Black Mountain residents wary of potential rezoning
Aldermen to hold public hearing on voluntary annexation near Brooks Cove Road
Fred McCormick
The Valley Echo
January 8, 2021
Residents on a small road in a rural area on the eastern boundary of town are voicing concerns ahead of a public hearing on a proposed voluntary annexation and rezoning request.
A 16.45-acre undeveloped tract of land on Brooks Cove Road, a dead end street with 17 homes that borders Buncombe County on the east and Black Mountain on the west, is slated to be the site of a development. Property owners are worried it will change the character of the small community.
The board of aldermen will hold a public hearing in its regular monthly meeting, beginning at 6 p.m., Monday, Jan. 11, to consider a request by the owner of the land to be voluntarily annexed into the town limits. The applicant, William Honeycutt, is asking that it be rezoned from Residential District 1 (R-1) to Urban Residential District 8 (UR-8) once annexed.
While retired Black Mountain Police Chief Steve Padgett and his brother Nathan, Owen High School teacher and head football coach, are not opposed to the annexation, they believe the UR-8 zoning designation would be inappropriate for the narrow road.
“We have no problem with the land being annexed into the town, and we’re not against the development of the property,” Steve said. “Reasonable, controlled growth is fine, but when you’re looking at eight houses per acre, is that reasonable for the Town of Black Mountain?”
The Padgetts submitted an email detailing their concerns to the board and mayor. The communication acknowledges the current UR-8 designation of the portion of the street that lies within town limits, but contends residents weren’t notified when the change was made a decade ago.
The letter, which the Padgetts asked to be included in the official record of communications, urges the board to consider the potential strain on the existing road and stormwater infrastructure.
“I know we have to grow, but we can’t grow too fast or beyond our capabilities,” Steve said. “Controlled growth while maintaining our identity as a small town is great, but I’m afraid with all the developments and clear-cutting trees, we’re losing that.”
The proposed voluntary annexation and rezoning was discussed by the planning board in its November regular meeting. Jesse Gardner, one of the six members of the seven-member board in attendance, recused himself from voting due to his role as a representative of the property owners.
On behalf of his client, Gardner stated that the annexation request was made in order to access the town’s water system. The property owners plan, according to Gardner, is to build 45-50 single-family homes that are accessed through Brooks Cove Road.
The developer, Gardner said, could proceed with the planned development regardless of annexation. However, the property is adjacent to a large mass of land in town limits, north of I-40, that is designated UR-8.
The existing R-1 designation in the county allows for 10 units per acre while eight per acre are permitted under the town’s UR-8 classification. Permitted uses under the requested zoning are more restrictive than R-1, but the Padgetts contend that Suburban Residential-2 (SR-2) is more consistent with the existing neighborhood. In fact, Steve points out, the neighborhood only feet to the north of Brooks Cove Road, while not adjacent, is zoned SR-2.
“A lot of the people who live there now were living there when these homes were built, back in the 1930s and 40s,” Nathan said. “The community hasn’t changed much, and I don’t remember ever seeing a ‘for sale’ sign in any of the yards during my time growing up there. So that really speaks to the demographics of the neighborhood and why many of the people who live in it have stayed for so long.”
They are speaking out on behalf of area residents who may find it difficult to navigate the digital world as government meetings continue to be held virtually during the COVID-19 pandemic, according to Steve.
The Padgett family has owned property on the street for more than 100 years, Nathan said, and they are not the only members of that community with generational connections to the land.
Chris Barry lives in a home on Brooks Cove Road that his grandfather purchased and moved to the property in the 1960s. His children are the fourth generation of his family to reside on the quiet street and the home of his grandparents is hundreds of feet away. When he received notice of the proposed annexation and rezoning he immediately questioned whether the existing road could support the development.
“It’s logistically impossible,” Barry said. “Some of the people on the road will occasionally bring in heavy equipment to do projects on their land, and if you’re driving when a large truck is on the road, you actually have to pull into a driveway to make room. There is no shoulder on the road.”
Barry is not opposed to growth, he said, but he believes the town should seek a way to manage the final outcome.
“I am not the kind of person who believes in telling other people what to do with their property,” he said. “But, at the same time, there is no reason to disrupt an entire neighborhood that has been here for 50 or 60 years.”
Heath Tweed, whose parents have lived on the road for more than 40 years, owns property adjacent to his childhood home.
“I grew up playing in the creek that runs through that property,” he said. “When I was young it was a small creek that you could easily hop across. But over the years, as people have built above it, all that runoff comes through there.”
Tweed, who is in the process of developing his own home on the land adjacent to his parents, has taken considerable care to not exacerbate what he describes as a worsening stormwater situation.
“I could have crossed the creek from Brooks Cove Road to create access to my property, but instead I was able to use an easement to get to it from up above,” he said. “I did that specifically because I didn’t want to do anything to make the flooding that my parents experience during big storms worse.”
The lots of Tweed and his parents border the parcel of land being considered for annexation and rezoning, and attempts to remediate the growing impacts of stormwater have proven unsuccessful through the years, he said.
“The creek makes a hard turn right there and we’ve worked to restore the bank where it turns,” he said. “But since there was a development on Thicket Lane, just above our neighborhood, people can’t believe how much the creek swells. I’m really worried about the impact a development on that property could have on my parents.”
Tweed would like the town to annex the property and zone it SR-2, matching the area just north of Brooks Cove Road.
“UR-8 is not consistent with this neighborhood now, nor with how it’s ever been,” he said. “If the town zoned it SR-2, that would ensure the developer doesn’t decide to build a larger development later. I want to find a middle ground because what’s proposed won’t just impact the older generation that lives here now, but the future generations of these families.”
The planning board on Nov. 23, expressed support for voluntary annexation. The board voted unanimously, in a Dec. 15, special called meeting, to approve the rezoning request, citing the property’s shared boundary with a UR-8 district.
Town documents indicate that 102 notices of the November meeting were mailed to property owners within 200 feet of the property’s boundaries, but the Padgetts maintain the notice for the Dec. 15 special called meeting was inadequate because they were received one day prior. They invited the mayor and aldermen to visit the site to gain insight into the existing neighborhood.
At the conclusion of next week’s public hearing, aldermen will decide first whether to approve the voluntary annexation before considering the rezoning request. The board discussed the matter in its Jan. 7 agenda meeting. Mayor Larry Harris inquired about the town’s financial obligations if the property is annexed.
“What are the town’s obligations in the cost of annexation, and specifically I’m asking about the infrastructure?” he asked town attorney Ron Sneed, adding that the road was “fairly inadequate.”
Sneed responded by describing the upcoming hearings as “odd.”
“The town can’t rule on a site plan, or particular zoning, until you have authorization of annexation,” he said. “So it makes it a little strange that the first decision you’ll be making on Monday night is about whether or not to annex, almost without consideration of what they want to do.”
Relating potential annexation to zoning can be difficult, he continued.
“The downside there is, whatever fits zoning, fits. And, we’re not in a very good position to say ‘you guys are going to have to build the road out for us,’” he said. “However, a term you could possibly get a developer to commit to is for them to come to you with a development proposal.”
A major subdivision with 75 houses or more would require a traffic study before approval, but the 16.45-acre property, which contains a stream that county or town buffer ordinances prevent construction within 30 feet of the bank. The property owner’s plans of 45-50 single-family homes will fall short of triggering a traffic study for the project.
Harris asked town manager Josh Harrold to develop an estimate of costs associated with the decision before the hearing.
For the Padgetts and other families on Brooks Cove Road, the concerns of the community represent a larger issue in the town.
“We, as a town, need to take our time to think about this,” Nathan said. “There is no need to rush, and since responsible and controlled growth is something that most people seem to agree on, this is an opportunity to show how that can be done.”