New Street Names and Business Loans: Carrboro Town Council's January 30 Meeting

The Carrboro Town Council met on Tuesday, January 30 for a business meeting in town hall. Here are some highlights from the council’s agenda:

Street Name Changes

The town council unanimously adopted several resolutions relating to the renaming of streets. It provided financial support for citizens affected by the renaming of East and West Carr Street to Braxton Foushee Street in honor of long-time Carrboro resident Braxton Foushee. Foushee was the first black member of Carrboro’s Board of Aldermen, is a current member of the town’s planning board, and led the desegregation movement at the UNC Hospital cafeteria in addition to numerous other civil rights initiatives.

East and West Carr Street was named after Julian Carr, the namesake of Carrboro. Originally known as West End, due to its geographic location directly west of Chapel Hill, the town’s name eventually changed to Carrboro after Carr expanded his textile mill and agreed to provide electricity to the community. Carr was a Confederate soldier and the single largest donor to the Silent Sam Confederate monument on UNC’s campus. The Town of Carrboro has reckoned with its namesake in recent years, dedicating a “Truth Plaque” at the town hall to clarify Carr’s role as a segregationist.

The council also approved renaming Phipps Street to Lavender Street. The street was originally named after Luther James Phipps, a former Carrboro Town Attorney who prosecuted the case against four Freedom Riders in 1947. He was also influential in preventing Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. from speaking in the University Baptist Church sanctuary during his 1960 visit to Chapel Hill.

The council’s Race and Equity Pocket Questions document cites residents’ requests as the impetus for changing the name and lists structural racism as the underlying cause that led to the initial naming of Phipps Street. It notes that the name change is in an effort to build a more inclusive community.

Council Adopts Rewrite of the Business Revolving Loan Policy

The Business Revolving Loan Program Policy was adopted in 1986 with an emphasis on the creation or retention of jobs for business applicants. Loan recipients could use funds for the construction or renovation of a building, purchasing existing buildings, acquiring equipment, extending utilities to new sites, parking lots, and inventory.

Carrboro’s Economic Development Director Jon Hartman-Brown spoke to some of the challenges with the existing policy. As currently written, he said the policy provides little guidance or standards, and is operated on very subjective terms. It also requires that real property collateral be used for any loan.

“Most significantly,” said Hartman-Brown, “that the lean on the property cannot be in second position. So, that means if you have a mortgage or any type of loan that’s already against the land, you can’t use that property as collateral for this loan program.”

Some of the changes include providing more objective terms based on the applicant’s credit rating or standing, the amount borrowed, and the amount of collateral provided. The policy includes the removal of some collateral requirements for lower loan amounts, creates an internal credit system, and ties rates to the Prime Rate. It provides benefits for low and moderate-income entrepreneurs, expands the geographic qualifications to include the Carrboro Area of Economic Influence,” and requires living wages for certain borrowers. The program also creates a new category to include social businesses.

“We are also creating kind of a new business category,” Hartman-Brown said, “which we’re calling social businesses, and this is included in the loan program as well. These are typically nonprofits that use business tactics to fund their missions. We’re allowing them to come in here, understanding and recognizing that they play an important part in our economy as well.”

The council unanimously adopted the resolution.

Honoring Career of Police Lieutenant Michael Metz

The council honored retiring Police Lieutenant Michael Metz for his 25 years of service in the Carrboro Police Department by awarding him his service sidearm. Police Chief Chris Atack spoke on Metz’s service to Carrboro.

“Mike’s done a lot of wonderful things over his career,” said Atack. “When we had some lingering cases, homicides from the eighties and nineties, some involving children, Mike was instrumental when he was in criminal investigations to getting those solved. DNA technology evolved, so he got those solved and was able to charge people. There’s a lot of hurt and lingering pain. We still have some work to be done, but Mike was instrumental. He’s rough on the exterior, but he’s got a big heart, and a lot of the stories today talked about his career and his service were really needed to hear.”

To watch the full meeting, click here.

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