This Weekend FRIDAY Clear 74/47 SATURDAY Clear 76/54 SUNDAY Clear MILL 79/54 One-year anniversary! Special Music Section Inside carrborocitizen.com OCTOBER 2, 2008 u LOCALLY OWNED AND OPERATED u VOLUME II No. XXiX FREE Elizabeth Edwards pans McCain health care plan BY KIRK Ross a nation of equality,” she said. “We Staff Writer need to make sure we’re addressing the health needs of every American.” Elizabeth Edwards, joined by two Rep. Verla Insko, a Chapel Hill state legislators, two doctors and a Democrat, said the number of unin- patient at Piedmont Health Care sured people in the state is increasing, Center, announced her opposition to a situation that is likely to worsen in John McCain’s health care plan after the economic downturn. hosting a roundtable discussion at the Many of the people without health Carrboro-based community health insurance, Insko said, are working for clinic. small businesses, which cannot afford Edwards, a senior fellow at the the benefit. Center for American Progress Action She said she’s concerned about the PHoto BY kirk ross Fund and a health care advocate with McCain plan because it is “wrapped the center’s grassroots Change to Win Rep. Verla Insko, Elizabeth Edwards and Sen. Ellie Kinnaird listen as Carrboro in this mantle of the free-market sys- resident Ida Fikes talks about trying to understand the health care system. effort, said a new report by the cen- tem.” ter says the McCain plan threatens “We don’t right now have a market cannot provide it, government has to employer-based health care plans and help. And we’ve got to be very care- system in health care and deregulat- provide that service. The market is not could cost 608,559 North Carolinians ful. Are we providing help or are we ing it further would not create a mar- working.” their coverage. Edwards said that the providing just another bureaucratic ket system.” Sen. Ellie Kinnaird, a Carrboro health care crisis is not just a budget- nightmare without real help for real Health care is too complex for pa- Democrat, said she is hearing a lot of ary concern for families and employ- people?” tients to be the kind of informed con- stories from constituents in Orange ers, but a moral issue as well. McCain’s market-based plan, Ed- sumers that can make the market work and Person counties who have lost “We have so many people in this wards said, would put people with PHoto BY Ken Moore for them, she said. “It’s really kind of their health care. country who have no health insurance chronic conditions at particular risk. On four-to-ten-inch-tall stems, the silhouettes of scary, I think, to have this kind of pro- “I know that other legislators are or who are under-insured and until we She said if she tried to buy health tiny coralroot flowers against fallen oak leaves are posal put forward. When you have an hearing the same thing from their easier to see than the flowers, themselves address that we can’t keep saying we’re essential service and the private sector constituents,” she said. “They want SEE HEALTH CARE PAGE 5 FlorA BY Ken Moore Chancellor’s Board passes A really obscure school tour 300 E. Main BY SUSAN DICKsoN wildflower starts at CHHS Staff Writer ou most likely won’t see BY SUSAN DICKsoN the little autumn coral- Despite a few reservations, the Staff Writer Carrboro Board of Aldermen voted root orchid, Chorallorhiza unanimously on Tuesday to approve odontorhiza, on any of UNC Chancellor Holden Thorp kicked off a weeklong statewide tour the 300 East Main Street project, one your fall woods walks, on Monday with a visit to Chapel Hill of the largest commercial develop- Yand with that challenging notion High School. ments in Carrboro history. I hope you’ll go out and discover To learn more about North Caro- The 507,500-square-foot project it. lina and how UNC can better serve is on 5.24 acres extending from the I hadn’t seen one in years the state, Thorp is traveling to sev- intersection of Main and Boyd streets – just hadn’t been in the right eral different high schools and college near Nice Price Books to the present campuses. Scheduled stops include municipal parking lot on the corner place at the right time. Walking of Main and Roberson streets. It in- along a forest trail in an earth Asheville High School, West Char- lotte High School, Terry Sanford cludes a 150-room hotel, a five-story sanctuary west of Burlington High School and several UNC system parking deck, a central pedestrian last week, I was lucky to glance campuses. plaza, three large commercial build- down and spot one on the edge On Monday, Thorp attended Tom ings and extensive changes for Cat’s of the path. Stooping down for Herndon’s Authentic Research class, Cradle and The ArtsCenter. “a closer look” at that six-inch- an honors-level research methodology The developer, Main Street Proper- high, solitary leafless stem, I dis- class of nine Chapel Hill High seniors. ties of Chapel Hill LLC, first brought After watching as students tested the a site plan to the board in 2004. The covered that none of the flower board postponed a vote on the project buds were open. Happy to have nitrogen levels in fish tanks, Thorp sat down with students to talk with them earlier in September, saying they had discovered this little orchid again about what they want out of the col- additional questions about the devel- after so many years, my visual lege experience and the benefits of a opment. awareness was sharpened as I large research university. Board member Jackie Gist said the continued along the trail. “We need to hear what students project didn’t fit with her vision for Several hundred feet farther want,” Thorp said. “Otherwise, we Carrboro and that she had heard from won’t know how to create academic many residents who did not support along, I paused to examine a the project, but that she would vote fallen former giant of the for- programs that will attract them to our university.” for it because the developer had com- est reduced by years of decay Student Alec Nelson told Thorp he plied with the ordinances and made to a linear hump of rich organic all the changes the board asked them wanted to attend a college where he PHoto BY Ava Barlow matter at the trail’s edge. I was would have the opportunity to learn UNC Chancellor Holden Thorp visited Tom Herndon’s authentic research class at to make. surprised to find a cluster of about many different subjects, so that Chapel Hill High School on Monday, speaking to the students about the university, “I’m not very happy with this proj- four coralroots. Looking more he could really figure out where he research opportunities there, and encouraging them to try new things in college and ect. In my heart of hearts, I want to closely along the entire length, wanted to focus. Other students dis- to study abroad if possible. vote against it,” she said. “I’m going to cussed study-abroad programs, psy- vote for it, and the reason I’m going to I discovered several more clus- vote for it is that it meets the letter of ters of four-to-eight-inch-high chology and biology classes and more. his plans to attend medical school. and what motivates him as chancellor Thorp encouraged the students to Thorp’s plans changed at UNC, of UNC. the ordinance as it now stands.” orchid stems and a few more try to figure out what they were truly where he had the opportunity to get “I think those of us who work in Gist expressed concern particu- single ones scattered about in interested in and to pursue it. involved in experiments and devel- higher education, we believe that larly regarding the hotel and it’s sign. the adjacent forest litter. Here’s “If you study what you’re really moti- oped an interest in research. higher education has the ability to lift Developers had said the hotel in the a suggestion for any of you who vated and excited and passionate about, “If I hadn’t gone to a place where society,” Thorp said. “Our institution project would be a Hilton Garden may go out in search of this little then you’re going to do better than if you I could have had that kind of experi- in particular is the one that invented Inn, but said Tuesday that it could be orchid: Look for fallen trees in study something you think you ought to ence, then I might not have figured public higher education. a Hampton Inn. Both Hilton Garden study,” Thorp said, adding that students that out,” he said. “Our founders wanted us to be Inn and Hampton Inn are run by the advanced stages of decay. These Hilton Hotels Corporation. rotting logs seem to provide should keep an open mind. Thorp wasn’t the only one asking known all over the world for our aca- “When I was your age, I thought I the questions; students probed Thorp demic programs,” he said. “That’s why Laura Van Sant, the lead spokes- suitable sites for germination of knew what it was I wanted to do the about what UNC looks for in stu- I get up at 5:30.” the talcum powder-like seeds of rest of my life,” Thorp said, recalling dents, science opportunities abroad SEE EAST MAIN PAGE 5 these small terrestrial orchids.