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Collaboration is more than a word: Highlights from the North Carolina Human Trafficking Commission Conference
   October 12, 2022

Maris Bey

Under federal and North Carolina law, human trafficking is defined as using force, fraud, or coercion to obtain some type of labor or commercial sex act. And any minor involved in a commercial sex act is a victim of trafficking.

Trafficking is often confused with human smuggling, which consists of the movement of people across borders. The movement of an individual is not required for...

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Tracking nature in an unlikely place: Piedmont roadsides
   October 10, 2022
Ruth Ann Grissom

Becky Dill’s phone was full. After moving to Wadesboro from Pennsylvania, she’d started taking photos of all the pretty wildflowers she found along the backroads of Anson County. She needed to ditch some images. While searching for options to archive her photos, she stumbled across iNaturalist. It seemed too good to be true – the site would store her images for free, and experts would help her...

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Are other cities’ good ideas a threat to Charlotte’s future?
   October 4, 2022
Aaron Houck
If “superstar” cities rationalize their land-use policies, what does it mean for the Charlotte region?

As the global economy increasingly rewards technological innovation, the gains from productivity enhancements have not been distributed evenly across cities and regions. The residents of so-called “superstar” cities–including Boston, New York, San Francisco, San Jose, and Seattle–...

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This Charlotte planner thinks the city should scrap its transit plans
   October 3, 2022
Ely Portillo

Michael Gallis is a longtime planner with a big idea for Charlotte: Throw out the city's transit expansion plans and start from scratch. Gallis — who's been involved in some of the big plans guiding Charlotte's future, including the original five-corridor transit plan...

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Want to learn about Charlotte’s history? Check out these resources
   September 28, 2022
Ely Portillo

If there’s one constant in Charlotte, it’s change. And while the pace of new building and construction might make you think Charlotte doesn’t have much history (at least, not much left), there’s plenty to explore in the city’s past.

The rebranding and upcoming changes to the Epicentre got me thinking about the ephemeral nature of Charlotte development (Before it was home to the...

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Charlotte's tree canopy is under threat — and we all have a role to play in saving it
   September 26, 2022
Ely Portillo

Jane Singleton MyersCharlotte loves its trees. But are we willing to do all that we can to save them? 

That's the paradoxical question confronting Jane Singleton Myers, executive director of TreesCharlotte. The city's iconic tree canopy has shrunk from 49% to 45% coverage...

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Having the hard conversations: Gentrification and displacement in Charlotte
   September 26, 2022
Lori Thomas

Our first Schul conversation this fall focused on gentrification and displacement – a conversation that’s necessary and often difficult. The discussion featured three panelists: one of our Gambrell Faculty Fellows, Dr. Kendra Jason; Charlotte attorney and community housing advocate, Ismaail Qaiyim; research economist at the US Census Bureau, Dr. Kate Pennington; and our Director of Regional...

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Charlotte leaders are looking for regional cooperation — and funding — to restart stalled transit expansion plan
   September 21, 2022
Ely Portillo

Charlotte’s transit plan is dead — long live the Charlotte region’s transit plan? 

It’s been almost two years since the $13.5 billion Charlotte MOVES plan was unveiled, and there have been weeks of hints that changes are coming to the city’s plan for expanded rail, bus and other transportation...

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Four things I wish I'd known about Charlotte's housing market before I started writing about it
   September 15, 2022
Ely Portillo

No local issue has been bigger than housing in Charlotte for the past few years — specifically, how much it costs to find a place to live. 

The soaring cost of housing dominates local news, local government meetings and local conversations. Talk to anyone in Charlotte, and it won’t be long before you hear some version of the following stories: Cruising some Zillow listings in a nearby...

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Streets of gold? Debunking American immigration myths
   September 13, 2022
Aaron Houck

The 1986 animated film An American Tail celebrates America’s story of immigration in the late 1800s and early 1900s–using mice as stand-ins for the humans who came to these shores from Eastern and Southern Europe. The anthropomorphic rodents’ unrealistic hopes for their new home were best expressed in the song “...

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