Citizen Participation

You’d think I would have known better. After all, I’ve been writing about growth since before they called it Smart Growth, and I’m still writing about it now that it’s “resiliency,” or “sustainable growth” or whatever the next term is. I can’t count how many times I’ve explained that when you decide where you want […]

“Smart Growth was an intellectual fetish of a self-selected liberal Eastern elite.” Robert J. Grow, president and CEO of Envision Utah, a public-private collaboration in the Salt Lake City region, told about 400 Charlotte region residents that his Western region calls what it does “quality growth.” “It was our growth,” he said. “It was our […]

Concord’s Union Street, downtown Belmont and Charlotte’s First Ward and Plaza Midwood neighborhoods have all been nominated for “People’s Choice” awards in this year’s “Great Places in North Carolina” contest. North Carolinians are being asked to vote. Polls are open until March 15. North Carolina residents can vote online by going to www.greatplacesnc.org. At that […]

When Allen Nelson moved to Charlotte’s Commonwealth-Morningside neighborhood in 2007, he was drawn to the area’s bungalow-style homes, the graceful, mature shade trees and the tucked-away location so close to downtown. But in Nelson’s view, Commonwealth has some of the same problems of many Charlotte neighborhoods – overflowing trash bins, energy-leaking older homes, a scattershot […]

Amid a political environment attacking global sustainability initiatives, a new national poll by the American Planning Association released Thursday finds bipartisan support for planning, as well as belief that community planners play a key role in economic recovery. Some political groups have attacked planning and are crafting laws that would bar cooperative planning or ban […]

The city, instead of holding its traditional spring summit conference for neighborhood groups, will offer them space and time with facilitators in July to encourage strategic goal-setting and planning. The meetings will be in Foundation For The Carolinas’ uptown meeting rooms, which can accommodate as many as 17 organizations. Trained facilitators from the city and […]