Statements from the Board of County Commissioner Meeting

May 27, 2025

Full Meeting recording HERE

Ann Rebeck

Good Evening I am Ann Rebeck, the Lead Coordinator for the People's Alliance. As you know in early March you received a budget request letter from PA. The PA members collectively vote on the budget priorities and the items in this letter were selected via that vote.

Since 1993 the PA Education Action Team has fought for full funding for traditional public schools. That remains true here in 2025. We thank the County Manager for considering the 10 million dollar increase, we respectfully ask that you honor the DPS request for 16 million. We recognize the challenges of the budget this year but remain steadfast that the fiscal needs of our schools should be a priority. 

In the last year and half the PA Child and Family Policy team formed and grew. In our budget letter we asked for the County to fund the newly formed 501(c)3 Carolina Parent Defenders in the amount of $250,000. We believe that this initial grant to the CPD from the Board of Commissioners will help stabilize and reunify families in Durham County. Thank you to each of the County Commissioners for expressing your willingness to meet and discuss this opportunity with team members. I think we collectively believe that we can do better in Durham to keep families together.  In the next few weeks we look forward to holding actual meetings with Commissioners who have expressed interest but so far have not been able to talk with the team. We are also grateful to members of the DSS board for meeting and communicating with the Team about the request. You will hear from some of those team members tonight and hope you will take seriously the PA's request for funding of Carolina Parent Defenders.

Sydney Schildnecht

I’m Sydney Schildnecht, resident and social worker with Durham Public Schools. I’m also here with the People’s Alliance Child and Family Coalition. Respectfully, tonight I need you all to be partners to the children and families I work with by fully funding both the DPS budget, and the holistic early defense pilot program designed to prevent and mitigate unnecessary removal of children from their families and community context when involved with Child Protective Services.

As a social worker with DPS, I am paid on the teacher pay scale. However, we were excluded from this year’s Master’s pay after the Board failed to account for us due to their refusal to include worker voices through Meet & Confer. After months of organizing, the Board approved our pay for next school year, if y’all pass this budget. Not at 5% Master’s pay increase, which is a pay cut to the teachers receiving it this year, but in full.

Here’s the tension of social work. I believe I deserve to be paid respectfully for my degree and skills. I know my working conditions can mitigate burnout and that when I’m not burnt out, I do my best work with our most vulnerable students.

I hold this, as someone with macro social work training, as I work with families who are being evicted, while there are no available eviction prevention funds, and no plans to expand these in the budget. As I direct parents to Entry Point, where they’re placed on a months-long waitlist, with no plans to increase shelter capacity.

I’ve seen an increase of 20 unhoused students in my elementary school this year. This is up 50%, and only includes those identified.

When families are evicted and unable to find shelter, they’re vulnerable to DSS CPS involvement due to the department’s interpretation of “neglect.” After separation, it’s near impossible to find and maintain affordable housing here. That’s why tonight, I also ask you fund Carolina Parent Defenders through their pilot. Doing so moves funds upstream to prevent traumatic separation due to inhumane policies that penalize families for system failures. Early defense keeps families together, protecting them from the harms of stigmatization due to poverty imposed by failing systems. Be on my families’ and students’ teams. Fund the DPS budget and the Carolina Parent Defenders. Thank you.

Maya Bracy 

My name is Maya Bracy, and I am a Durham resident, developmental psychology researcher, intern serving Durham Public Schools, and member of the People’s Alliance and the Child and Family Coalition. I am here today to urge you to invest in a holistic early defense pilot program that supports families involved in Durham’s child welfare system.

In Durham, over 95% of maltreatment cases involve “neglect,” which often identifies symptoms of poverty, rather than a lack of care. When children are removed from their homes by the Department of Social Services, it’s then that they’re confronted with a sudden shift in their access to care. They’re removed from their attachment figures, care routines, and sense of safety. This ruptures critical developmental processes, including brain development and emotional regulation. It puts children at greater risk for developing long-term challenges with depression, PTSD, and forming healthy relationships. 

And the impact doesn’t stop with the child. Family separation is a traumatic event for parents, changing their lives and fracturing the trust and support they receive from their communities. Families are left alone to navigate complex emotional and legal experiences with few resources or social support to help them repair and reunify with their children. But by investing in a holistic early defense program like Carolina Parent Defenders, Durham County could help prevent unnecessary separation and trauma for the children and families of Durham.  

There is already evidence that programs like this work. In Massachusetts, Oklahoma, and New Jersey, early legal intervention and holistic services have kept hundreds of children out of foster care by supporting families, not separating them. These models prevent trauma, improve outcomes, and cost less than our current system. 

So, I ask that you allocate $250,000 dollars of the budget to holistic legal representation and early defense for families involved in Durham’s child welfare system and invest in an intervention that protects child development and promotes healthy outcomes for our entire community. 

Dear City Manager Ferguson and County Manager Hager,

The Coalition for Affordable Housing and Transit (CAHT) is a grassroots organization with 612 supporters committed to supporting programs, initiatives, and policies that increase affordable housing and public transportation options in Durham City and its surrounding county.  Our advocacy encompasses consideration of all social drivers (i.e., housing inventory, rental availability, eviction avoidance, health outcomes, AMI household income levels, environmental impacts, etc.) to promote affordable homeownership, providing neighborhood stability, diversity, and equitable wealth-building, housing security, and safety for all Durham residents. As such, we would like to provide our local government leaders with input on specific items of interest for the FY2025- 2026 budget planning process.

The four FY2025- 2026 City, County, or County-only budget priorities that our organization has endorsed previously and continues to advocate for in this year’s budget process are as follows,

Request #1: Continue funding the GoDurham Free Fares program, which helps alleviate the financial pressure on individuals and families facing economic challenges. ($1.5M)

Please note that the Coalition also adamantly opposes $2.00 fare proposals, as the increased fares would harm Durham’s struggling residents, who tend to use public transportation.

Request #2: Fully fund the HEART program, which provides valuable outreach and tangible support for residents facing eviction and homelessness.

Request #3: Maintain the 2-cent tax increase to the property tax rate implemented in the FY2021- 2022 budget. This increase is needed for:

1. Maintaining progress on developing and redeveloping affordable housing in Durham’s transit opportunity area for households at or below 60% Area Median Income (AMI);
2. Expansion of supportive housing program opportunities;
3. Continuation of the Down Payment Assistance Program for homeownership;
4. Funding the Repairs program for Durham’s low-income seniors;
5. Establishing a contingency fund to enable short-term loans to non-profits and city programs expecting HUD reimbursements; and
6. Implementing a rental assistance program for low-income residents to help offset the loss of federal-funded vouchers and other lost funding, thereby supporting Durham’s most vulnerable citizens.

Request #4: Continue the Low-Income Homeowners Tax Credit Program at its current funding level.

Additionally, CAHT requests funding for the following budget items, which are new requests for FY2025- 2026,

Request #5: The redevelopment project for the 505 W. Chapel Hill Street police headquarters is progressing slowly. However, the Coalition requests that subsidies be included in the budget to increase the number of affordable housing units in the Peebles Corporation proposal from 110 to 130, representing a 20-unit increase that requires subsidies.

Request #6: The allocation of $5 million to thoroughly remediate toxic chemicals (i.e., lead) in the affected parks.

We appreciate your consideration of our coalition community budgetary requests and are available to answer any questions regarding the information in this document. Please reply to this email with any requests for more information.

Thank you in advance for consideration of CAHT's requests as a member of community of organizations concerned about Durham residents and the area's affordable housing.

Sincerely,

Cynthia

Cynthia Williams, Chair

The Coalition for Affordable Housing and Transit of Durham

WHAT DOES “AFFORDABLE HOUSING” MEAN?

Henry Sniezek

It was once said by a guy who ran for President in 2012, “the rent is too damn high.” And, for many, it still is. The current consensus is that housing in Durham and in many portions of the country is not “affordable.” But, what does “affordable” really mean? This short piece will review what “affordable housing” generally means to our government(s) and also the private sector housing industry. 

THE 30% RULE

Emerging from public housing regulations in the late 1960s and early 1970s was a standard that no more than 30% of gross income should go towards housing costs. Specifically, it was the Brooke Amendment (federal HUD legislation) passed in 1969, which capped public housing rent at 25% of income, later adjusted to 30%. The 30% standard generally includes rent or mortgage payments (principal and interest), and utilities (e.g. water, sewer, electricity). Sometimes, depending on the program or policy, property taxes, homeowner's insurance, and homeowner's association dues may be included in the total housing expense calculation. 

INCOME CATEGORIES

Affordable housing programs and policies often focus on the following income categories:

• Very Low Income (households earning up to 50% of the area median income)
• Low Income (households earning between 50% and 80% of the area median income)
• Moderate Income (households earning between 80% and 120% of area median income)
• Workforce Income (sometimes defined in overlap or similar to Moderate Income, but also known to reference households earning up to140% of area median income)

The definitions and percentages above are often used but they may vary by program or policy.  For instance “very low income” has been used to mean up to 30% of area median income.

The meaning of “area” may vary by program or policy as well, and be defined as a city or county boundary, a census block, zip code, neighborhood, or other defined geographic area. 

“Household” usually means people living together sharing common living arrangements and expenses in one housing unit. Housing assistance programs often issue a yearly chart of median income for differing household sizes. Often, a household size of 4 persons is used to describe data and findings in reports and assessments about housing affordability in communities. 

COST BURDENED

“Cost Burdened” is frequently used in housing affordability assessments to describe households that spend more than 30% of income on housing.  “Severely Cost Burdened” usually means households that spend more than 50% of income on housing. 

HOUSING & TRANSPORTATION

In areas (such as dense downtowns) that offer a significant and viable range of transportation options in addition to the automobile, such as light rail (e.g. subways), buses, and other multi-modal choices (including walking), affordable housing policy makers may consider an “affordability” rule-of-thumb higher than 30% of household income. The rationale is that the availability of multiple non-auto transportation choices can lower overall expected transportation costs, and therefore open up additional income for housing. The Housing and Transportation Affordability Index, developed by the Center for Neighborhood Technology, suggests a benchmark of 45% of income for housing and transportation costs. For example, if an average of 10% of household income is used for transportation in dense multi-modal areas, then a benchmark of 35% of income for housing costs may be acceptable. 

DURHAM DATA

21.3%         -    Cost Burdened Mortgage Holders 2023

                          (Source: Durham Neighborhood Compass)

45%            -    Cost Burdened Renters 2023

                          (Source: Durham Neighborhood Compass)

$79,501.     -   Median Household Income 2023

                          (Source: US Census)

$408,600. -  Median House Sales Price - February 2025

                          (Source: Realtor.com)

$1,895.       -   Average Rent - March 2025

                          (Source: Zillow)