PLANNING BOARD HEARS CASES

On August 15th the planning board heard a couple of cases. One dealt with the Downtown project and Mr. Harrell presented his case for why he would like changes to the conditions the council had placed upon him back when they passed his project.
16 conditions of the 44 Mr. Harrell was seeking modifications. I believe in the end, the planning board did a wonderful job expressing concerns and beliefs of what needed to happen.
One condition dealt with the open space on the project. The town stated 15% was needed and the developer wanted less. The recommendation of the planning board was to allow the open space to be counted that maybe municipal land and then mitigate a dollar amount for the other 5%. Value will have to be set by the council if they even approve our suggestion.
I won't go into all the conditions but they can be seen via the towns website or by visiting the town and looking at the council packet.

The other major case was a retail area over on Secrest Shortcut road. The developer wants to put a grocery store and some out buildings that would be maybe a retail restaurant type and some office buildings. The map looked nice for the area and many neighbors showed up to voice approval of the project. One sticking point for the developer is that there is no sewer access at this time. May be slow in the near future also. Because of that and the fact he doesn't think enough rooftops exist now, he would like a 5 year window instead of the normal 2 years. The planning board sent its recommendations to the council for approval with conditions attached.

Both cases will be up to the council to decide on September 12,2006 at 7pm. If you have time please make yourself available.

****Also, the town is seeking interested people that would like to serve on some committees to volunteer their time and help the town. Interested??? If so contact the planning department or go on the IT website.