[Durham INC] 751 Hearing at the Board of County Commissioners - Monday Night!

[Tom Miller]

INC delegates and friends:

 

Please plan to attend the 751 Rezoning hearing Monday night, July 26, at 7
p.m. in the Commissioners' meeting chamber, 2nd floor, Old County Courthouse
downtown.

 

The rezoning, if approved, would allow 1,300 new homes and 750,000 sq. ft.
of commercial and other non-residential construction on 167 acres right next
to Jordan Lake.  INC opposes the rezoning because of the unusual
behind-the-scenes maneuvering of the developers and members of the board of
commissioners determined to see the project approved whatever the damage to
planning process and the public's confidence in it.

 

The developer's fancy tricks and the abysmal handling of this matter by the
BOCC have continued unabated.  The developer has now granted an easement to
the NC DOT to defeat the protest petition declared valid by the planning
department.  The easement ostensibly makes the road too wide for the
property owners on the other side to participate in the protest petition.
The problem is, NC DOT has no plans to widen the road and while the easement
sits unused by the DOT, the developer may use it as rezoned (if the BOCC
goes along with this ploy).  The development plan submitted to the county is
entirely silent on the easement since it was never part of the developer's
intention to grant right of way to the DOT until the protest petition was
declared to be valid.  'Seems that so significant a change to the plan ought
to require a resubmittal of the rezoning application with an appropriately
modified development plan.  Will the county government require this?  Under
its current leadership, I doubt it.  From the beginning, this developer has
wanted to have its cake and to eat it too and at least a majority of the
commissioners has shown themselves willing to let them have it.  Never mind
that the Planning Commission voted overwhelmingly against the project.
Never mind that the project violates the County's own stated policies on
growth in the area.  And never mind that Durham is facing a financial burden
to clean up the pollution of area lakes that will drive property tax rates
out of sight.

 

And what about the DOT?  How did they allow themselves to get mixed up in
this mess without any notice to the public?  Whose side are they on anyway?
Who watches over them?

 

Please turn out for the Board of County Commissioner's meeting and join the
opponents to this rezoning.  As ordinary citizens, we are the people the
zoning code is supposed to protect, not he people who twist and turn it to
their financial advantage.  Let the Commissioners know we are watching and
that we care!

 

This may not be in your neighborhood, but the next big planning issue may
be.  When your neighborhood is facing a planning issue, don't you want a
fair and open process, true to the express policies of the zoning code, and
free of tricks?  So turn out.  We have to stick together when the
credibility and value of the planning process is under assault.

 

Tom Miller

President

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