Normally, the types of people and things that I report about don’t make front page news. Well, sometimes in the News and Record, but I digress.
And this is the point where I will stop and shamelessly plug my Twitter and Instagram accounts @blackurbanist, where you can find live tweets and photos from today’s Piedmont Together seminar. I’m on the program again, playing myself, well, the version that advocates for transit and writes Placebook’s Daily News every weekday just for you. If you love reading this and keep missing it because it doesn’t show up on social media often enough, subscribe to our email.
Meanwhile, back to the subject at hand. Chicago and sometimes New York and Cleveland get attention for big time city bribes and corruption deals. You know the kind, the kind profiled in American Hustle. Charlotte gets attention for being slow and southern. Well, it used to. Now, along with light rail and snarling traffic, IKEA, pro teams, major consumer financial operations and lots of expensive apartments and homes, Charlotte has a disgraced mayor.
So does that make us, us meaning the South, equal? Probably not. When Atlanta had its issues over the snow, people just laughed. However, when many of our leaders begin to show the same propensities, do we on the home front just sit back and scoff and laugh? Or do we highlight the people, on the ground and many times still in the city halls, the county courthouses and other government and office buildings that just know to do the right thing.
Think on this issue, but remember, do right by your community, always. The rest of the news:
On this list, Rocky Mount is one of the nation’s smallest dangerous cities.
Someone may get kicked off Downtown Greensboro, Inc.’s board.
More on Greensboro’s Gate City Boulevard’s new zoning restrictions.
What Governor McCrory was like in college.
North Carolina’s part of the federal transportation fund could dry up this summer.
The City of High Point is looking to improve the High Point Theater.
The Guilford County School Board may vote tonight on purchasing a former Catholic school to expand one of its magnet high school programs. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools parents have several new school options for their children next fall.
Buncombe, Henderson and Jackson County lead all population growth in Western North Carolina in the past three years.
Asheville is one of USA Today’s six small cities with an awesome food scene.
The City of Fayetteville has forced the auction of the Prince Charles Hotel.
New apartments in Wilmington are expected to ease the demand for multi-family spaces in the city.
And finally, what should North Carolina’s new slogan be?