University Community Relations Alliance

UCRA Members – Andrea Weaver, Lindsey Trione, Lt. Lindsey, Rachel LaCoe, Brian Rostholder, Lt. Malone, Brian Renner, Daniel Lynch, Lee West, Miranda Rutledge 

Welcome and Approval of Minutes (2 minutes) 

Lindsey Trione opened the meeting with a welcome at 4:01 p.m. She let everyone know that minutes were distributed at the beginning of the meeting and are posted on our website. There were no edits to the minutes. Minutes were approved at 4:03 p.m., Miranda Rutledge moved to approve the minutes and Lt. Lindsey seconded the motion. 

Andrea Weaver, UNCW Office of University Relations (3 minutes) 

Andrea Weaver reported that the winter magazine came out in December. She brought copies in case someone wanted one. If anyone wants to be on their mailing list, let Andrea know at weavera@uncw.edu.   

Lindsey Trione, Assistant Dean of Students (3 minutes) 

Lindsey Trione welcomed two of the URCA’s newest members: Rachael LaCoe from the City of Wilmington and Lt. Malone from the Wilmington Police Department. Off Campus Student Services has launched a workshop series about once a month. The focus of the workshops is to assist students with how to manage their apartment search and how to transition from living on campus to off campus. We are partnering with housing and residence life to get the word out about the workshops, especially with sophomore students. The tenant education program is still active and online. It will be pushed out a little more as an alternative. There will be an Off Campus Housing Fair on March 19 in the Fisher University Union Town Square. There are 14 apartment complexes signed up to attend. There are new apartments joining our Off Campus Partners group and two have outreached within the last few weeks. There is a lot of interest for our students to live with them. We are offering all apartments that are part of our off campus partners tabling opportunities on campus. We are averaging about two opportunities per week between now and the end of the semester with spring break being off. We have had one neighbor complaint call in about trash. We worked with Roger Simms to address. We have one situation with an apartment complex where we have been supporting the student and their parent through the situation.  

Lt. Lindsey, UNCW Police Department (3 minutes) 

Lt. Lindsey reported that UNCW has some major events coming up that will cause an influx of traffic on and around campus. Our commencement will be in the middle of May. UNCW will also host the CAA tournament for both softball and baseball this spring. This is an awesome opportunity for the university. It will also take place the same weekend as commencement. There will be some conflict involving parking. There might be an increase flow of traffic in and around campus during those times.  

Rachel LaCoe, Housing and Neighborhood Services Director (3 minutes) 

Rachel LaCoe thanked the alliance for having her join them. She is the new director of Housing and Neighborhood Services for the City of Wilmington. This department used to be Community Services which was Parks & Recreation, Affordable Housing as well as Code Enforcement. There has been some restructuring and now Parks & Recreation is its own department. This new department oversees code enforcement, code compliance, affordable housing and community development operations.  

Brian Rostholder, City of Wilmington Solid Waste (3 minutes) 

Brian Rostholder discussed the differences between the bulky program and the orange sticker program. There has been confusion around why residents must pay extra for household trash, but not for bulky items. It is based on the way the City of Wilmington’s recycling and trash services are charged. The City of Wilmington’s trash services are a non-profit and operate on a budget. It is operating cost only. The trash can that residents have is how the city determines your bill. If a resident has more than that, the city is not receiving money from the public to pay for the landfill to dump it. By purchasing the orange sticker, residents are buying the dump fee for another bag of trash. The bulky program is schedule based only. If you have orange stickers on bags, it will get picked up. You don’t have to call to schedule pickup. If you have a bulky item, you must call recycling and trash services to schedule pickup. It all gets recycled to keep the cost down for residents.        

Lt. Malone, Wilmington Police Department (3 minutes) 

Lt. Malone introduced himself and explained that he has taken over as the Assistant Division Commander for district 4, 5, and 6. UNCW and the surrounding area falls under district 5. Anything that comes up as concerns Lt. Malone would be the primary contact to be able to push it to their on-street personnel or to the proper personnel. Since he took over in January, not a lot has been filtered to him so far. WPD did deal with one off campus party on the corner of Rose and Hooker. UPD also assisted as students made their way back to campus. There is a parking situation every now and then on Andover regarding boats. Lt. Malone can be reached at matthew.malone@wilmingtonnc.gov.   

Brian Renner, City of Wilmington Code Enforcement (3 minutes) 

Brian Renner reported on behalf of Roger Sims because he was out. There have been 13 cases initiated for public nuisances in the area around UNCW: 8 resulted in no cases meaning it was resolved before they handled it, 2 voluntary compliances that involved them talking with the owner, and 3 cases in progress. The area adjacent to UNCW like Andover there have been total of 22 cases: 13 cases for public nuisances like grass and trash issues, 2 junk vehicles in progress and 7 complaints about university area parking around 4805 and 4809 College Acres Drive. To help with the parking complaints, they mailed out 790 informational letters that went out to the entire university area plus other streets where they are having problems. The letter went to both the owners and residents. Roger and other staff have spoken with several property owners that received the letters so there has been engagement from the effort. Roger has also been talking to neighbors about excessive parking issues if he sees it. The way that violation works is that Roger must see it for it to be addressed. Regarding housing, there are 5 in progress housing cases, most involving apartments and one trailer. Total of 15 housing cases in area northeast side of the city. This last 90 days several notices have been sent out to property owners about property maintenance concerns.    

Public Comment (15 minutes) 

Fred Doll appreciates the letters coming out from the city. He believes that it is helping a little bit. He mentioned that 4805 College Acres Drive still has trash along the sidewalk and has been there for years. He believes a case has been opened for it, but he is not sure why it hasn’t been cleaned up. Brian Renner wanted to know how much trash. Brian stated that it could be just a few pieces of minor litter that didn’t warrant a case. If it is minor, then Brian offered to go pick up the trash. Fred stated that he has picked it up over the years, but this time he wanted to let it go to see if it was handled.  

Fred Doll also wanted to know when the yellow stick barriers would be converted into something like smart traffic signals or signs so they can get out of their neighborhood. He stated that half the time there are no traffic issues. The barrier in place is a 24/7 barrier. They need something that reacts to the traffic flow. There should be some type of smart signal that can respond to the activity on campus, so they don’t have to live with this 24/7 barrier. Fred went to talk with the traffic department, and they stated this was how it was going to remain. He felt like they didn’t think it was an important issue to resolve. It is an important problem to resolve for them. Brain Renner responded that whatever their response was in his meeting is the city’s response to this issue. The barriers will stay in place and will stay like this until they have something more permanent. The primary reason for the placement of the barriers is for safety and to reduce crashes at this intersection. Fred stated the city also informed him they would keep this in place for a few years to review the data and would move to a more permanent, concrete barrier. Fred does not believe this is the correct solution. Brian will follow up with the city engineer to periodically check in with them to find out their assessment of that intersection.   

Fred also had a question about driving over sidewalks lawful. Brian Renner asked if he was talking about driving over sidewalks to enter the yard. Brian stated that you would normally expect to see a driveway to access the property. Brain would have to defer to the police department about people driving over the sidewalk to access their yard. From a code enforcement standpoint, people can park in their front yard.   

Meeting Adjourned at 4:20 p.m. 

Next Meeting 

Wednesday, May 1, 2024 at 4:00 p.m. 

Fisher University Union / Azalea Coast A & B 

“Through research and collaboration, the UCRA will identify issues and make recommendations to improve to quality of life for residents, students, and the broader community,” 

UCRTF Initial Report, July 2004 

UCRA Members – Lt. Stephanie Boucher, Ryan Logan, Officer Kara Mariotti, Chris McQueen, Brian Renner, Miranda Rutledge, Lindsey Trione, Andrea Weaver, Lee West 

Welcome and Approval of Minutes (2 minutes) 

Lindsey Trione opened the meeting with a welcome. She let everyone know that minutes were available at the meeting and an electronic copy has been posted to our website. Lindsey received one edit to the minutes. The edit was to update the URCA members in attendance to include Miranda Rutledge. Minutes were approved at 4:02 pm, Miranda Rutledge moved to approve the minutes and Brian Renner seconded the motion. 

Andrea Weaver, UNCW Office of University Relations (3 minutes) 

Lindsey Trione reported for Andrea Weaver that the UNCW website is up-to-date and OUR is still working out some kinks with it. If anyone has any suggestions, please contact OUR. Andrea was able to join the meeting and she let everyone know that fall Commencement is coming up December 14 and 15.  

Lindsey Trione, Associate Dean of Students (3 minutes) 

Lindsey Trione reported that our office issued 13 warning letters to students off campus for off campus behavior. She met with two students to discuss neighborly relations. Our office housed an off-campus housing fair, on Chancellor’s Walk, this fall with 11 apartment complexes in attendance. A lot of apartments are already in the process of resigning leases with their current tenants and were able to start building their list for when they are ready to sign for the next academic year. Our office is looking forward to hosting another off-campus housing fair in the spring. We are in the process of creating an off-campus housing search workshop geared to our sophomore year population to help guide them through the process of finding off-campus housing as well as start talking about how to be good neighbors. The soft launch of that will be after Thanksgiving with a hard push of those workshops after the new year.   

Officer Mariotti, UNCW Police Department (3 minutes) 

Officer Mariotti asked for any questions about her report to be directed to Captain Curry while Captain Lindsey is out. Officer Mariotte reported that four weeks ago about 9 juveniles (ages 12-15) were stopped on campus in possession of 9 stolen bicycles. The bicycles were recovered and the juveniles were turned over to their parents. A homeless camp located at Kerr Ave and MLK had 12 stolen bicycles there. One of our common crimes on campus is the issue with stolen bicycles. Lastly, UNCW police does have a memorandum of understanding with the city for party patrol where the city can call and UNCW police will go out to assist. As of right now, UNCW police has not been called to assist with any party related issues.  

Amy Beatty, Director of Community Services (3 minutes) 

No report provided. 

Brian Rostholder, City of Wilmington Solid Waste (3 minutes) 

Brian Renner reported solid waste with be coming under his purview once the new Housing and Neighborhood Services director starts. He will be their supervisor and handling their cases. There are 3 student housing buildings, in Wrightsville, that had a trash issue that was resolved. 

Roger Sims, City of Wilmington Code Enforcement (3 minutes) 

Brian Renner reported for Roger. There were 39 new cases for the area around UNCW – 12 active cases, 4 public nuisance cases and 4 housing cases. They did have 7 parking complaints, 23 public housing, 6 housing and 3 junk vehicles that were investigated. In the adjacent area, which is east of the university, there were 63 new cases with 12 active including a chicken compliant, 50 public nuisance cases, 5 housing and 6 vehicles. If there are any issues, please let them know and they will be happy to look at them. 

Lt. Boucher, Wilmington Police Department (3 minutes) 

Since the last meeting, WPD has sent 7 noise citations over to ODOS. Lt. Boucher has been getting some complaints around UNCW that are probably not related to students. Lt. Boucher is happy to be serving this area and to assist with any issues. She encourages people to reach out to her.  

Brian Renner, City of Wilmington Code Enforcement (3 minutes) 

Brian reported the city’s new Housing and Neighborhood Services Director, Rachel LaCoe, starts next week. Rachel will start attending these meetings once she has had a chance to get acclimated.  

Ryan Logan, UNCW Interfraternity Council (3 minutes) 

Ryan reported that he is at the end of his term. A new person will be taking over in the Spring for 2024. Their council represents all the recognized fraternities at UNCW.  

Public Comment (15 minutes) 

Dean Godwin spoke about a fraternity house that popped up in their neighborhood in 5400 block of Andover Road. They had a live band on Saturday night and fireworks on Sunday night. Dean received several calls from other neighbors about it. It is TKE fraternity and they have a big sign in their backyard. There was some confusion about where the house was located in the Andover neighborhood. Dean also mentioned that he had already talked with Lt. Boucher about the speed on Andover. They are interested in getting similar signs that are on Hooker Road that states your speed checked by radar. Dean also wanted to say he was walking on Reigel, near the Film Studies building, and almost got wiped out by a car. This is the area where you come off campus. There is supposed to be a walkway, but people are using it to park cars.  

Lt. Boucher mentioned that the noise citation she sent to ODOS was from the 5400 block of Andover Road.  

Fred Doll from College Acres Drive wanted to know if anyone from traffic had responded about the traffic barrier at the end of their road. He had reached out to someone from traffic, but they never answered him back. He wanted to know if anyone could help him figure out who to talk with about this issue and have them explain why they didn’t come up with something more sensible at that intersection. Brian Renner stated it was his understanding traffic went through their process and studies to make the decision on that intersection. Brain will look to see if he has any additional updates and will get them to Fred. If not, he will find out who Fred needs to speak with in the traffic department. It is Brian’s understanding they will continue to move forward with what is there at that intersection to help with traffic flow based off of their studies. Fred would still like to talk with someone who is designing it and how it is impeding traffic in their neighborhood. Fred also wanted to talk about parking in the yards. The person across the street from him put in a pad so he could park in his yard and get by with it. Fred doesn’t know how he put that pad in because it is on a right of way. Brian Renner stated he had sent this over to city engineering to look at and he will follow up on it. Fred stated there were 5 cars in the yard and 1 in the driveway across the street from him. The house down the street from him there were 4 cars in the yard and 1 in the driveway. There are a couple of houses right at the beginning of College Acres Drive at Racine who has always made their yards parking lots for the university. They have widened their driveways so they can park many cards in their yard. He believes these yards should not be parking lots for students. Lindsey Trione let Fred know that she had spoken to his neighbors about the noise. Fred stated that it had helped and he appreciated it.  

Meeting Adjourned at 4:19 p.m. 

Next Meeting 

Wednesday, February 7, 2024 at 4:00 p.m. 

Fisher University Union / Azalea Coast A & B 

UCRA Members – Amy Beatty, Brian Renner, Roger Sims, Candice Johnston, Jennie McNeilly, Mike Walker, Lindsey Trione, Krissy Vick, Chris McQueen, Shaquan Walker, Lt. Musacchio

Welcome and Approval of Minutes (2 minutes)
Lindsey Trione opened the meeting with a welcome. Minutes approved at 4:03 pm, Miranda Rutledge moved to approve the minutes and Roger Sims seconded the motion.

Andrea Weaver, UNCW Office of University Relations (3 minutes)
Andrea Weaver reported that OUR is excited about students coming back to campus in about three weeks. She wanted to thank the community for supporting UNCW and for being excited for us.

Lindsey Trione, Associate Dean of Students (3 minutes)
Lindsey Trione reported that we have not received any noise violations. She let everyone know that our incoming class of first year students is one of the largest classes that UNCW as had in a while. Our on-campus housing will be full. Lindsey setup special office hours for incoming transfer students that have never been to the area to assist them with their off campus needs and to help them learn about the Wilmington area. She is also working on the good neighbor packets. Lindsey had copies available of our 2022 packets. She encouraged attendees to grab one and let them know she is open to feedback if there is anything else that should be included in it.       

Lt. Lindsey, UNCW Police Department (3 minutes)
Lt. Lindsey reported that during August 18-20 there will be heavy pedestrian and vehicle traffic on and around campus due to move-in weekend for students. UPD is predicting around 2,600 students moving onto campus. Move-in will start at 8:00 a.m. and end around 3:00-4:00 p.m. in the afternoon. Lt. Lindsey recommends that people find alternate routes instead of cutting through campus on those days. UPD will try to work and manage the traffic as best they can. UPD has been enforcing regulations and have been making traffic stops. They have arrested a couple of DWIs and confiscated weapons on campus mostly from traffic stops of people cutting through campus.

Amy Beatty, Director of Community Services (3 minutes)
Brian Renner submitted the report for Amy Beatty because she was not able to attend the meeting. The city was approved to establish a new department after the last budget was approved the beginning of July. The department is called Housing and Neighborhood services which is comprised of the city’s community development team, housing rehab program, code enforcement and public services compliance team. Recycling and trash compliance report will now be under this new department as well. The new department will be more interactive in the neighborhoods. This should really help impact the neighborhoods around UNCW. The city is willing to come out to meet with community members in the neighborhoods if they reach out to them. The new department will be able to draw on some additional resources and have more of an ability to advocate for the resources their team needs. The plan is to have the new director in place by October.

Brian Renner, City of Wilmington Code Enforcement (3 minutes)
Brian does not have anything to report for the City of Wilmington Code Enforcement.

Roger Sims, City of Wilmington Code Enforcement (3 minutes)
Roger reminded everyone his role is to cover a 1-mile radius around the campus monitoring for public nuisances such as junk vehicles, parking violations. Compliance for the quarter totaled 68 public nuisances (35 resolved and 14 active), 3 junk vehicles (2 resolved and 1 active). There were several calls for parking violations, but they ended up being invalid complaints. Roger explained the reason the parking violations end up being invalid is that by the time they respond the violation has been corrected. 4 housing violations (2 resolved and 2 active). Roger brought several pamphlets for people to receive on trash/recycling, landlords and tenants what the law is and information about parking violations. He encouraged community members to reach out to him if they have questions or concerns.

Lt. Musacchio, Wilmington Police Department (3 minutes)
Since the last meeting, WPD has only had two noise complaints. The complaints were not for college students or the area surrounding UNCW. Lt. Musacchio did receive an email about Andover circle and the parking on the median. He is handling that issue now. If the community members have any questions, Lt. Musacchio encouraged them to call or email him. He reminded them if the parking violation is on the right of way, it would be the responsibility of WPD and anything on the person’s property would be code enforcement.

Ryan Logan, UNCW Interfraternity Council (3 minutes)
Chris McQueen, Director for Fraternity and Sorority Life, submitted the report for Ryan Logan because he was not able to attend the meeting. IFC has mentioned to the areas that might have parties or noise complaints there should be no parties move-in weekend. Community members are encouraged to report any noise violations so they can be handled by the UNCW conduct process and within the fraternity judicial board process. Recruitment for the fraternities is 8/28-9/4. All events off campus, at any residences, should be done by 11:00 p.m. with people leaving to come back to campus should be no later than 12:00 a.m. If there are any loud noise violations or loud music after 11:00 make sure they document, it so it can be handled on our end. The chapters will receive warnings. Sorority recruitment will have around 300 sorority members and will take place over Labor Day weekend. Their events mainly happen on campus. The following weekends there may be a little more activities happening because they are socializing. The only official organization with a property that is recognized by the university, their fraternity and alumni is Chi Phi fraternity. There are 8 members housed there. Everyone else is rental properties or associate organizations. Those locations would be in violation if they host large parties or events. Community members are encouraged to contact WPD if there are problems so they can be cited and go through our judicial process.   

Shaquan Walker, City of Wilmington Solid Waste (3 minutes)
Compliance for the quarter totaled 12 violations, 0 final notices and 0 civil violations issued.

Public Comment (15 minutes)
Fred Doll and his wife June with College Acres Drive spoke about having lived here for over 20 years. They have enjoyed training the students on neighborhood involvement. They feel like they are part of their educational system because of all the problems they have had to report over the years. Their main concern today is the traffic barrier at the end of their road. They feel trapped and access out of their street is horrible. The traffic barrier was put there for congestion during busy hours when the university would leave in the afternoon and traffic would back up onto College Acres Drive. The barrier forces them to turn right out of their neighborhood and forces the neighbors and visitors to make a lengthy detour even during times there is no congestion which is 95% of the time. There is very little congestion during the summer, evenings, weekends and holidays. The college traffic is very predictable and has very narrow time slots. Fred Doll suggested options to the city instead of the barrier. One would be for the city to install a traffic sign that states no left turn when congested or put up a traffic signal that can coordinate with the UNCW traffic congestion. Another suggestion that he had was for UPD to have a patrol officer there directing traffic during the heavy congestion times. He doesn’t know why the community members living there needs to suffer when the college is inactive. He stated the barrier impedes emergency vehicle access, causes drivers to make dangerous U-turns to avoid it and forces fuel waste and wear-and-tear of vehicles. Delivery vehicles disregard the barrier to get their jobs done. Fred mentioned that right now is a prefect time to solve the congestion problem due to the disruption of their street being caused by the drainage improvement project. The other concern Fred mentioned was the issue with parking on the grass. He feels the welcome brochure encourages college students to park in single family yards. Other areas in Wilmington don’t allow parking on grass. He asked for the ambiguous and unenforceable university area ordinances not be referenced. He hopes the ordinances will be revised or removed because how it is written today does nothing to discourage parking on the lawn and will be used by students to justify it. The goal of the brochure should not be to help them avoid fines or citations, rather it should encourage their concern for the beauty of the neighborhood and the effect on their neighbors. This will hopefully make their neighborhood look as nice as the university.

Lindsey Trione clarified the traffic barrier Fred Doll was referring to is the one on Racine that intersects College Acres. June Doll confirmed that it was. Lindsey inquired to see if anyone from the city wanted to speak on behalf of their concern. Brian Renner asked Fred Doll if he has spoken with the city’s traffic engineer about the barrier. June informed him the engineer stated they were just continuing a study. Brian Renner stated he will reach out to the city’s traffic engineer to see where they are at and will loop the Doll’s into the conversation. June stated it is getting harder and harder to turn with the new curbs the city has also installed. Lindsey Trione spoke about the parking on the grass compliant and that she had been communicating with the Doll’s about their concerns. Lindsey stated we will be adding to the good neighbor packets a half sheet about parking on the grass. The half sheet will instruct students to check with their local community organization about what ordinances/rules are in place in addition to what the city has in place. Students need to make sure they are aware of any irrigation or drainage easements and to be aware per their leases they are responsible for their landscapes. If they park on the grass, it will hurt their landscaping for which they could be charged for it at the end. The university cannot tell students to follow a rule that doesn’t exist, we are going to do a lot of work to try to discourage it through other avenues by reminding them of their responsibilities to be a good neighbor

Meeting Adjourned at 4:22 p.m.

Next Meeting

Wednesday, November 1, 2023 at 4:00 p.m.

Fisher University Union / Azalea Coast A & B