Durham Confronts Gun Violence and Homelessness
The Durham City Council hears emotional testimony on gun violence in Cornwallis, debates new ‘Saving Lives’ strategies, and responds to urgent concerns about a homeless encampment near an elementary school. The council also weighs support for tenant unions, plans to preserve aging affordable housing, and considers long‑term options for remaking Highway 147 amid new powers and mandates from the state. 59mins
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Original Meeting
Thursday, August 20th, 2026
15138.0
Durham City Council Work Session August 20, 2026
Video Notes
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Welcome to the City Council Work Session for August 20, 2026.
Agenda: https://www.durhamnc.gov/AgendaCenter/City-Council-4
How to participate: https://www.durhamnc.gov/1345
Contact the City Council: https://www.durhamnc.gov/1323
NOTE: Comments left on this livestream will not be read or entered into the meeting record
In This Video
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Jacqueline Wagstaff urged the city to use flexible housing funds to quickly rehouse residents living in the Fayetteville Street encampment near an elementary school and provide dignified hotel housing with wraparound services, and Mayor Williams responded by referencing ongoing homelessness updates at Monday meetings.
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Former Council Member DeDreana Freeman proposed a charter amendment to expand the Durham City Council from 7 to 9 members to improve ward-based representation for a growing population, emphasized benefits for low-wealth communities, and encouraged residents to join a working group and sign a petition to bring the proposal to a referendum.
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A representative from Durham County’s Community Intervention and Support Services Department introduced a Summit on Saving Lives presentation, outlining its mission, strategies, extensive community listening sessions, and homicide data analysis, and requested Council feedback and endorsement to guide implementation.
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A presenter reported that most homicide and shooting victims and suspects were Black adults ages 18 to 34 with prior justice system involvement and group or gang ties, and shared community feedback that Durham should focus, coordinate, and sustain existing resources—especially environmental improvements in high‑risk areas—rather than create new programs.
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Director Smith outlined the ‘Focus Deterrence’ strategy as a coordinated routine among city, county, law enforcement, prosecutors, service providers, and community messengers to deliver unified support-and-accountability messages to individuals at highest risk of violence, citing Baltimore results showing significant drops in shootings and homicides without increasing overall arrests.
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Director Smith explained how street outreach used credible messengers to detect and mediate disputes, prevent retaliatory shootings, and shift norms around violence, noting the working group’s recommendation to reinvest in this strategy with clear safeguards, separation from law enforcement, and quality standards, citing Los Angeles and Baltimore as evidence that well-run outreach reduced homicides.
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Director Smith described plans for site-based partnerships where residents, community leaders, agencies, and law enforcement jointly guided physical and programmatic investments—such as environmental fixes and expanded youth programming—in high‑violence areas, emphasizing that place-based improvements must be layered with other strategies to be effective.
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Council Member Shanetta Burris questioned how members of the gun violence working group had been selected and whether outreach had been inclusive, and Director Smith responded by explaining practical size limits, prior broader engagement, and a speaker added that future efforts should better include those working with the highest‑risk youth and trusted community advocates.
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Council Member Burris pressed for an urgent, more inclusive process to address youth violence and ensure community members who felt excluded from the gun violence working group are invited into upcoming efforts, and a presenter responded by outlining plans to reach out to violence‑prevention organizations and summit participants for a new youth-focused summit table.
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Council Member Chelsea Cook questioned whether the gun violence recommendations were prioritized and unanimously supported as a single package, and Director Smith and another speaker responded that the strategies were intended to advance together—with emphasis on layering focused deterrence and street outreach, housing outreach in multiple community organizations, and better coordinating existing place‑based work—even as details about implementation and site partnerships were still being clarified.
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Mayor Pro Tem Caballero emphasized that Durham’s gun violence and homelessness responses required joint commitment from the City, County, and School Board, criticized the County for not contributing rapid rehousing funds that could address a homeless encampment, and reflected on the widespread trauma residents in the city’s core experienced from persistent shootings and homicides.
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Council Member Baker asked how existing resources like the Office of Survivor Care could be redirected and how to ensure accountability for violence‑reduction targets, and Director Smith described deploying survivor care teams for post‑shooting neighborhood outreach and using a public advisory board and regular metrics reporting to adjust or halt strategies that were not working.
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Mayor Williams framed gun violence as a public health crisis, pledged full mayoral support for the ‘Saving Lives’ plan, called for broad partnerships with hospitals, the county, and schools, and stressed that the City must now prioritize residents’ lives using community-driven work already completed.
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Mayor Williams expressed support for residents’ and tenants’ right to unionize, described facilitating a forthcoming mediated meeting between the residents and the developer named in the resolution, and recommended broadening the resolution to affirm unionizing rights generally rather than focusing on a single case.
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Mayor Pro Tem Caballero supported a broad tenant‑union resolution rather than one targeting a specific affordable housing partner, shared a personal example of a parent moving from substandard housing into subsidized housing, and urged residents to focus their advocacy on the state legislature where preemption limits the City’s power.
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Mayor Williams explained having spoken with both the landlord and residents, urged removing all individual parties from the tenant‑union resolution to depoliticize residents’ lived experiences, and stressed that supportive affordable housing developers like DHIC should not be equated with negligent landlords while a sit‑down meeting to address tenant concerns had been arranged.
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Mayor Pro Tem Caballero explained that work sessions were the venue for colleagues to propose edits to resolutions, and Council Member Baker argued that scarce, legally constrained tenant unions in North Carolina should be publicly highlighted, framing the proposed resolution as a principled affirmation of organizing rights rather than taking sides in a specific dispute.
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A Housing and Neighborhood Services staff member explained that the goal of restructuring the loan was to keep long-term residents—many of them over 80 and 90 years old—in place by avoiding a market refinance, and in response to Council Member Rist’s questions about the looming 4‑year horizon, noted that the owner would likely return to the City with a request for additional support to extend affordability beyond the current term.
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Director Vinas explained that Housing and Neighborhood Services was proactively tracking expiring affordable housing and NOAA properties, planning to use a relaunched affordable housing loan fund with partners to extend affordability, while Mayor Pro Tem Caballero noted that the upcoming housing plan would require difficult budget decisions to prevent widespread loss of long-term affordable units.
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A staff member explained that the City was working with the state transportation department to assess bridge conditions and remaining useful life as a key factor in choosing among three corridor options, while emphasizing that a community-led vision built through equitable engagement and acknowledgment of past freeway harms had created a strong foundation for future decisions.
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Council Member Rist asked under what circumstances the corridor would remain a modernized freeway, and a staff member explained that if bridge and structure assessments showed long remaining life it could affect cost‑benefit analysis, citing Rochester’s decision not to simply rebuild existing infrastructure when it neared the end of its lifecycle.
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Council Member Matt Kopac reflected on Freeway 147 as a lasting scar of urban renewal, voiced support for boulevard and cap options that would reconnect historic neighborhoods and create affordable housing and community equity opportunities, and cautioned that removing the freeway alone would not automatically repair past harms and could create new ones without intentional planning.
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Mayor Williams expressed support for a freeway cap that would reconnect neighborhoods while warning against bypass designs that could harm downtown businesses, Council Member Baker reflected that the vision felt aspirational but cited an El Paso project as proof such plans can be realized, and a staff member thanked regional and state transportation partners for funding and supporting the study as a generational effort.
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City lobbyists Johnny Schilling and Derek Applewhite presented an end-of-session overview of North Carolina General Assembly actions, highlighting Durham’s legislative wins, a forthcoming vague property tax constitutional amendment on the fall ballot, and recent shifts in Local Government Commission appointments from the governor to the legislature.
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Derek explained that a state proposal to recoup federal SNAP error costs could divert local sales tax revenue from both cities and counties, and a Council member warned this fit into a broader pattern of intentional erosion of attorney independence and autonomy through new restrictions on IOLTA funding and governance.
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Lobbyist Johnny Schilling warned that a proposed property tax constitutional amendment would further entrench the already powerful General Assembly, while city staff and Attorney Ghosh explained that a new state law would require Durham to clear homeless encampments or create designated camping areas without providing funding and expose the City to civil lawsuits and mandatory attorney fees if it failed to enforce the restrictions.
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Lobbyist Johnny Schilling reported following up with the governor’s office and state DOT about existing cameras on DOT roads and promised to share details with Council, while Mayor Williams cautioned colleagues to prepare for major upcoming discussions in work sessions that could strain the City’s capacity.
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Planning and Development staff outlined upcoming omnibus text amendments and internal changes to comply with new state legislation, including allowing appeals to go directly to Superior Court, aligning interpretation language, removing now‑prohibited glazing requirements, increasing transparency around fee methodologies, and updating permit choice procedures that can now be invoked at the rezoning stage.
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