March 24, 2004. Town Of Cary staff recommends to accelerate annexation process and reduce public notice.

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In this "recommendation" the first chance the public gets to know about a voluntary annexation is recommended to be removed by staff for an "automatic" direction.

Here is how it works. The staff will make all the pre-determinations about a property requesting voluntary annexation. That they say will eliminate a "few weeks" of time to approve it.

What they don't tell you, the public, in this recommendation is that the neighbors surrounding such property requesting voluntary annexation(as in the case right now of the property being considered in Dutchman Downs) will not have that initial notice (by virtue of the fact that it would not be a part of the Town Council Agenda as a first step) that property next to them is being considered for annexation and rezoning.

This means quite simply that Cary Staff is trying to speed up the process so that opposition by surrounding neighbors will not happen or be greatly reduced due to the fact that by the time the neighbors know what is going on, the public hearing will have already happened or be in such a short time after the neighbors find out that an organized opposition will be difficult to put together.

By this recommendation The Cary Town Staff is showing that it wants to be a sneaky government that tries to move quickly through a process without ample opportunity for neighboring opposition and their ability to be aware of what is taking place around them. In essence, this is a move to limit your ability to be heard in opposition by speeding the process and reducing the time it takes and must be in the public process!

Having an item on a Governmental Agenda is open records...this proposal keeps the voluntary annexation "a secret" while planning uses its "automatic" direction to put the whole thing together and then just quietly posts a public hearing notice at City Hall and on the property. This takes several weeks away from when the public will know what is going on and just sneaks the annexation right past you as quickly as they can!

s Always,

Ron Thoreson
Ron@StopCary.com

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TOWN OF CARY
STAFF REPORT

Amendment to the Voluntary Annexation Procedure (PL04-046)
Consideration of simplifying the voluntary annexation procedures

Speaker
Ricky Barker

Planning & Development Committee
3/18/04

TOWN COUNCIL MEETING

FROM: Ricky W. Barker, AICP, Associate Planning Director
Prepared by: Jeffery G. Ulma, AICP, Director, Planning Department

Approved by: William B. Coleman, Jr., Town Manager, Benjamin T. Shivar, Assistant Town Manager

INTRODUCTION: Staff recommends reducing the number of times that a voluntary annexation petition is before the Town Council at its meetings. Presently, these petitions are placed on three separate Council agendas to:

Direct staff to investigate the sufficiency of the petition; Certify the sufficiency and set the date for the required public hearing; and Hold the public hearing and act on the annexation ordinance.

The first item (directing staff to investigate the sufficiency) is regularly approved by council under the consent agenda because it simply directs staff to determine whether the petition contains the correct signatures and has an accurate boundary description. Items two and three are more important actions. If Council directs staff to automatically investigate the sufficiency of voluntary annexation petitions, then the first step can be eliminated from council action. Through this procedural change, voluntary annexation petitions will be processed more efficiently (reduces processing time by several weeks) and the work related to placing this item on the council agenda will be eliminated.

The Town Attorney has reviewed the state statutes and has determined that this change will meet the processing requirements.

Staff Recommendation: Direct staff to automatically investigate the sufficiency for all annexation petitions received by the Town, with Council only acting on the other two steps in the process.