INC NEWS - Durham rezoning case #Z06-40 (Duke Central Campus)

[John Schelp]

Neighborhood Partnership Initiative residents and
others:

Duke submitted its rezoning application for Central
Campus last month. 

During meetings with Partnership neighborhood
representatives and public meetings with Durham
residents, university officials promised to make these
plans available to us. But we seem to be encountering
some resistance on that. 

FYI, below is email correspondence with Michael Palmer
(Duke Community Affairs) requesting copies of the
Central Campus development plan.

Will share any response we get from Duke.

~John Schelp

****

Wed, 31 May 2006 12:00

Michael,

In meetings with Partnership Neighborhood
representatives and community members, Duke has
repeatedly said it would make its Central Campus plans
available to us. Thus, I am a bit puzzled by your
seeming resistance (below) to the requests for copies
of the development plans that Tom Miller and I have
made. 

This is exactly the kind of behavior that undermines
community trust and productive town-gown relations.

I checked with Frank Duke, Durham Planning director,
about whether the Planning Department would have any
problem with you supplying us with copies of these
plans. I've pasted in a copy of his reply below just
FYI, but he says that the city's fees for Development
Plans are not a revenue source for the City or County.

So from the City's perspective, there isn't any
violation of "principle or precedent" involved in you
providing those copies as university officials have
previously promised to do.

Concerns about starting a precedent also don't seem to
be an issue. In fact, the university provided us with
copies of its Development Plans for East, West and the
Medical Center back in 2003 (Haden-Stanziale,
8/04/03).

To Tom Miller in Watts-Hillandale, you say you need a
request from the neighborhood association president.
To me, a neighborhood association president, you say
the university can't set a precedent (a precedent that
you've already set).

Please ask your consultant, Haden-Stanziale, to
provide a large-size copy of your Development Plans to
OWDNA.

This is not a fee issue for us. It is a principle
issue for us, insofar as Duke officials have
repeatedly said they would share their plans for
Central Campus with us.

Please let us know if the university intends to keep
its word or not.

Thank you.

John Schelp, president
Old West Durham Neighborhood Association

cc:
Richard Brodhead

****

Date:	 Wed, 31 May 2006 10:58:32 
From:	"Duke, Frank" 
To:	"John Schelp" 

We only recover our costs through everything we do. We
are not a revenue source for the City or County.

Anyone may ask a developer to provide them with a copy
of what they have submitted, though there is no
requirement for the developer to provide it.

****

Tue, 30 May 2006 17:40

Michael Palmer wrote:

> John, sorry it took me this long to respond.......in
> the mist of many 
> e-mails I had not discovered the e-mail you sent on
> May 18........ We do 
> not have a copy of the Central Campus development
> plan in this office. 
> Given that the development plan became a public
> document once it was 
> delivered to the City, we see the City as the
> appropriate distributor of 
> "public documents."  If this request is a "fee"
> issue then we might be 
> able to assist you with funding.........as a matter
> of principle and 
> precedent  we would not want to negate the Planning
> departments opportunity to collect fees. 

****

> John Schelp 
> 05/26/2006 02:45 PM
> To michael.palmer at duke.edu
> Subject: re: Z06-40
> 
> Dear Michael,
> 
> We haven't yet received a reply to our May 18
> request
> for copies of the Central Campus development plan
> recently submitted to the Planning Department (see
> below). I'm just following up to see if you've had a
> chance to ask your consultant to mail us copies of
> the Central Campus plans?
> 
> In our experience with other developers (Ninth
> Street
> North and Station Nine), they've provided us with
> copies of their plans upon request. We have a
> healthy
> collection of large rolled-up plans of successful
> projects from the past. Among neighborhood
> associations, OWDNA has a reputation for being a
> reasonable voice on development issues (as our
> support
> for Duke's earlier rezoning case demonstrates).
> 
> A request for development plans is not an unusual
> request -- especially since it's coming from a
> partnership neighborhood. In fact, I was surprised
> to hear from Tom Miller that you indicated
> Watts-Hillandale's request needs to come from their
> president. As you know, John Burness sent both of us
> a very cordial thank you letter for our effort
> representing the partnership neighborhoods on Duke's
> rezoning case for East, West and the Medical Center.
> 
> In any event, I am making our request request
> (again)
> as the president of the neighborhood association,
> and we're looking forward to seeing your plans.
> 
> Please get in touch with me by June 1 if Duke has a
> problem with this request. Duke officials have
> repeatedly said they'd share their Central Campus
> plans when they were ready. We expect you to keep
> your word.
> 
> thank you so much,
> John
> 
> ****
> 
> > Date: Thu, 18 May 2006 12:58
> > From: John Schelp
> > Subject: Z06-40
> > To: Michael Palmer
> > CC: Tom +Miller
> >
> > Hi Michael,
> >
> > Would you please ask Haden-Stanziale to mail us
> two
> > regular-size copies of the three-page Development
> > Plan
> > you recently submitted? (I have small copies but
> > can't read the text.)
> >
> > One will go to Tom Miller and one is for me. You
> > will
> > recall that Tom and I were involved in previous
> > rezoning discussions with the Duke-Durham
> > partnership neighborhoods.
> >
> > thanks so much,
> >
> > John Schelp, OWDNA