This article was originally posted in our June 15, 2022 newsletter, Chapel Hill Matters, and was updated on June 19, 2022 with these changes:
- Corrected the amount of cemetery acreage that was sold by the town to DHIC for 8.5 acres. The price was not one dollar but $100.
- Updated description of DHIC to specify that they are a Raleigh developer specializing in affordable rentals.
- In the post, we originally put acreages for the affordable housing and the amount to be sold. We took these from a plan but it was pointed out later that Michael Parker didn’t actually list amounts in his petition. We have updated to as not to suggest that he specified acreage.
CHALT continues to advocate for the creation of a community park in northeast Chapel Hill with the town-owned property purchased from the American Legion. The 36.2 acres of Legion land contains 8.6 acres of Resource Conversation District, or RCD, land and 1.3 acres of steeply sloped land, leaving only 26.3 acres of buildable land. The remaining acreage is composed of two portions: 19.5 acres from Legion Road to the RCD area (this includes the 3 acre pond) and 4.6 acres behind the RCD.
Affordable housing is a worthy goal, one that does not have to require the loss of public green space benefiting neighboring residents, many of whom qualify as lower income. Linda Brown raises the issues of “Change with Equity, Reparative Justice, and Fair Development” in this Chapelboro opinion piece.
History and Context
The history of how this site was acquired by the Town bears revisiting to fully understand the context of current discussion, as well as to understand the opinions of many community member for why this property is destined to be a town park.
The bottom line summary is that Mayor Hemminger, in one of her first notable actions as Mayor in 2016, succeeded in reversing a closed session Council agreement to waive the Town’s right of first refusal to buy the property and to allow developer-built luxury apartments on the Legion site. Under her leadership, the Town made an offer of purchase for the American Legion property which was accepted. See Town Information Page and the purchase agreement that requires that the parcel be named “Legion Park”.
The Legion purchase was celebrated at an event at the Arts Center by many Chapel Hill neighborhoods in the surrounding areas who lacked a park. Over the years the small 10-acre park at Ephesus Elementary has been heavily utilized, and neighbors have enjoyed the adjacent woodlands of the large 36 acre Legion property next door. With the construction of many apartment units in Blue Hill, the need for a park is even more acute than it was in 2013, when the Town’s Parks and Recreation Department proposed a Community Park for the northeastern part of town by combining Ephesus Park with the Legion land.
It is also important to understand the area surrounding the property. The adjoining Blue Hill district is under a disappointing form-based code (see our article “Are we Building Communities, or Just Structures?”). CHALT formed in part due to failure to include affordable housing and other community needs in this code. When this Council realized that affordable housing was ruled out by this zoning, the Town sold 8.5 acres of Chapel Hill Cemetery for $100 dollars to DHIC, a Raleigh-based developer specializing in affordable rentals. (Assessed value of the land was 2 million dollars.) Regrettably these new units do not make up for the loss of the previously existing affordable Park Apartments – which the Town allowed to be torn down and replaced with luxury apartments while placing 200 families in need of immediate, affordable housing – units which did not exist in Chapel Hill. (see Park residents must vacate).
The Council appointed the American Legion Task Force chaired by Rachel Schaevitz (who later in 2017 was elected to Council) to plan for the Legion property and held a community charette involving over 120 participants. The Task Force presented two reports to the Council in 2017. Their findings supported a park and did not support selling the land or using it for affordable housing. However, mixed use was not ruled out. The report includes the results from a citizen survey, which identified Athletic Activities and Casual/Passive activities. Also in the report were staff priorities. The staff said: “This site is the best opportunity for a community park in northeast Chapel Hill. Residential growth nearby underscores the need.”
Since early 2020, a hardy band of citizens on a weekly basis have removed invasive species growing on the Legion property, pulled stilt grass, sawed out wisteria vines, cleared out the forest floor, planted native plants, and defined trails in the woods and near the stream. There are fifteen regular weekly volunteers plus UNC students, four Scout troops, and members of local civic organizations and churches. They have involved the Parks and Rec Department and experts from the Botanical Garden. They estimate that they spend between 900 and 1000 volunteer hours per year working at the Legion site.
Council Member Parker’s Petition
Fast forward to June 1st of 2022. Council member Parker, supported by a council majority, petitioned the Council to begin a planning process that included elements that threaten the community park concept. The petition asks the Town Manager to take actions that would “begin a process of developing an implementable plan based on the 2016 resolution that would use the following as a framework.” These included selling or leasing a portion of the Town-owned land along Legion Road and exploring affordable housing for other portions.
Given the physical constraints of the property, these requests would result in a much smaller park and the loss of a large stand of mature hardwood trees, and the petition’s content has proved controversial. The Town Council discussed the Parker petition in a work session (video recording) where public comment was not allowed.
Why a Park?
Chapel Hill is growing. One of many concerns with selling this land is that it proposes a short-term solution for a long-term problem. Our new neighbors, and many existing neighbors, need homes. They also need Town services and green space. These goals are often spoken of as if they are mutually exclusive.
Housing and public recreational space are not and should not be framed as oppositional. As Chapel Hill grows, our new neighbors will also need space to walk, picnic, and let their children play. Far from being a luxury we can’t afford, access to public parks is a well-known equity issue with far-reaching implications for climate resilience and residents’ physical, social, and psychological wellbeing.
A 2007 article from NC Policy Watch is still relevant today: “Too often, a disconnect exists between the strategies used to promote greater housing options for low- to moderate-income residents and strategies used to preserve the environment. Can’t we change that? Surely we can.” (“Meeting the Need for Affordable Housing and Land Conservation“)
Don’t We Already Have Enough Park Land?
The Trust for Public Land (TPL) rates our Town as not only lacking but woefully behind. So why do the Town’s metrics suggest that Chapel Hill has abundant park land? A closer look reveals that the Town is including land that is owned by UNC, destined for other uses, and/or not publicly accessible. For example, Chapel Hill’s metrics count the Jay Street property which will be developed. It also includes inaccessible land owned by the Botanical Garden which while environmentally important for conservation is not truly a park.
It is interesting that Chapel Hill’s statistics – statistics that include the Legion tract as being “park land” – are being used to support the position that it is not a park and is not needed as one.
Referring to land owned by UNC as park land for Chapel Hill is a problem for many reasons. Most importantly, land owned by the University is not controlled by the Town and its continued use is not guaranteed. The public may be free to use UNC land such as in Battle Park, but the Town has no say in what happens to that land now or in the future. When residents call for park amenities such as a Splash Pad, sensory-friendly playgrounds, or pickleball courts, UNC-owned land is not on the table. It is unsound planning to rely on an expectation that UNC will be the provider of needed services for Town residents.
Even with these dubious inclusions, Chapel Hill is still way behind standards for park land. The nationwide median park area is 15 % – and Chapel Hill is only at 9 % – even with Chapel Hill’s skewed data. Other important features of TPL’s data is that Chapel Hill has Park Deserts. TPL identifies areas that need parks. They score areas next to Legion Park and the Greene Tract as “high Priority” for needing parks.
Residents exploring walkability data should also be aware that it can be skewed by Pocket Parks. Pocket parks boost the walkability metrics but can be incredibly small and may be of limited value to the whole community. Pocket parks need to be part of the overall plan, but might not meet most resident’s needs.
What’s Next?
A recent letter from the Chair of the Parks, Greenways and Recreation Commission with the approval of the entire Commission recommends that none of the Legion town-owned property be sold.
Finally, and most important, the American Legion property is the only available open space for a park left in the eastern part of the Town. Thousands of new residents in new apartments deserve a place to recreate. The new apartments located in “Blue Hill” already built contain 1015 units. Additional apartments are under construction on Ephesus Church Road or under contract on Fordham Blvd. numbering 922 units, and additional anticipated units through 2029 number 921 units, for a total of 2858 new housing units. If we assume that often more than one person lives in an apartment unit, that means several thousand people will soon be added to Blue Hill.
The four proposed housing developments (related: North-East Chapel Hill Neighbors Petition Town Council for Area Planning) along Old Chapel Hill Road will add even more residents in an adjacent area to the hundreds of residents in rental homes all along Legion Road and its side streets. Residents in the new units of affordable housing on Legion Road such as Greenfield Place, Greenfield Commons (for seniors), Legion Road Townhomes, Colony Woods West, and residents of the entire town deserve a place to recreate and connect with nature.
Virginia Long, Linda Brown, Abel Hastings, Julie McClintock, and Diane Willis contributed to this article.