Council’s sledgehammer efforts at planning have been both thoughtless and undisciplined. Density does not improve quality of life or lower housing prices.
Good, thoughtful, inclusive processes result in good decisions. It takes a diversity of perspectives to avoid the most damaging, unintended consequences. Mary-Ann Baldwin is selling the lie that growth and development at any cost is good for the people who live, work and visit Raleigh.
“I have $500,000 in the bank,” she said in an interview with The News & Observer. Her response was in sharp contrast to the more statesmanlike response from challenger Terrance Ruth:
Your relentless drive to spread density everywhere is going to be the death knell for the remaining urban forests in our older subdivisions. You are riding the crest of the tree removal wave, as well as the steady progression towards increased traffic gridlock.