What can you do to help stop this annexation?
- Write, email, and call the folks on City Council
- Show up to the Public Informational Meeting (9/13/10 at 5:30pm)
- Show up to the Public Hearing (10/12/10 at 5:00pm)
- Sign our petition
- Put a sign in your yard supporting No Annexation
- Write a letter to the editor (Citizen Times, Mountain Express, etc.)
- Talk to your neighbors about this and encourage them to do any of the above!
Here is a copy of the email I sent to all of City council:
ReplyDeleteI already pay for the services you claim will be provided! My neighbours do as well and have been for decades! If a city council was given unlimited power to kick city residents out of the city, there would be outrage. The idea would be considered absurd. Yet in North Carolina, a city council with no relationship to citizens who live in unincorporated areas can generally do whatever it wants to bring those citizens into the city.
Based on the level of recourse provided to property owners in state statutes, nearly every state in the country (48 states) has abandoned North Carolina’s outdated approach to forced annexation. The primary purpose of forced annexation, according to the North Carolina Supreme Court, is for municipalities to provide meaningful services to the annexed areas, but the problem is that the League, instead of apologizing for failure and seeking REAL reform, they ask for incentives to provided services to neglected areas while the ones who have had services for decades get swept up regardless of the fact that they are not actually receiving any services they didnt already have!
In other words, they want to get paid to do what they were supposed to be doing in the first place.
Also, in NC, thereis NO OVERSIGHT on forced annexations. the logical oversight would be to allow counties to approve annexations. If municipalities want to annex an area, it should be their burden to pay the costs of water and sewer infrastructure.
It is not too much for every North Carolinian to be treated equally regardless of weather they live in cities or not. It is baffling that in a democracy, and especially such a “progressive” city that something like the right to vote is something that is scorned so badly!
We already have sidewalks the residents maintain, and that is what you're using as justification for adding $150 a month to our bills by forcibly annexing us without allowing the residents to vote on it. That $150 a month is the difference between keeping the water and electricity on for some of us! I mean it THAT literally! We already pay for services, I honestly cant afford anymore bills and work 60 hours a week! Beyond that I am a single parent. If I wanted to live in the city and pay that much in taxes I would have moved there. I love this city and community but to disallow a vote on whether we get annexed is almost beyond words.
Respectfully,
Agnes Cheek
Agnes - Thank you so much for helping flood the emails of the councilmen and women! They need to know that we are truly a neighborhood of working people who don't need or want to be annexed! I hope others read this and are inspired to send (and post!) their own letters they've sent to city council. I hope to meet you on Monday night at the meeting.
ReplyDelete- Wendy Guyer
Unfortunately, due to business travel I can't make the informational meeting but will definitely be at the hearing on 10/12. I will also send e-mails to the city council as suggested. I haven't seen a petition. Who can I contact to sign the petition?
ReplyDelete