CARY, N.C. (WTVD) — The town of Cary was very different when James Powers settled there 38 years ago.

“At the end of the street is High House Road and Cary Parkway. It was gravel when I moved here. There was no road on the left, no road on the right,” Powers said, standing in front of the Cary Senior Center Thursday afternoon.

Today, the city’s population is quickly approaching 200,000, and the city has put two bonds on the ballot that could shape the city’s appearance for decades to come.

The first measure is $30 million housing depositwhich would help expand housing options, acquire properties, preserve the supply of affordable housing, provide rehabilitation financing for landlords who rent multi-family housing, among other efforts to facilitate access to the property.

“It’s a no-brainer. I actually wish it was a little bigger than that because I really need to think and work on making Cary more affordable for the people who work here. The firefighters, the teachers, the Ordinary people like us need to have an affordable place to stay,” said resident Mona Singh.

“It only serves to improve the community, which I think in the long run makes it more diverse and more valuable,” Jeff Jefferson added.

However, some voters believe there are more effective ways to deal with population growth.

“I hope there’s another solution to help people with housing and everything else without raising taxes so much and so quickly,” Sandy Joiner said.

“If you constantly raise taxes and everything else, property values ​​go up and guess what? It’s out of reach for most people,” Powers added.

According to ZillowThe median sale price as of Aug. 31 in Cary was $612,000, with home values ​​increasing 60% over the past five years.

The second obligation generated much more reaction: a $560 million measure that covers six parks and recreation projects. Projects include $10 million for an Asian Garden master plan, $60 million to expand Cary Tennis Park and add new pickleball courts, $150 million for the Mills Park Community Center on the West Side of Cary, $10 million for the Nature Park Master Plan, $300 million for a community sports and recreation center in the South Hills District and $30 million for the Walnut Creek Greenway.

“The Cary Parks and Rec has been able to provide (my kids) with after-school activities, you know, sports, whether it’s football or softball or baseball. And we need to continue to do that because it gives the kids something something to do and they learn a lot from playing sports,” said Steve Assad.

“My son played in Cary Rec leagues and thought it contributed a lot to his personal development,” Jefferson added.

However, the scale and amount of the bond has led some taxpayers to be hesitant.

“Raising taxes too quickly for six different projects. If it was one project, one at a time, maybe raise them a little bit. You know, I can understand that. But when they lump it all together into just one, I’m not ready for my taxes to go up again so quickly,” Joiner said.

“I was concerned about the expenses. Obviously we have to pay off these bonds and they are paid off through property taxes. So I look to the future and I’m also concerned that our downtown park“, which was budgeted in the 2019 bond for $50 million, ended up costing $69 million,” Mary Collins added.

Collins created a website, outlining her reasons for opposing the measure. Like Joiner, she recognized the value of parks and recreation, particularly praising the Mills Park community center plan. However, the number of projects in a single bond ultimately served as a deterrent for Collins.

“I love young people and I want a vibrant community. The problem I have is we’re basically told to build these things with an eye toward the future, but we don’t have a prudent budget. We don’t have a good way to pay them without all the taxpayers, the taxpayer community here, having to foot that bill,” Collins said.

Deputy City Manager Danna Widmar says the city has always proposed individual bond measures that include multiple projects.

“We think the projects are widespread enough to appeal to a good majority of our citizens,” Widdmar said.

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If both bonds are approved, Cary’s property tax rate would increase by nine cents for every $100 of assessed property value; of that amount, 8.5 cents comes from the parks and recreation bond, and half a cent comes from the housing bond. The current increase would be three cents for calendar year 2026, an additional three cents for calendar year 2028, and an additional three cents for calendar year 2030. The parks and recreation bond does not cover the costs operating costs, which the city said would likely be paid for through additional property tax increases.

“There’s a long history of projects that relate to parks and recreation bonds. When you look at the details, there are decades-old proposals associated with them, master plans that go back several years that have identified these projects. That’s really the reasoning. It’s really a new generation of projects that include new facilities, we’ve done a lot of work over the last few years. our Imagine Cary Community Plan in 2017, and then our housing plan in 2021, and that housing plan has become much more specific about where we’re going, what we’re doing and housing development. so is just the next logical point of improvement associated with that our housing,” Widdmar explained.

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