The ol’ college try didn’t count for much with Elon’s town council this week as its members attended to a slate of year-end appointments to the town’s advisory boards and commission.
During its latest regularly-scheduled meeting on Tuesday, the council delivered a double blow to Elon undergraduate Tina Varis, who had submitted applications to serve on both the town’s planning board and its sustainability committee.
In the case of the planning board, which doubles as Elon’s board of adjustment, the council had received three other applications for a pair of in-town positions. The council ultimately awarded these posts to incumbent planning board members Mark Podolle and Aiesha Leath, whom the town’s planning director had commended for their faithful attendance and constructive input at planning board meetings.
Passed over in the course of these reappointments were both Varis and Elon resident Matthew Byrd. As a consolation to Byrd, who was present on Tuesday to press his case for the appointment, the council encouraged him to apply for the town’s comprehensive plan steering committee, which is expected to have an open slot in the spring. No similar invitation was extended to Varis, whose resume described her as being on a three-year track to graduate with a degree in Environmental Studies and Public Policy.
The council was even more blunt in its dismissal of Varis when it turned to Elon’s sustainability committee, which weighs in on the town’s energy consumption and ecological impact. Because there’s nothing in state statute to stipulate the makeup of this board, the council has gradually expanded it from four to seven members – three of whom are currently students at Elon University.
Elon’s planning director Lori Oakley informed the council that she had also received a request for reappointment from the committee’s chairman Dennis Pagano. She added that the council could approve Pagano’s reappointment with or without the concurrent installation of Varis. Oakley nevertheless conceded that, with three of its seven slots assigned to students, the sustainability committee has trouble attaining a quorum whenever the university isn’t in session. The council, for its part, resolved not to exacerbate this problem with the appointment of another college undergrad.
“I’m not comfortable appointing another student,” Elon’s mayor Emily Sharpe declared as she gave voice to the prevailing mood of the council, “and I think we should put a limit in the [committee] bylaws on how many students are allowed so we don’t even get this far in the future.”
The council went on to approve Pagano’s appointment in a 4-to-0 vote – the same margin by which it had accepted Leath and Podolle’s reappointments to the town’s planning board.
The council also voted 4-to-0 to approve a recommendation from Alamance County to elevate planning board alternate Rachael Dimont to a position reserved for a resident of Elon’s extraterritorial jurisdiction. This seat was slated to free up with the voluntary departure of Diane Gil, who has served as the planning board’s ETJ representative for the past 30 years.
The council made no changes on Tuesday to the town’s other appointed advisory board, which focuses on matters of diversity, equity, and belonging. Sharpe told her colleagues that this DEB committee is currently mulling a proposal “to adjust what they do and how they do it,” which is expected to come before the council next year. She advised the council to hold off on reconfiguring the committee’s membership until then.
Councilman Quinn Ray was absent from Tuesday’s proceedings.
