Raleigh

Community-focused posts

There are 775 posts filed in Raleigh (this is page 47 of 78).

Coyote sighting

Late last night a man walking his dogs in the Cameron Park neighborhood spotted a coyote as it crossed the road about 20 feet in front of him. The coyote trotted on to the property of St. Mary’s College, apparently paying no mind to the man’s dogs.

I’ve had a friend report a coyote sighting in East Raleigh, too, but her sighting took place along the wooded Middle Crabtree Creek greenway east of Raleigh Boulevard. I think a coyote roaming around St. Mary’s is that much more unusual because of how urbanized that area is. It’s amazing how adaptable some wildlife is.

Thriving neighborhood

Friday morning I walked the dog as usual around the neighborhood. This particular morning I saw no fewer than 5 separate groups of people, either walking their dogs, jogging, or biking around. Not bad for 7 AM.

I also saw a group of eight 40-something people out playing Ultimate Frisbee in the park. Now that made me smile. Sure, they were hooting and hollering and probably waking up my neighbors, but what a sight that was! Folks were out using the park for what it’s meant to be used for. Two years ago I’d walk through that park in the morning and shady individuals would be there hanging out in their cars. They would often bolt when they saw me walking by. Now to see folks out exercising in the park in the morning really makes me happy. I don’t care how loud they are, that is just awesome.

Seeing people being comfortable coming to the park in the morning and the folks out walking around shows how healthy our neighborhood has become.

Sparkcon

We spent our afternoon at Sparkcon, Raleigh’s art and design showcase that “celebrates creativity.” Fayetteville Street was covered with hundreds of beautiful chalk drawings. circusSpark performers did acrobatic tricks. Bands played on the stage in City Plaza and the Turner family played drums in the drum circle provided by Raleigh Drum Circle members.

Playing drums is interesting. I struggled to keep a steady beat at first, but then something clicked and the drum seemed to play itself. I noticed subtle changes in the group dynamic, where someone would start a cool-sounding beat and others would then latch on. This would go on until someone else would take us in a different direction and then we all began to follow the new leader. Before I knew it I was playing non-stop for 20 minutes or more without feeling fatigued. Sure, it was a workout but rather than have tired hands after playing I had “happy hands.”

We spent the rest of our time drawing our own chalk drawings at the corner of Martin and Fayetteville streets. Then it was home for pizza and rest. It’s been a long day!

Neighborhood exchanged

I spent the morning attending the Raleigh Neighborhood Exchange, a half-day of talks and information booths designed to strengthen Raleigh’s neighborhoods. It was sponsored by the city’s Community Services department, which supports the city’s CACs, including mine. I was asked to be a presenter at this year’s Exchange, and so this morning I did two sessions with Eugene Weeks (a fellow member of the Parks board) and Jason Hibbets (chair of the Southwest CAC) on the topic of using high-tech and low-tech methods to strengthen neighborhoods.

I was originally planning to speak off the cuff at today’s meeting, but last night I became inspired to create what I hoped was a captivating slide presentation, Lawrence Lessig-style. I was up until 2:30 this morning assembling my slides, grabbing about 4 hours of sleep before I had to get up for the meeting. I arrived at the Convention Center with plenty of time to spare. The only problem is that the Exchange was being held at N.C. State’s McKimmon Center! I arrived at the correct venue about 10 minutes before our session was scheduled to begin. I had time enough to wolf down a muffin and grab my badge before the session started.
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No more divisions

There was a shooting last night not too far from my neighborhood. Three kids and one 18-year-old got shot, the 18-year-old fatally. Police are still working the case and haven’t released many details but they did let the neighbors know it wasn’t a random shooting and that the shooting had nothing to do with the neighborhood. The fact is, this could have happened anywhere. I followed the story as it unfolded on the local media websites, trying to assure folks that my area of town isn’t a bad one. Later this afternoon police arrested a suspect: a 24-year-old man, apparently Hispanic.

Because the shooting happened in East Raleigh, some forum commenters somehow assumed the victims and suspect were black. Out came the ridiculous comments deriding African Americans. Then when the suspect was Hispanic, even more heated comments appeared leaping to the conclusion the suspect was an illegal immigrant. Some went so far to say that if he’s illegal he should just be lynched!
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Political musical chairs in Southeast Raleigh

Political goings-on in my area of town just got more interesting. Long-time Southeast Raleigh activist and Wake County Commissioner Harold Webb has tendered his resignation, citing his health. Raleigh’s District C City Council representative James West is being considered to replace him. Should West get appointed, this will leave a vacancy on the City Council that the Council will fill by making its own appointment. The leading candidate for that is Eugene Weeks, a Democratic Party activist, co-chair of the South CAC, and my colleague on Raleigh’s Parks board.

I have worked with Eugene on parks issues for the last two years and fully support his nomination to the Council, should West be tapped for County Commissioner. Eugene has worked hard to improve Raleigh’s parks as well as his Southeast Raleigh neighborhood. I have no doubt he will work just as hard for the citizens of Southeast Raleigh.

Raleigh’s website woes

The City of Raleigh’s new website was in the news again today. City Councilor Russ Stephenson picked it apart in an email to City Manager Russell Allen. Russ’s experience is the same as most folks’: he tried using the search engine to find something and failed utterly. When I critiqued it myself, I faulted it for simply relying on the search engine as heavily as it does. That wasn’t even considering that the search engine seems so completely broken.

My buddy Scott has built many a website in his many years of geekdom. He’s a professional. He tells me that he had seen many $500,000 websites, and what Raleigh got is not one of them.
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East Raleigh Community Day

I am back from a fun but busy day at the East Raleigh Community Day. I was the master of ceremonies for the four-hour event, and also ran between booths to fetch supplies when needed.

It was fun, there was a good turnout from the neighborhood, and lots of kids got school supplies. That’s a good day in my book!

You can see pictures on Flickr here.

The City of Raleigh’s new website

Yesterday, the City of Raleigh unveiled it’s new website: the first update in a dozen or more years. The old website has long been a pet peeve, with it’s cryptic, miles-long URLs and lack of photographs or graphics. To find anything useful, users often had to resort to using the search box.

Unfortunately, that’s also the problem with the new website: to find anything useful the user has to use the search box. In fact, it’s more of an issue now. The old site at least attempted to categorize information in a hierarchical format (for every page, you saw a list of breadcrumbs that showed you where you were in the site). The new one, however, makes no attempt at all at organizing data (at least as far as I can tell).
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