action, largely reducing the amount of nitrogen and phosphorus from entering the lakes, soon. Part of the reason for the degradation of the lakes is the large increase in urban land cover, a 242 percent increase in 20 years.
We drive more miles per day than the U.S. average, Rindge said, and all our major roads will be at or over capacity in 10 years. One of the side effects? The American Lung Association rated our air quality at F in 2012. She quickly outlined the proposed transit plan for the county, which is still being assembled.
As for the schools, Wake has the sixteenth largest school system in the country with 2,000 or 3,000 new students each year, yet North Carolina ranks 46th in the nation for teacher pay and 48th for per-pupil expenditure. By 2020 we will need 33 new schools in Wake County, and the board of education has set a goal of graduating 95 percent of all students by 2020.
After Rindge’s presentation, moderator Don Mial turned to the three panelists: Rolesville Mayor Frank Eagles, Wake Forest Mayor Vivian Jones and Wake County Commissioner John Burns, asking their thoughts about transportation and transit.
“Money!” Jones said. “We need to have that half-cent sales tax on the ballot. It is a plan everyone can buy into, and everyone countywide will benefit.”
Eagles said South Main Street in Rolesville is now “a pleasure to get on” since the U.S. 401 bypass opened. “I think it’s helped Franklin County too.” He added that the commuter-type train should not stop at Wake Forest but go all the way to Henderson because there are a lot of people in southside Virginia who commute to work in the Triangle.
When it turned to schools, Burns said the growing Wake system needs capital investment and should be “a public school system that people don’t want to leave.” He added that the school system faces “a great challenge from Jones Street” and that if schools lose more teacher assistants and have to add more teachers for lower class sizes then “we will have to build more schools.”
Jones said the state should spend more on teachers and teacher assistants and complained that the school system is not encouraging enough vocational education. “A lot of young people are not going to college. If we don’t train them, they’re going to fail.”
Eagles said he was an advocate for vocational training. “If we teach them a trade, they’ll stay in (high) school.” He then related the story of a young woman who found her niche in life because the new Rolesville High School has a culinary arts program and she now is training to be a chef. “Good schools bring quality growth and makes good citizens,” he said. “The legislature has not stepped up to the plate.” Also, “If employees say we’ve got sorry schools, they’re not going to come here to work.”
Calling himself a “tree hugger,” Eagle said the 200-foot buffers along streams and rivers should be retained – they are threatened in the General Assembly – and said Rolesville is now going to “wavy,” not straight, sidewalks flanked by grassed swales to capture stormwater runoff. With the need for more water, Eagles said the old granite quarry near Rolesville holds a billion gallons and cannot be pumped down. “Why isn’t somebody using it?”
Burns talked about the future Little River Reservoir. The county has purchased all the land needed for the reservoir and now has an active program of buying land around it for open space.
Burns also said the proposed change in the distribution of the state sales tax could be an $8 million hit on Wake County next with a $1 million loss every year after that. “They are opening up sores that don’t need to be opened.” He said counties are very limited in how they can raise money, the property tax and sales tax. “Our property tax is really low. Our values are higher.”
As for growth, Eagles said he believes in sidewalks and trails. “You’ve got to plan and do open space.” Jones said the county seems “to build big schools that kids can’t walk to.” She urged building more dense communities, saying “Young people are not as hung up on big cars, big houses and big lawns.”
“We (the county commissioners) want people to choose to live where the transit is and development will follow,” Burns said. Transit should be “reliable, frequent, dependable and pleasant,” he said.
During the conversation section, Paul Harrison said he drives around a lot in Wake Forest and Raleigh and it “infuriates” him to see buses with no riders or one rider going by. Burns said the reason for the empty buses might be the infrequency of that service and “it’s asking a lot for someone to sit in the sun for an hour.”
Cheryl Casale explained her problems with the school system for her two sons, and Burns said the county is “doing our best to increase resources” and suggested she call County Commissioner Caroline Sullivan, who is very involved in schools and their services.
A woman who did not give her name asked about transit, and Jones told her Capital Boulevard would begin to be rebuilt as a limited-access highway in 2020. “Capital Boulevard is our biggest problem.”
Pat Wharton, a Rolesville resident, said she walks all the time and wants better and more cross walks for pedestrians. Eagles said he is having a fight with the state Department of Transportation about this issue because they “have a manual” and will not allow them “even if we pay for it.”
