[Durham INC] 751 development being shoved down our throats -- pls write letters

[Melissa Rooney]

See below. And please write a short letter to the editor of the Durham News/ N&O with your opinions/concerns:
http://www.newsobserver.com/about/newsroom/editor/ 

Not a single person made positive comments at the first neighborhood meeting. The couple possible proponents that were there left before the actual meeting. All questions (the entire discussion during the meeting) was from opponents of the project -- I was there.
Given this fact and the greater than 2000 people who signed an earlier online petition against rezoning this land that is immediately adjacent to Jordan Lake, I don't see how the development team can possibly say that the first meeting had a 'mixed reaction' or use the word 'small' in the following quote: ""It seems there is a small, committed group that views opposition to the project as related to preservation of Jordan Lake and (that they) aren't open to much discussion beyond their opposition."
Dan Jewell, himself, informed the group at the first neighborhood meeting that this project is paying to pollute into Jordan Lake via nitrogen buy-downs that enable them to buy land much further upstream (and currently undeveloped) in order to increase the amount of pollutants they are allowed to discharge into Jordan Lake. This means a net increase in pollutants into Jordan Lake. And they are now seeking to increase the impervious surface to 70%! That means, 70% of this forested land can be cleared and surfaced (and you can bet it will be). How can they possibly call this 'environmentally friendly'. 
Of course they want this new rezoning to get voted on this summer. They want the vote before their friendly commissioners are replaced in the upcoming elections, and while their favored replacement, Pam Karriker (who was clearly not the favored choice of Durham citizens and Commissioner Heron, herself), is still filling in for Becky Heron.
This entire thing is a travesty and makes a joke of Democracy in Durham.

--Melissa Rooney


751 South plan revised, reviled
THE NEW REQUEST COULD WIN APPROVAL WHILE THE FIRST REMAINS IN COURT.

BY JIM WISE, JWISE at NEWSOBSERVER.COM
As previously announced, Southern Durham Development turned in a new site plan and rezoning request for its 751 South project last week and, not surprisingly, some of those who disliked the first feel the same way about the second.
"The re-rezoning is worse than the first one. ... And I wouldn't have thought that possible," said south Durham homeowner Steve Bocckino.
"They are also going back on promises made in this first rezoning hearing," said opponent Melissa Rooney.
The Durham County Board of Commissioners approved the first rezoning in August 2010, but the vote is the subject of a lawsuit now scheduled for trial Jan. 9.
However it's decided, an appeal could extend the case for an indefinite time.
City-County Planning Director Steve Medlin said it's possible the new rezoning could win a clear approval before the first is out of court.
Southern Durham Development, though, has other reasons for seeking to re-rezone its 166.83-acre site, according to landscape architect Dan Jewell, who filed the new request and plan for the developers.
The new plan removes annexation into the city as a condition for donating land for a school campus to Durham Public Schools.
It does away with a detailed street plan set out in the original.
It removes a self-imposed impervious-surface limit on most of the site from 55 percent to the maximum allowable 70 percent.
Rooney called the 70 percent "crazy and irresponsible."
But Jewell said inquiries and letters of intent from prospective developers and tenants convinced Southern Durham that its zoning needed extra flexibility for layout and construction.
Southern Durham held two public meetings on the re-rezoning. Jewell said about 50 people attended the first and gave the project a "mixed" reaction.
At the second, "only nine or 10 people showed up and there were many of the same folks," he said.
"They were asking more pointed questions about runoff and so forth."
Much of the opposition to 751 South is based on belief it would aggravate pollution, particularly nitrogen and phosphorus, in already polluted Jordan Lake.
State regulations require pollution-reduction measures that will cost Durham hundreds of millions of dollars during the next 20 to 30 years.
Both old and new development proposals pledge the developers to comply with the new state standards, and Southern Durham claims its project will be environmentally friendly.
Opponents dispute that.
"It seems there is a small, committed group that views opposition to the project as related to preservation of Jordan Lake and (that they) aren't open to much discussion beyond their opposition," said Cal Cunningham, an attorney representing Southern Durham in the lawsuit.
In the suit, several property owners near the 751 South site contend that the county improperly ruled invalid their protest petition against the 2010 rezoning.
A decision in the plaintiffs' favor would nullify county approval for an earlier rezoning. Approval, in the meantime, for the new rezoning would render the court process moot.
When that approval might come, though, is "a million-dollar question," said Jewell.
The request gets review by planning and some other city-county departments, then must go through a public hearing by the advisory Durham Planning Commission.
That hearing could be concluded in one meeting, or continued over two or more months.
Eventually, it goes to the county commissioners for another public hearing and vote.
"We would like to get to the county commissioners in June or July.
"But it's out of our hands," Jewell said.


----- Forwarded Message -----
From: Will Wilson <willwilsn at gmail.com>
To: durhamopenspace at duke.edu 
Sent: Wednesday, 21 December 2011 10:16 AM
Subject: Durham News 751 article
 
they just keep going:

http://www.thedurhamnews.com/2011/12/21/210239/751-south-plan-revised-reviled.html
-- http://www.biology.duke.edu/wilson/
New Book: http://www.constructedclimates.org/

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