Chronology

St. Joseph CME sold Henry W. Baldwin's Broad Street land to Carrboro for a park

Henry W. Baldwin, a Black landowner in the Lloyd/Broad neighborhood, left his estate to St. Joseph CME Church. During the pastorate of Dr. L. Kenneth Bennett the church sold a tract on Broad Street to the Town of Carrboro for a park, which was named Baldwin Park in his honor.

Sandy McClamroch helps found the Carol Woods retirement community

McClamroch, by then a former mayor and the founder of WCHL, was instrumental in founding the Carol Woods retirement community in Chapel Hill in 1979.

Chapel Hill brings public housing under direct town control after a rent strike

After a rent strike and other problems in the 1980s, the town council took over public housing from a separate housing authority and ran it as a town department. Chapel Hill and Shelby are the only North Carolina municipalities with that structure.

Northside's Black population falls by about 40 percent

Between 1980 and 2010 Northside's Black population fell by roughly 40 percent as investors bought homes and converted or replaced them as student rentals; over the same period the share of university workers living 10 or more miles away rose above 60 percent.

Robert Campbell helps start Faith Tabernacle Oasis of Love International Church

Campbell and his wife helped start Faith Tabernacle Oasis of Love International Church, where he was ordained in the 1980s. He has said his bishop's charge to the congregation to go beyond its own comfort turned him toward the landfill and the neighborhood's water.

Orange County begins discussing the first expansion of the Eubanks Road landfill

Ten years after the landfill opened, the county began discussing an expansion even though it had estimated the site would be full by 1985. Residents had been told the landfill would close after about ten years.

Chapel Hill, Carrboro and Orange County bought the Greene Tract as a possible landfill site

The three governments purchased the roughly 164-acre Greene Tract, just north of Rogers Road inside Chapel Hill's extraterritorial jurisdiction, for a future landfill. The county's landfill site search committee did not choose it, and its future use was argued over through the 1990s.

1990 census counts the Hispanic-origin population of Orange County, Carrboro and Chapel Hill

The 1990 census counted 1,279 persons of Hispanic origin in Orange County (1.4% of 93,851), 199 in Carrboro (1.7% of 11,553) and 607 in Chapel Hill (1.6% of 38,719). Census Bureau report 1990 CP-1-35, Table 5 (counties) and Table 6 (places).

Carrboro, Chapel Hill and Orange County begin a countywide search for a new landfill site

The three governing boards started a countywide search for the next sanitary landfill, carried out with a citizens' Landfill Search Committee and an engineering consultant. The Greene Tract, bought in 1984 for landfill use, was screened but not made a finalist.

Orange County Affordable Housing Task Force creates the Orange Community Housing Corporation

The county's Affordable Housing Task Force created the Orange Community Housing Corporation, the organization that later became the Community Home Trust.

Chapel Hill Town Council recommends site OC-17 beside the Eubanks Road landfill for the next county landfill

After the search narrowed to four sites judged permittable, the council voted 7 to 2 to recommend a reduced site OC-17, adjacent to the existing landfill, as the county's next sanitary landfill. INDY Week reports that the county commissioners and the Hillsborough board also voted for it that month, with Carrboro Mayor Mike Nelson opposed.

People: Mike Nelson

Chapel Hill authorizes buying land beside the landfill to widen its buffer

The council unanimously authorized the town manager to buy the 4.05-acre Wilson property adjoining the Eubanks Road landfill at $6,000 an acre to expand a minimal buffer, subject to approval by Carrboro and Orange County.

Four governing boards hold a unified public hearing on a new landfill next to the Eubanks Road site

The Orange County commissioners, Chapel Hill council, Carrboro aldermen and Hillsborough commissioners took comment on site 17 and three alternatives. Neighbours including David Caldwell, Kathy Schinley and Cornelius Kirschner spoke against it, B.B. Olive presented a 39-signature petition, and Frank Emory, representing Duke University, said the poorest residents lived nearest site 17.

Assembly of Governments agrees compensation items for neighbors of the landfill

Orange County, Chapel Hill and Carrboro met as an Assembly of Governments in 1997 to take up benefits for people living near the Orange Regional Landfill and agreed a set of compensation items. In 2007 Carrboro Mayor Mark Chilton wrote that not all of them had been carried out.

People: Mark Chilton

Orange County chooses to keep expanding the Eubanks Road landfill instead of opening a new site

With site OC-17 blocked, the county announced it would expand the existing landfill rather than close it. A new construction and demolition landfill was later built on the north side of Eubanks Road.

Chapel Hill approves digging on the Neville Tract to build new landfill cells

The council voted 9 to 0 for a special use permit letting the Orange Regional Landfill take earth from the Neville Tract to build containment cells and for daily cover, with access across landfill property to Eubanks Road. Work was to begin by 1999 and end by 2007.

Duke University easement to NASA stalls landfill candidate site OC-17

Chapel Hill's manager reported that Duke University had filed an easement in favor of NASA on candidate site OC-17, leaving the towns unable to test the land. The council voted 8 to 0 to have the town attorney write to the U.S. Attorney and called an Assembly of Governments for October 22, 1997.

Project HomeStart opens

Project HomeStart, transitional housing for homeless families on Homestead Road, opened in 1998 as a joint project of the Inter-Faith Council and the Orange County/Durham Coalition for Battered Women. By October it housed five families; it now runs as IFC's HomeStart shelter for women and families.

Chapel Hill sets conditions for new solid waste sites before handing control to the county

The council unanimously directed its Landfill Owners Group members to secure a construction and demolition waste site by fall 1998, naming land on the north side of Eubanks Road next to the landfill, with eminent domain if needed, and the Greene Tract as options. It said pending solid waste issues had to be settled before any change in governance.

Chapel Hill backs countywide funding to extend water lines to the Rogers Road neighborhood

By a 7 to 2 vote the council said water service lines for the community around the landfill should be paid for from a countywide revenue source so that all county residents share the cost, and opposed using the sales tax for those benefits.

Community Land Trust in Orange County is incorporated

Local activists and governments incorporated the Community Land Trust in Orange County to keep homes permanently affordable through ground leases.

El Centro Latino serves Latino residents from Carrboro

El Centro Latino, incorporated in 1999, provided educational and social services, advocacy and cultural activities for Latinos in and around Orange County from Carrboro. It closed the day before Thanksgiving 2009 after funding losses and eight executive directors in ten years.

The solid waste interlocal agreement set 60 acres of the Greene Tract aside as Headwaters Preserve

The 1999 Solid Waste Management Interlocal Agreement set the terms for disposing of the 104 acres that stayed in joint ownership and allowed 60 acres to be deeded to Orange County, which became the Headwaters Preserve. In 2002 the three governments adopted a resolution identifying acreage on the joint portion for preservation and affordable housing.

Chapel Hill lets Orange County commissioners pick the next construction and demolition landfill site

With the existing construction and demolition landfill expected to fill by summer 2000, the council voted 9 to 0 to let the Board of Commissioners select an in-county replacement site on its behalf, citing time pressure and the expected transfer of solid waste authority to the county.

2000 census counts the Hispanic or Latino population of Orange County, Carrboro and Chapel Hill

The 2000 census counted 5,273 Hispanic or Latino residents in Orange County (4.5% of 118,227), 2,062 in Carrboro (12.3% of 16,782) and 1,506 in the Orange County part of Chapel Hill (3.2% of 46,798). Census Bureau report PHC-1-35, Table 3.

The land trust sells its first home, in Carrboro

The first land trust home was sold in June 2000 in Carrboro. By then the organization had helped create nearly 100 affordable housing opportunities in Chapel Hill.

Land trust and housing corporation merge as the Orange Community Housing and Land Trust

The Community Land Trust in Orange County merged with the Orange Community Housing Corporation under the name Orange Community Housing and Land Trust. It reached 100 homes in 2005 and 230 by 2014.

Mark Kleinschmidt serves on the Chapel Hill Town Council

Kleinschmidt was elected to the Chapel Hill Town Council in 2001 and served until 2009. He was executive director of the Fair Trial Initiative and a former board president of the state ACLU affiliate.

Town Council approves UNC's main-campus Development Plan under OI-4 zoning

The Chapel Hill Town Council approved the university's Development Plan covering 582 acres of the main campus in the Office/Institutional-4 district, proposing 41 new buildings, 8 parking decks and new roads, about 5.9 million square feet in all, to carry out the 2001 Campus Master Plan.

Orange County agrees to build a new construction and demolition landfill tied to a recycling ordinance

Because the construction and demolition landfill on Eubanks Road would fill around 2003, the Board of Commissioners agreed to build a new one only if certain bulky materials had to be recycled. The Regulated Recyclable Materials Ordinance took effect on October 1, 2002.

Town forms the Horace Williams Citizens Committee to shape review of the tract

Chapel Hill formed the Horace Williams Citizens Committee in 2003 to advise on development proposals for the university's Horace Williams tract, and the Town Council adopted the committee's March 2004 final report as town policy.

Robert Campbell petitioned Chapel Hill for bus service to the Rogers Road neighborhood

Minister Robert Campbell asked the Chapel Hill council to extend free transit service to the Rogers Road community, noting that it lacked sidewalks and sewer service and that children walked along the landfill's heavy truck route. He suggested rerouting underused Airport Road buses.

People: Robert Campbell

Chapel Hill enacts the Northside neighborhood conservation district

After residents asked for protection from student-rental conversions, the council enacted the town's first neighborhood conservation district, a zoning overlay limiting house size and height in Northside. An advisory committee drafted it through 2003 before a January 21, 2004 public hearing.

Carrboro formed the New Horizons task force for the Rogers Road area

Carrboro created the New Horizons task force to serve residents of the Rogers Road area it was annexing. The town's Rogers Road sidewalk and bus stop project, begun in 2018, grew out of the task force's work.

Chapel Hill council took up how to carry out a Rogers Road small area plan

Under a 2002 resolution adopted jointly by Orange County, Chapel Hill and Carrboro, Chapel Hill had agreed to plan the residential area west of the Greene Tract around Rogers and Purefoy roads, including an affordable housing site. The manager recommended starting after four neighborhood conservation districts were finished, with the Planning Board leading.

Carrboro annexed subdivisions on the west side of Rogers Road

Carrboro annexed six subdivisions north of Homestead Road, including Fox Meadow and Highlands, bringing part of the Rogers Road area inside town limits. In September 2004 the aldermen had voted 6 to 1 to go ahead even though the historic neighborhood had asked the two towns to move their annexation boundary so the community would not be split.

People: Mark Chilton

UNC's Latino Migration Project begins the New Roots/Nuevas Raíces oral history initiative

The Latino Migration Project at UNC-Chapel Hill began New Roots/Nuevas Raíces to record stories of Latino migration, settlement and integration in North Carolina, with interviews archived through the Southern Oral History Program and University Libraries. The project has collected over 200 interviews, adding about 20 a year.

People: Hannah Gill

UNC's Campus Master Plan update is approved

The update to the 2001 Campus Master Plan found about half of the 2001 plan's sites under construction or in design, with over six million square feet of new buildings under way, and put remaining main-campus capacity at about 4.5 million square feet; it planned residence halls to replace Odum Village on South Campus.

Carrboro aldermen bar police arrests based solely on civil immigration violations

The Carrboro Board of Aldermen unanimously adopted Resolution No. 123/2005-06, making it police policy not to arrest or take into custody anyone solely because they have or may have committed a civil immigration violation. The board had asked the town attorney to research the question on April 18, 2006.

People: Mark Chilton · Jacquelyn Gist · Randee Haven-O'Donnell · Joal Hall Broun

Chapel Hill enacts the Pine Knolls neighborhood conservation district

The council voted 9-0 to adopt Ordinance O-7 creating the Pine Knolls district, which bans new duplexes, caps floor area at 2,500 square feet and reduces front-yard parking. The Greenwood and Kings Mill/Morgan Creek districts were adopted the same night.

Residents founded the Rogers-Eubanks Neighborhood Association

About 85 households founded RENA as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, putting a long-running informal community alliance on a formal footing. RENA went on to organize the Coalition to End Environmental Racism and to run the neighborhood's community center.

St. Joseph CME Church and UNC begin the Northside oral history partnership

Rev. Troy Harrison and UNC professor Della Pollock began collecting oral histories in Northside, the project that grew into the Marian Cheek Jackson Center.

St. Paul AME Church bought land on Rogers Road for a new church campus

The Chapel Hill congregation bought more than 22 acres for a worship complex with a banquet hall, wellness center, daycare, senior and affordable housing, athletic fields and a cemetery. The land, at Rogers Road and Purefoy Drive, became the site of the planned St. Paul Village.

Orange County commissioners vote to put a waste transfer station at the Eubanks Road landfill

The board voted unanimously to develop a solid waste transfer station at the landfill site, following its Solid Waste Advisory Board's recommendation, over objections from Rogers Road residents. The landfill was then expected to fill in 2010.

People: Mike Nelson · Robert Campbell · Valerie Foushee

Carrboro rewrites its density bonus for affordable housing

Section 15-182.4 of Carrboro's Land Use Ordinance sets a goal that at least 15 percent of units in new residential developments be affordable and offers density bonuses or payments in lieu to meet it. The section was rewritten on June 26, 2007.

UNC trustees approve the Carolina North plan

The Board of Trustees approved a plan for Carolina North on the Horace Williams tract, later submitted to the town with the 2009 rezoning application; the trustees adopted Carolina North design guidelines on November 19, 2008.

Carrboro adopts an anti-lingering ordinance at the Jones Ferry and Davie roads day-labor corner

After neighbors complained about conditions at the corner where day laborers, many of them Latino, waited for contractors, the Board of Aldermen approved an ordinance barring waiting at the intersection of Jones Ferry and Davie roads from 11 a.m. to 5 a.m. In September 2007 the board had also approved an action plan and a motion to create a designated space for day laborers.

People: Mark Chilton

Commissioners reopen the search for a transfer station site

After Rogers Road residents and the Coalition to End Environmental Racism pressed the county, the Board of Commissioners announced it would reopen its search for a transfer station site. Eubanks Road stayed on the list while consultant Olver Inc. drew up siting criteria.

People: Robert Campbell

David Caldwell retires as a sheriff's lieutenant to organize in Rogers Road full time

Caldwell joined the sheriff's department in 1985 after returning to the area and retired as a lieutenant in 2008 to work full time on community and social justice work. He became project director and community organizer for the Rogers-Eubanks Neighborhood Association.

Commissioners drop Eubanks Road and choose two other transfer station candidates

Conceding that the 2007 choice had not adequately weighed its effect on Rogers Road, the commissioners voted 5 to 1 to pursue two other sites, the 143-acre Howell property and an OWASA tract in Bingham Township.

Chapel Hill council received the Rogers Road Small Area Plan Task Force's final report

Council members Mark Kleinschmidt and Bill Strom presented the report, and the council voted 9 to 0 to send it to advisory boards, Carrboro, Orange County, OWASA and the city schools, with a joint public hearing planned for October 2009. Rev. Robert Campbell of RENA thanked the council for giving the community a voice.

People: Robert Campbell · Mark Kleinschmidt

Marian Cheek Jackson Center opens at St. Joseph CME Church

The Marian Cheek Jackson Center for Saving and Making History held its ribbon cutting on the second floor of the H.W. Baldwin Fellowship Hall at St. Joseph C.M.E. Church. It is named for Marian Cheek Jackson, the church historian and lifelong Pine Knolls resident.

UNC's library exhibited Rogers Road family histories drawn from Emily Eidenier Pearce's book

The exhibit We're All Family Here: Preserving Community Heritage in the Rogers Road Neighborhood of Chapel Hill introduced families who had shaped the area from the 1700s on. It was inspired by Pearce's 2009 history Rogers Road, which RENA presents as part of its History Project.

Town Council approves the Carolina North development agreement and U-1 zoning

After ten joint work sessions with trustees and hearings on May 11, June 15 and June 22, the Town Council approved a 20-year development agreement for Carolina North and rezoned the in-town portion of the tract to University-1, authorizing about 3 million square feet on 133 acres.

The Greenbridge condominium towers topped out on West Rosemary Street

The 10-story and 7-story Greenbridge towers, with 98 condominium units, rose on the former Black business block that had held the Mason Motel. Northside residents opposed the project in an open letter, and restaurant owner Mildred "Mama Dip" Council said rising property values threatened her business.

Mark Kleinschmidt is elected mayor of Chapel Hill

Kleinschmidt won 4,006 votes to Matt Czajkowski's 3,766 with all 21 precincts reporting, succeeding Kevin Foy, who had endorsed him. He was Chapel Hill's first openly gay mayor and the third openly gay man elected mayor in North Carolina, after Mike Nelson in Carrboro.

Commissioners vote to truck county trash to Durham's transfer station

After OWASA refused to sell or swap land for a transfer station and Chapel Hill withdrew its Millhouse Road property, the Board of Commissioners voted to haul county trash to Durham's transfer station for three to five years while the towns and county weighed a longer-term plan.

2010 census counts the Hispanic or Latino population of Orange County, Carrboro and Chapel Hill

The 2010 census counted 11,017 Hispanic or Latino residents in Orange County, 2,603 in Chapel Hill and 1,921 in Carrboro, as compiled in the NC Office of State Budget and Management's LINC Census Population dataset.

El Centro Hispano opens a Carrboro office

El Centro Hispano, founded in Durham in 1992, added a Carrboro office in 2010 after El Centro Latino closed. It planned a resources office, legal and tax clinic, tutoring, ESL classes and an HIV prevention program at Carrboro Plaza on N.C. 54, beside a new Latino Community Credit Union branch.

RENA opened its first community center on Edgar Road

Three years after incorporating as a nonprofit, the Rogers-Eubanks Neighborhood Association opened a small community center on Edgar Road so the neighborhood had a place of its own to gather and run programs.

Chapel Hill adopts an inclusionary zoning ordinance

The Town Council unanimously passed an ordinance requiring for-sale developments of five or more units to make 10 to 15 percent of them affordable to households earning 65 to 80 percent of area median income, or to give land, housing or cash in lieu. It took effect in 2011 and does not cover rental projects.

Orange County commissioners raised the landfill tipping fee to pay for Rogers Road remediation

Commissioners raised the tipping fee from $52 to $57 a ton to create a remediation fund of about $50,000 to $60,000 a year for water and sewer connections, cleanup of illegal dumping and a community center in Rogers Road. The county also moved $750,000 out of its solid waste reserve for the same purpose. Chapel Hill and Carrboro objected to the timing of the fee.

People: Robert Campbell · Mark Kleinschmidt

Council freezes building in Northside and Pine Knolls for six months

The council voted 7-0 for a six-month development moratorium in Northside and Pine Knolls, backdated to May 23, 2011, while a community plan was drafted. Jackson Center staff helped organize residents in support.

Commissioners decide not to extend the life of the landfill

The Board of Commissioners voted not to extend the landfill and approved cleanup of 50 illegal dump sites. In April 2011 it had postponed a decision on deepening the landfill, which could have added capacity to 2018.

Council adopts the Northside and Pine Knolls community plan

The council approved three resolutions under the plan, amending both conservation districts with building rules effective February 1, 2012 and a four-vehicle-per-lot parking limit effective September 1, 2012.

Commissioners set the landfill's closing date and created the Historic Rogers Road Neighborhood Task Force

On the night the Orange County commissioners voted to close the landfill on June 30, 2013, they also authorized an eight-member task force, with two members each from Chapel Hill, Carrboro, the county and RENA, to recommend how to deliver sewer service and a community center and how to guard against displacement. An interim report was due that August and a final report to the Assembly of Governments on December 6, 2012.

People: Penny Rich

New Roots interview records the history of the Spanish Mass at St. Thomas More

Luis Royo, coordinator of Hispanic ministries at St. Thomas More Catholic Church in Chapel Hill, told New Roots interviewer Kelsey Jost-Creegan that the parish's Spanish Mass went back almost twenty years. He said his coordinator post had existed for about ten years and that he was its fourth holder.

A new Northside Elementary opened on the old Training School grounds

The Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools opened a new Northside Elementary on the former Orange County Training School site. In 2012 neighbors had rallied to make sure the new school kept the Northside name.

Neighbors form the Rogers Road Community Unity Board

The Community Unity Board brought together leaders from every sub-neighborhood of Rogers-Eubanks, among them Historic Rogers Road, Billabong, TallyHo, Meadow Run, Phoenix Place and Sandberg, for continuing talks about the area's future. RENA and the Jackson Center reconvened it in 2015 for the planning work the three governments had asked for.

EPA accepted RENA's civil rights complaint over water and sewer service for investigation

The EPA Office of Civil Rights took up the question whether the Orange County Planning and Inspections Department had intentionally discriminated on the basis of race by denying water and sewer service to the African American residents of Rogers Road. RENA had filed the complaint with the U.S. Justice Department, which referred it to several federal agencies, and it was joined to an earlier complaint against OWASA accepted on November 23, 2009.

Chapel Hill extended its extraterritorial jurisdiction over the Historic Rogers Road area

Because none of the neighborhood lay inside Chapel Hill's limits, the town could not legally spend money on its sewer, so the council held a public hearing set for October 15, 2014 on bringing its part of the area under the town's extraterritorial jurisdiction. Afterward the neighborhood was split between Carrboro and Chapel Hill's ETJ.

People: Robert Campbell

NEH funds public access to the New Roots oral history archive

The National Endowment for the Humanities awarded UNC-Chapel Hill a Humanities Collections and Reference Resources grant (PW-51527-14) to open public access to New Roots interviews through a bilingual digital archive.

People: Hannah Gill

RENA and the Jackson Center produced the Historic and Vibrant Rogers Road report

The Rogers-Eubanks Neighborhood Association and the Marian Cheek Jackson Center put together survey analysis and community feedback on the neighborhood's future. Two years later the same partners ran the planning process behind Mapping our Community's Future.

Carrboro aldermen declare the town a welcoming community for immigrant children

The Board of Aldermen unanimously passed a resolution declaring Carrboro a welcoming community for minors fleeing violence and affirming immigrant children's right to attend public school regardless of immigration status. The Southern Coalition for Social Justice and the ACLU of North Carolina helped develop it.

The county-funded Rogers Road Community Center opened at 101 Edgar Street

Orange County commissioners awarded a $522,488 contract to Riggs-Harrod Builders of Durham on April 1, 2014 after a first round of bids came in at two to three times the authorized budget and the building was redesigned. The larger center, with a community room, kitchen, computer lab and outdoor courts, opened that December a short walk from RENA's 2010 building.

Mark Kleinschmidt leaves the Chapel Hill mayor's office

Kleinschmidt served as mayor from his election in November 2009 until 2015.

New community house opens

The men’s shelter moved to Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard.

UNC, Self-Help, the Jackson Center and the town launch the Northside neighborhood initiative

UNC-Chapel Hill committed a $3 million, 10-year, no-interest loan to Self-Help to buy Northside homes as they came on the market and hold them in a land bank for affordable resale or rental. The Jackson Center and the Town of Chapel Hill were partners.

People: Mark Kleinschmidt · Carol L. Folt

Carrboro's Center for Employment and Leadership for day laborers opens

El Centro Hispano, the Carrboro Day Laborer Task Force, Orange County Justice United and the Town of Carrboro opened a workers' center for day laborers at 201 W. Weaver St., which organizers called the first in North Carolina. The opening began with a march from the Jones Ferry and Davie roads corner and followed about ten years of planning.

People: Lydia Lavelle · Randee Haven-O'Donnell

New Roots launches its bilingual digital archive

New Roots/Nuevas Raíces launched a Spanish and English website with more than 150 digitized interviews, including audio recordings, abstracts and full transcripts. UNC's University Libraries handled digitization, cataloging and preservation.

People: Hannah Gill

RENA and the Jackson Center published the Rogers Road community plan commissioned by the three governments

In July 2015 Orange County, Chapel Hill and Carrboro asked the Marian Cheek Jackson Center and RENA to run a community-first planning process as sewer design advanced. The resulting report, built from nine Unity Board sessions and two rounds of interviews, set four priorities for the neighborhood and became the reference document for the later zoning districts and Greene Tract resolutions.

People: Robert Campbell · David Caldwell Jr.

Orange County voters approve a $5 million affordable housing bond

More than 65 percent of voters approved $5 million in bonds for affordable housing, alongside a $120 million school bond that passed with 75.5 percent.

A stone gateway honoring Northside's freedom fighters was opened at Rosemary and Roberson streets

The gateway of Chatham stone carries eight black granite slabs with civil rights images and quotations from oral history interviews. It was opened with a ribbon cutting at the first Northside Festival, as the Jackson Center renamed its annual celebration.

People: Hilliard Caldwell

Barbara Foushee receives the Chapel Hill-Carrboro NAACP's Martin Luther King Jr. Community Service Award

The branch gave Foushee its Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Community Service Award for work promoting diversity and social justice. She was then the branch's secretary.

Ground was broken on the sewer extension to the historic Rogers Road area

Orange County, Chapel Hill, Carrboro, OWASA and RENA held a groundbreaking at the RENA Community Center on Edgar Street after the sanitary sewer design was finished and a contractor hired. Construction was to begin in July 2017 and run 10 to 12 months.

People: Robert Campbell

Barbara Foushee is elected to the Carrboro Board of Aldermen

Foushee, who announced her candidacy in March 2017 saying she wanted a seat at the table where changes were made, won a seat in the 2017 municipal election. She served on the town's governing board for six years before being elected mayor.

Carrboro broke ground on the Rogers Road sidewalk and bus stop project

A $1.37 million project put a five-foot sidewalk from the west side of Rogers Road to Meadow Run Court, together with a new bus pad and shelter. Ground was broken in late June 2018 and construction began that fall. The project traced back to a New Horizons task force created in 2005.

Mark Kleinschmidt is elected Orange County clerk of superior court

Kleinschmidt was first elected clerk of superior court in 2018 and has held the office since. The state judicial branch says that in the post he has worked to strengthen court services and the administration of guardianship matters.

Carrboro created a zoning overlay district to protect the Lloyd-Broad neighborhood

At residents' request the Board of Aldermen set square-footage and parking limits and a cap of four unrelated occupants per household for the historically African American neighborhood, which had seen more student rentals and larger replacement houses. New building had to comply at once and existing houses were given three years.

People: Lydia Lavelle

Chapel Hill voters approve a $10 million affordable housing bond

About 72 percent of voters approved $10 million in general obligation bonds toward the town's goal of 400 new and 300 preserved affordable units over five years, including public housing redevelopment.

Chapel Hill and Carrboro created Historic Rogers Road zoning districts

The Chapel Hill Town Council closed its public hearing on May 22, 2019 and enacted Land Use Management Ordinance amendments establishing new zoning districts for the Historic Rogers Road Neighborhood. Carrboro added Section 15-136.1 to its Land Use Ordinance on June 18, 2019, creating the HR-R and HR-CC districts expressly to carry out the Mapping Our Community's Future plan.

The Rogers Road sewer extension was placed in service

OWASA put the extension into service on June 27, 2019 after the state accepted the as-built certification, ending a wait that residents traced to the 1972 landfill agreement. About 3.5 miles of sewer had been laid, and the neighborhood held a celebration at the community center on June 3. Individual owners still had to pay to connect their homes.

People: Penny Rich

EPA closed the Rogers Road civil rights complaint as moot

The EPA External Civil Rights Compliance Office told the Orange County attorney that Complaint No. 13R-07-R4 was closed because interlocal agreements to which the county was a party had produced a completed water and sewer extension, and because OWASA is bound by those agreements to serve Rogers Road residents who connect. The letter found no systemic issues left to investigate and made no finding of discrimination.

2020 census counts the Hispanic or Latino population of Orange County, Carrboro and Chapel Hill

The 2020 census counted 15,812 Hispanic or Latino residents in Orange County, 4,734 in Chapel Hill and 2,723 in Carrboro, from the 2020 redistricting data as compiled in the NC Office of State Budget and Management's LINC database.

Family and community march to remember James Cates on the 50th anniversary

A candlelit march went from Hargraves Community Center to St. Joseph CME Church and down Franklin Street to Peace and Justice Plaza, where the Town of Chapel Hill invited residents to leave flowers and messages for the Cates family. Mayor Pam Hemminger pledged to work with the family and UNC to investigate the killing.

People: Danita Mason-Hogans

Community Home Trust marks 30 years with 332 permanently affordable homes

At its 30th anniversary the Home Trust held 332 permanently affordable homes in Chapel Hill and Carrboro, up from about 100 in 2005.

James Cates Remembrance Coalition proposes naming Student Stores for Cates

A coalition of Cates's family, historian Danita Mason-Hogans and community members proposed renaming UNC's Student Stores building in his honor. The building had not been renamed as of 2024.

People: Nate Davis · Valerie Foushee · Danita Mason-Hogans

The three governments adopted an interlocal agreement on the future of the Greene Tract

The agreement required Orange County, Chapel Hill and Carrboro to act jointly in hiring consultants, entering development agreements and taking public input, put the mayors, chair and managers in a working group to negotiate the ultimate uses, and stated an initial intent covering mixed use and affordable housing, a school site with recreation, a joint preserve and connectivity. A November 2021 resolution then approved the recombination plat and the conceptual plan for the 60-acre county tract and the 107-acre joint tract.

Chapel Hill Public Library webinar marks the 51st anniversary of the Cates killing

The Chapel Hill Public Library hosted a webinar in which family and friends, including state Senator Valerie Foushee, a first cousin of Cates, reflected on his life and on the failures that followed his death.

People: Valerie Foushee

Northside land bank passes 41 properties

By mid-2022 the initiative had bought more than 41 Northside properties with the UNC loan, and 51 families with 50 children had moved into the neighborhood through its housing work.

Justice Department opens a cold-case investigation into the Cates killing

The U.S. Department of Justice opened an investigation into the killing under the Emmett Till Unsolved Civil Rights Crime Act and its cold-case initiative for racially motivated killings before 1980. Cates's cousins Nate Davis and Valerie Foushee welcomed the review.

People: Nate Davis · Valerie Foushee

UNC announces a permanent memorial to James Cates in the Pit

Chancellor Kevin M. Guskiewicz announced that a permanent memorial to Cates would be installed in the Pit later in 2022, developed with students, faculty, staff and the Cates family, approved by the Board of Trustees and supported by the Town of Chapel Hill.

People: Kevin M. Guskiewicz

Chapel Hill names the Hargraves Center gym for Nate Davis

The Town Council unanimously approved naming the Northside Gym at the Hargraves Community Center for Davis, the center's director for more than three decades, and its indoor court for Fred Battle, director from 1970 to 1987.

UNC dedicates the James L. Cates Jr. Memorial in the Pit

On the 52nd anniversary of his death, UNC dedicated a black lectern-style marker near the spot where Cates was stabbed, with an inscription from the University and the Town of Chapel Hill. Speakers included Chancellor Kevin M. Guskiewicz, Congresswoman-elect Valerie Foushee for the family, student body president Taliajah Vann and BSM president Julia Clark.

People: Valerie Foushee · Kevin M. Guskiewicz

EMPOWERment broke ground on PEACH apartments at the former Pine Knolls Community Center

The nonprofit began building 10 debt-free apartments for households earning 30 percent or less of area median income at 107 Johnson Street, where Ted Parrish had run the independent Pine Knolls Community Center. It had raised $3.5 million for the project.

Carrboro adopts a townwide Language Access Plan

The Town Council adopted a Language Access Plan naming six community languages (Spanish, Chinese, Korean, Karen, Burmese and Arabic), with Spanish the most spoken. The plan was developed with UNC's Building Integrated Communities program and the Refugee Community Partnership.

Chapel Hill breaks ground on the Trinity Court redevelopment

Trinity Court, 40 public housing units built in 1975 and vacated in 2018 for structural problems, is being rebuilt with Community Housing Partners as 54 affordable apartments after an April 2022 rezoning and an October 2022 tax credit award. Leasing began in winter 2026.

Student groups hold a memorial for James Cates in the Pit

The Southern Student Action Coalition, the Black Student Movement, the Community Justice, Abolition and Anti-Racism Collective and the UNC NAACP held a memorial at the Pit, where speakers criticized the wording and placement of the 2022 plaque.

People: Danita Mason-Hogans

State law removes Chapel Hill's zoning control over UNC projects

The Regulatory Reform Act of 2025 became law without the governor's signature, making UNC System projects in Orange County subject only to state rules and leaving the town a consultation role on utilities, stormwater, traffic and similar matters.

Carrboro Town Council reaffirms support for immigrant communities and its 4th Amendment status

The Town Council passed a resolution by council members Eliazar Posada-Orozco and Cristóbal Palmer condemning discriminatory actions by U.S. Customs and Border Protection and reaffirming Carrboro's status as a 4th Amendment town. The council had voted unanimously for that designation on May 20, 2025.

People: Barbara Foushee

Students and residents mark 55 years since the killing of James Cates

The Carolina NAACP chapter and the Black Student Movement held a remembrance for Cates on campus, and student leaders again called the 2022 plaque's passive wording inadequate.

UNC announces a campus extension at Carolina North

The university announced plans for a mixed-use extension on about 230 acres around the former Horace Williams Airport, with student and workforce housing, research space and retail, calling it the largest expansion since 1793; groundbreaking is expected in summer 2027.

Orange County's clerk of superior court is honored for work in guardianship law

Kleinschmidt received the Isabella Award at the National Probate Judges Conference for his contributions to guardianship and probate law. The award is named for judge Isabella Horton Grant and goes to people whose leadership improves guardianship laws, court administration and practice.