Town Council to shorten sessions

Town Council member and Mayor Pro Tempore Ed Harrison missed his birthday celebration once because a Chapel Hill Town Council meeting went past midnight.

But Harrison won’t have to miss any more birthdays — this session, all Town Council meetings will end at 11:15 p.m. due to an alarm system at the council’s new meeting location.

“It’s harder on the rest of your life if meetings go past midnight,” he said.

The unseasonably wet summer months flooded the first floor of Chapel Hill’s 42-year-old Town Hall. The building will be undergoing repairs for up to a year.

With the Town Hall out of commission, the Town Council obtained a temporary location to hold its meetings at the Orange County Southern Human Services Center located on Homestead Road.

Due to an alarm system set to operate at midnight in the Southern Human Services Center, the Town Council meetings must adjourn at about 11:15 p.m. to allow proper time for attendees to leave the building and for town staff to clean up.

With the new time constraint, the Town Council meetings should be more concise and concentrated.

Harrison said he thinks every step of the meeting will be carried out with more respect to time.

“The public needs to be able to speak, but they need to understand the new time restraints,” he said.

Council member Lee Storrow is excited about the temporary location and is eager to face the challenges of a restricted time frame for the meetings.

“It can’t hurt to force us to end in a shorter time,” Storrow said.

“Our Town Council work can happen anywhere because we have very smart council members and active citizens.”

Catherine Lazorko, the town’s spokeswoman, said the Town Hall is in need of more than just a cleanup.

“Due to the extent of the nature of the event, we are looking at the total structure of the Town Hall and looking to make changes with it for the better,” Lazorko said.

Lazorko said she is pleased with the temporary location.

“We made a request and told them when we would need to use the building,” she said.

“They have been very accommodating towards us in every way, and we are very gracious for the temporary location.”

Various changes will be made to accommodate the new location.

“We are temporarily not going to be streaming live coverage of the meeting on Channel 18,” Lazorko said.

“We will be recording the meetings and showing them later on the channel. We will still be streaming live coverage of the meetings online.”

Lazorko said town officials will be trying their best to make the transition a smooth one.

“We ask the public to exercise patience with us and know we are working to minimize the inconvenience,” she said.

city@dailytarheel.com