Orange County Voice
Orange County Voice (OCV) is a network of citizens, farms, businesses and others who are committed to raising awareness about the importance of Orange County’s rural community. We are committed to assure that the voice of this vital community is heard in planning and decision-making, and that rural assets are engaged in a complementary and sustainable manner. OCV is a 501c3 non-profit. We are re-activating our network as a community organization in response to requests from friends and neighbors. We are non-partisan and non-denominational. Click on the Projects & Interests tab to learn what we are following now.
History of Orange County Voice
Orange County Voice (OCV) was founded in 2008 when the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill proposed the closing of Horace Williams Airport in Chapel Hill with alternative airport sites in and around Bingham Township in southwest Orange County. All of the proposed sites were located on farmland in our area – several of them on Century Farms (farms that have been under family ownership for 100 years or more). We raised community awareness, spoke with UNC officials, including Chancellor Holden Thorp, worked with another community group, Preserve Rural Orange, and ultimately stopped UNC’s placement of the airport in our community.
Not long after the UNC airport issue was put to rest, Orange County started making plans to place a waste transfer station in Bingham Township. This coincided with the closing of the Rogers Road landfill. OCV and our community supported the closing of the landfill and worked closely with the Rogers Road community in their efforts to close the landfill. We objected to the county’s waste transfer station’s placement in Bingham, as the county’s trash “centroid” was in the Carrboro/Chapel Hill area, not in Bingham. Again, we raised community awareness, attended Solid Waste Department meetings and Board of County Commissioner meetings, again worked with Preserve Rural Orange, and we stopped the county from placing the waste transfer station in Bingham.
Over the years, OCV worked with Schley Grange to create urgency around high-speed internet in the rural community and continues to monitor the Lumos project to help residents receive services that were promised. We helped to prevent the county from closing rural convenience centers, and from placing expensive, industrial scale centers in rural areas. We proudly protected the conservation easements at the Keith Arboretum and supported the Defend Maple View Community to assure agritourism works for our farmers and communities.
