Mayors+Council+Meeting


 * Page for discussion of what we should do at this meeting**

Mon 17 March 6PM Carvers Creek. We have one hour.

Subcommittee charged with developing presentation during our 2008 Feb 7 meeting: Gary Blank, Leigh Anne Cienek, Jamie Ramsey, Chris Snow

Hess & Blank will present. Snow will be there, and Ramsey is trying to arrange to be there.

Final presentation :: ::  :: Posted by Hess 2008 Mar 18.

Look at PDF to see what our handouts will look like (we are talking from this packet, not from a projector). Look at PPT to see talking points (notes).

Here is the endorsement, which Hess received by email ...

The presentation went well and the mayors passed a resolution endorsing our project; we will receive this in writing. They were very supportive. The final presentation is posted on the Mayors Council Meeting page.
 * Debrief of Mayors Association meeting** (copied from 2008 Mar 20 meeting notes)

What next? - Hess will send a note to the mayors next week thanking them for their support and with the one-page summary of our partnership attached.

From Jamie: I agree it went very well. Here are my take-aways from the meeting. Hope others there will chime in as well.
 * we got a great reception and did an equally great job of laying a foundation for future efforts to work with municipalities
 * discussion topics included: question about how much public open space there is in the County, Wake Forest newest parks, Fuquay-Varina talk with both planning and operational sides, acquisition of land in addition to already owned land, concern about if we were asking for money, urgency of purchasing land in Mark's Creek
 * by sending the executive summary to the mayors, it will give them all a more full description of our interests and our project. This will also be a good introduction for staff (hopefully the mayors will pass it on!)
 * we need to stress that we are only interested in the __best__ natural heritage lands -- I was concerned about the questions about how much public open space there is was not really relevant, since most of that land may not qualify as a nature preserve. Should we revise the mission to say "the most ecologically valuable..."?
 * when we present to OSAPAC and others, we should highlight the long term vision of a system of well recognized, well managed and high quality nature preserves across the county, regardless of who owns them
 * we need to build survey data into the power point for future presentations
 * it might be helpful to refine our examples to provide more diversity -- and I think the examples slide should be moved to later in the presentation
 * in the presentation, it should be "Wake Audubon Society"
 * we need to decide the best way to bring in municipalities
 * we need to also focus on the volunteer side of this project


 * NOTES**
 * We decided not to add "the most" in front of "ecologically valuable" in our mission - we can deal with issues like that as they come up without "micromanaging" the mission statement.
 * There was some discussion about the vision of a system of preserves. Basic idea is that people could get a pamphlet describing all of the nature preserves in Wake County, regardless of municipality. Some concern was raised that we might not want to identify the exact location of all of these areas, because some will be ecologically sensitive and we have a management recommendation to control access (ie, guided tours) to some exceptional natural areas.
 * We will beef up the PowerPoint with some survey information. General idea is to present a core presentation that can be modified (by removing or rearranging slides) to meet audience needs.
 * We need some basic statistics about open space in the county for use in presentations, answering questions, and any kind of brochures we might want to deliver. It would also be nice to have some of that on the web site.

//Action//
 * How to proceed with municipalities will be the major agenda item for our next meeting.
 * Hess & Ramsey will work on presentation.
 * Hess will send thank you to mayors next week

List of high-quality sites within Wake County (SNHAs) (Sinclair, updated 7 March):

Umstead State Park (NCDPR)- Old-growth beech-mixed hardwood forest on Crabtree Creek. Purple rhododendron is found along the slopes with several rare plants: Indian physic, Lewis' heartleaf, ginseng and dwarf ginseng. The four-toed salamander is found in small pools on the Crabtree Creek floodplain.

Mitchell Mill State Natural Area (NCDPR)- Granitic flatrocks containing soil pockets and shallow vegetation mats of lichens, herbs, and mosses. A rare moss (//Campylopus oerstedianus//) has its only North American occurrence here. One of the pioneer plant species occurring in the depressions is the endemic Small's portulaca, which grows only on fall-line granite outcrops and is considered a state Endangered species. Piedmont quillwort, another rare plant associated with fall-zone outcrops, is found in seepages and shallow pools.

Yates Millpond (Wake Co.)- One of the largest populations of Carolina least trillium (//Trillium pusillum// var. //carolinianum//) in the state.

Marks Creek Floodplain (Wake Co.)- A Regionally-significant occurrence of the rare plant Michaux's sumac (//Rhus michauxii//) with a string of Piedmont Semi-permanent Impoundments (beaver ponds).

The Rocks (Wake Co.)- Granitic flatrocks containing soil pockets and shallow vegetation mats of lichens, herbs, and mosses. Contains rare species such as Small's portulaca and Granite flatsedge.

Hemlock Bluffs Nature Preserve (Town of Cary, NCDPR) - A steep 80-foot high, north-facing bluff along Swift Creek that contains a disjunct population of Canadian hemlock that is over 200 miles east of its typical habitat in the mountains.

Horseshoe Farm Park (site name is Upper Neuse River Floodplain) (Raleigh)- The Neuse floodplain contains a well-developed natural levee forest with scattered floodplain pools that provide habitat breeding amphibians.

Lake Johnson (Raleigh)- Hilly topography just south of the lake supports a cluster of bigleaf magnolia (//Magnolia macrophylla//), and 15-20 mature longleaf pines (//Pinus palustris//), rare in Wake County. A small creek in the site contains a Piedmont Boggy Streamhead natural community.

Temple Rock (TLC)- A granitic flatrock, sloping gently to the west and surrounded by upland oaks and shortleaf pine. It contains representative flora including white-flowered sandwort, stone-crop, and the rare Small's portulaca. Many shrubs and trees, such as red cedar, loblolly & shortleaf pine, and oaks, grow on "islands" on outcrop where soil is deepest.


 * //OLDER DISCUSSION//**

We should be able to tell the mayors what we'd like by the end of the discussion.
 * What is are our objectives?**


 * What will we present?**
 * Brief background of need for action
 * Nature Preserves Project Concepts
 * Pilot activities with Wake County

Note: Please suggest current statistics or measures (and their sources) that would be useful to demonstrate growth and loss of open space in Wake County and other appropriate matters for this presentation. Here are some ideas. Your feedback would be appreciated!

Population change over time (past and projected numbers and percentages from Census data)

Land is developed at a rate of ___ acres per hour, per day, or per year. (last year, five years, ten years -- where can we find the most current and reliable data on this?)

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How much land is in publicly owned open space/parks/greenways in Wake County? (Wake Co., municipalities, State, total) - Louise - What is the intent of this question, or where are we going with it? Is the intent to say that as a pilot project, WC owns x amount of acres and does not have the resources to steward it all?

Is it possible to estimate how much (in terms of acres or percent) publicly owned land is SNHA? Louise - WC can give this information

Is there any measure of species lost within Wake County due to urbanization? Louise - Does this go back to George's point about being anti-growth? Can we frame this question to be about the value of stewarding open space to prevent species loss?