We commend Councilor Branch for recognizing that the Missing Middle policy is not working as intended and that there are problems with it that need to be fixed. We challenge Branch’s fellow councilors to join with him to take positive action to stop these undesirable, incompatible projects.
In response to the 17,000 unit deficit I noted that between Dec 2019 and Mar 2023 Raleigh’s City Council approved zoning cases for over 70,000 residential units. Over 4 times the reported deficit. Unless those cases were speculative and only to raise the property values for resale purposes, Raleigh is NOT lacking the entitlement to build residential units.
I have been coming here since last year to talk about Glenwood South vandalism, brutal assaults, stabbings and gunfire. Raleigh citizens do not think you are doing anything about this issue. People in Raleigh want a safe place to live. In honor of what the city has let Glenwood South become I am wearing a t-shirt I had made. It reads ‘I went to Glenwood South and made it out Alive.’
This issue has been on City Council’s agenda for nearly two years now going back to Sept 2021. The Council has been very timid in their responses over this time. Council’s response to the latest wave of crime and neighborhood vandalism was all talk and no action, except to ask staff for another report in a month or two.
Preservation isn’t Nimbyism, it isn’t classist, it isn’t fossilization. It is care by design; it happens when people show up and participate.
Actions speak louder than words, and the action city council took on the Shaw University was one that allows religious discrimination to continue, and the enabling of an administration looking to avoid the consequences of their own actions. Government is supposed to protect the community, not to create investment opportunities for the wealthy. And Raleigh City Council chose the latter. It’s a disgrace to democracy.