Evolution of Polivka's MX Commercial Zoning Proposal 2010-2013 - Part 2

Evolution of Polivka's MX Commercial Zoning Proposal 2010-2013 - Part 2

I am sharing excerpts from Weddington Town Council minutes January 14, 2013.

You can go back and look at the planning board meeting for more details, September 24, 2012. To find these minutes do a search on the dates on the town of Weddington's website. 

Referring to Nancy Anderson's petition against Polivka's MX commercial rezoning from residential R40.

TOWN OF WEDDINGTON REGULAR TOWN COUNCIL MEETING MONDAY, JANUARY 14, 2013 – 7:00 P.M. WEDDINGTON TOWN HALL 1924 WEDDINGTON ROAD WEDDINGTON, NC 28104

EXCERPTS FROM POLIVKA PROPOSAL: beginning at page 29/31 of pdf 

Mayor Davidson – Will you talk about the protest petition that we received? 

Attorney Fox - There was a protest petition received for the property. The petition was received within the time period as provided by the statute. The protest petition was evaluated by our office and it was determined that it was a valid protest petition. Under the protest petition, once you have a valid protest it changes the vote from a simple majority to a super majority which is three-fourths of the Council members have to vote in order to approve the item. The Mayor is not included in that calculation.  (edited to add context : the petition they are discussing is a petition started by former Nancy Anderson who was opposed to the proposal at that time. Nancy is currently a member of the planning board) 

Ms. Nancy Anderson – I am a little confused because the rules got changed in the beginning. I called today and asked what the time limit was and I was told there was not a time limit. If I am only allowed three minutes I would ask that I be allowed more time. I will be speaking on behalf of all of the visitors that come to the farm. 

Mayor Davidson asked how much time she would like. 

Nancy Anderson – I will be as brief as I can. 

Mayor Pro Tem Barry moved to give Ms. Anderson 10 minutes and more if she needs it at the end specifically because she is the adjoining property owner. All were in favor, with votes recorded as follows: AYES: Council members Thomisser, Harrison, Hadley and Mayor Pro Tem Barry NAYS: None 

Ms. Anderson – I did serve as the Mayor from 2003 to 2011. I am owner of the Hunter Farm and the current custodian. I am the adjoining property owner and the one most affected. I filed the protest petition but it appears now that even though it is a valid petition it really will not apply very much to a five member council. 

My only purpose for filing that petition was to hit the reset button. It was not in any way, shape or form to try to stop the development at all. Somehow I did not manage to work within the rules that were happening. I have had many conversations with Jordan over the last couple of months on how to apply for a conditional use permit for the farm because we are operating without one. We were grandfathered in. We do not have a permit to be an agritourism business. I think it is important to get one. We want to add to our program. So he advised me that the Land Use Plan is being reviewed and the survey is being done and do it that way. 

My real goal was to incorporate the project with the whole west Providence Road corridor. I believe that we have an awesome opportunity here today to be the shining star and an example of how we can incorporate commercial, institutional, conservation land, agricultural land and residential. Not just to coexist but to thrive. We can knit this together in such a way that it will enhance our community and be what everyone should aspire to. The timing is off. They put their application in. It was considered prior to the Land Use Plan being finished.

 I am not asking you to hold up their process only by 30 days. I am not here to talk about runoff, traffic congestion or median cuts. What I am here to talk with you about is something more important. I am not here to talk about whether we should develop this property. I am here to talk to you about how we should develop this property. 

Since 2001 the Hunter Farm was put into the conservation easement which made it undevelopable. There will be no houses or anything there. It has presented a great challenge to this Town. What to do with the Polivka property? What is appropriate there? Daniel, in our many conversations about this you have already said I just want to get the dialogue going. I think you have succeeded. Since you and I have known each other the very first time I met you, you told me that any time someone presents a reasonable,  thoughtful suggestion or proposal that you will listen to it with an open mind. I trust that you are going to do that today. 

I do have some ideas that I would like to share with the Town Council. I want to tell you the basic concepts. I see this as a great opportunity to really do something beautiful here. We can knit it together very well or it could turn out like one of the sweaters my grandmother used to make. She was getting old and she would run out of yarn and she would start with another color. One of the sleeves would be too long and one too short. The buttons would not match. We had to wear it or it would hurt her feelings if we did not. I do not want us to have a ragged looking sweater. I want it to be a beautiful quilt all knitted together. We can do that.

 Before I show you the basic concept I want to address a few issues that have come up during all the public meetings and that is that all landowners are created equal. I have sat at this podium and said that it does not matter if they have owned it for two hours, two years or 200 years that landowners have property rights but that is not always exactly the case. The Hunter Farm is special. I tell the children that come out to the farm that the Hunter Farm will be a farm forever. It is a forever farm and our family is the current custodian of what many describe as the crown jewel of Weddington. It is what most of the residents love about our community. Besides preserving it we share it with you. Thousands of people come to our farm every year and most would agree that it adds value to the community and we exemplify that Weddington brand.

 I know that there are members on the Council that have studied this for months and they are sick of it. I know that there is very little that can be said tonight that is going to change your mind. I commend you for all the hard work you have done. But I do want to ask you if you have talked with anyone from the Catawba Lands Conservancy or the Ag Extension because what we are talking about here is a century old farm. Many of the regulations and ordinances that we have in this Town do not apply well to agricultural uses and the buffer one being the most glaring one. Twenty-five feet is not enough. You need a 50 foot buffer if you are going to be organic. You cannot even spray roundup. We are not doing that now but we are certainly looking into it. It is a three year process. 

A person should have the right to develop their property. Agreed. As a family that has owned over 500 acres here at one time I would never deny that to anyone but you are not allowed to develop your property at the expense of someone else’s and I think that is what we are looking at. 

There is another statement that I have heard and that is that it has been eight months since they applied and they deserve an answer and we cannot put this off any longer. Ladies – you carried your children for longer than eight months and I know during that last trimester you wanted that delivery date to come. Asphalt is the last crop you will ever plant. Once you do this it is forever. Eight months in those kind of terms is really not that long and another 30 days should not be considered that long either. 

I have heard that Mr. Polivka is a very patient man. Another comment that I have heard many times is I am getting tired of getting beat up over this with all these awful emails. I will say to you stop beating them up over this. Stop being part of the problem and be a part of the solution. Stop posting videos on YouTube saying derogatory things. This is a very hard job. I did it for eight years and it is not easy. Many times when I was on this side of the table, Barbara Harrison hardly ever missed a meeting and got up to speak many times and never once do I ever remember her being disrespectful or unprofessional. Please follow her example. Some of you have made careers out of complaining. Be grownups about this. 

I do have some visual aids. The whole point of this conversation is that you need to preserve the viewshed, the beautiful vista from the farm’s side. All of you have been there and seeing it in the summertime and fall are beautiful. You need to look at it when the leaves are off the trees. This is a view that you have seen. This was done by Jean Lee Pirkey and it struck her as one of the most beautiful scenes on the farm of looking up on that hill. I am just giving you my ideas.

 The simple and quick solution for the Polivkas. This is what you have seen. This is a blow up of what the plat looks like. In my mind a very simple solution here would be simply to extend these buffers and take this whole thing just as it is and pull it down the hill. It would take 10 minutes on a CAD system. Bring it down and extend the buffers. That alleviates a lot of concerns over what is going to happen next. It would help save the tree but apparently they do not want to save the tree or it can’t be saved. I have had many conversations with the CLC. We can have a mini trail there. We could incorporate it into the Hunter Farm and even extend to the Polivka property if they would like by footpath only. Along the sidewalk we could connect with the Carolina Thread Trail. If someone would like to ask me a question about the NCDOT thing I will answer it. The topography at this level makes it conducive and the scale would work to have three stories showing on the front and two in the back. If this messes up the drainage on your maps you can see that we have more than ample drainage receptacles. 

The Town Council took a brief recess. 

Chris Rea - I live in the Steeplechase neighborhood. My wife Jan and I have lived in Weddington for 18 years. I am a native of Charlotte and we moved here back in 1994. In 2007 Mr. Basil Polivka with Polivka International bought a five-acre piece of property with a single-family home on it across the street from our little business center. This 5-acre property that he knew he overpaid for was zoned R-40 but he was and is still arrogant enough to figure that he could roll over whatever local politicians he had to to get the property rezoned and easily get his way. But he was wrong. The Town Council at the time turned him down. And when the Town Council did not give him the answer he was looking for he waited patiently until 2011 when a Council more favorable to his position was elected by trusting citizens but he was wrong again. The Council that was elected at that time campaigned on promises that they would never agree to do the bidding of some developer or so we were led to believe. Somehow this developer was able to change enough Council members’ minds that some of them completely reversed the positions that they campaigned on and now there are enough votes on the Town Council to push this rezoning through.

Assuming that the Council votes to approve the zoning, they will have succeeded in opening the door to something that virtually no citizen of Weddington is in favor of – a 15,000 SF office building. During the Planning Board meeting on September 24 one of my neighbors in Steeplechase spoke. I will read the brief exchange between him and some members of the Planning Board. He is not identified by name here only by gentleman. This is on page 130 of the agenda packet for tonight’s meeting. He says, “I live in the Steeplechase subdivision. Originally there was a sewer line that was going to go through Hunter Farms down through my back yard. Can you make a condition so that in the future that would never happen? A condition that says that they must tap in at Providence Road.” Chairman Sharp responds, “A condition that any sewer connection in the future must be in front of the property.” Ms. Propst said, “How would that ever happen any way?” The gentleman says, “If they come to you guys and want expansion of the property and no longer can use the existing septic system and now we have to revisit going through Steeplechase to tie in at Highgate.” Chairman Sharp says, “Any future sewer connections to a sewer system must be through the front of the property. You can’t cut across Hunter Farms and go to Steeplechase over to Kings Manor.”

Again reading from the minutes of the September Planning Board Meeting on Page 135 of your agenda packet it says, “Any future sewer connections must occur along Providence Road.” Here is what is interesting that also in the packet is a letter addressed to Jordan Cook from Mike Garbark from the Union County Department of Public Works and he writes the following: “The above mentioned site plan for 13700 Providence Road has been reviewed by Union County Public Works. County water is accessible along Providence Road but County sewer is not accessible.” It appears that an issue that my neighbors thought had been settled has not been.

If the building of the Polivka property is expanded at some point in the future beyond what they are telling us now something that is likely to happen in my opinion this developer will be in my back yard and my neighbor’s back yard and we will be fighting the sewer thing all over again. Even aside from the sewer issue regarding the larger issue of commercial development in Weddington generally I fail to understand why we need any more commercial development than we already have. It would be different if Weddington were stuck out in the middle of nowhere when you have to plan a day trip and pack up the car and stock up on supplies. The fact is that you can drive 5 or 10 minutes in any direction and find whatever you are looking for at any number of humdrum cookie cutter businesses. From a few minutes drive from here is the Arboretum, Rea Village, Providence Commons, the Promenade, and Village Commons in Wesley Chapel - there are no shortages of places to shop nearby. It is not a rare thing.

You know what is rare – a tranquil quiet place with a small town feel – Weddington, our Town, that is what is rare. Someone speaking in favor of bringing commercial development to Weddington mentioned how nice it would be to have a coffee shop where you could sit down with a friend, relax and have a cup of coffee. Some of you may remember that we had such a shop right there in Weddington Corners and it went out of business and now it is a karate school. Why is Mr. Polivka the only one that is exempt from the Land Use plan as it exists now? Why is it so urgent to vote on this tonight? The deadline for the residents of Weddington that have completed the new survey is November 19 – six days from now. Can this not be delayed until after the land use is collected and published? What made some of you change your minds after you promised to preserve the things that made our Town so special?

The simple fact is that the overwhelming majority of Weddington residents state that they do not want any further commercial development. One of you stated for the public record the following: “Basil is a very good friend of mine and he supported my campaign and so for transparency and disclosure purposes I wanted to make sure everybody in the audience and for the record and were aware of that. It is public record and you can go to the fec.gov website and punch in my name and see all 375 people that gave me money a lot of whom are real estate developers here in Weddington.”

In the end council member Barbara Harrison made a motion to approve Polivka

The council voted to approve Polivka's plan 

AYES: Councilmembers Harrison, Hadley and Mayor Pro Tem Barry 

NAYS: Councilmember Thomisser 

End of minutes

In the minutes it discussed a recess before the vote. The council discussed whether they should postpone the vote, as current town surveys were pending and would have been completed in 9 days.  70% of Weddington residents did not want more commercial development at that time. The council also discussed updating the the Land Use plan as it had not been updated in 10 years. The discussions were heated among council members and the Mayor. 

There were a lot of public comments opposing the Polivka proposal. There were a few comments in support of the proposal. It's important to note that all  town council members and the Mayor ran on platforms of no commercial development. Current town council member Jeff Perryman voted to recommend the wedding venue when he was on the planning board in 2013. This vote was one of the times where council went against the majority of Weddington citizens in opposition and approved it anyway. 

After reviewing and researching Polivka's current 2024 proposal,  we do not feel that there is a need to add two more commercial buildings on their property. I feel this will only expand commercial to that side of the road and calling it an "office park" could set a precedent for other office parks down Providence Road. We should keep commercial development limited to the downtown designated district according to our land use plan. 

Around the same time, in 2013 as Polivka was approved,   the same council members voted to approve  7112 Newtown Road conditional zoning from residential to a wedding venue.  This vote to approve,  also went against strong opposition from Weddington citizens at that time. After getting approved,  the wedding venue never became a business and has sat empty all these years, abandoned.   Current town council member Jeff Perryman recommended to approve it as a weddington venue as he was a member of the Planning Board. 

Now, in 2024, 7112 Newtown Road is under contingent contract, for a conditional zoning for a "church/other worship activities". The property is currently zoned residential. The members of the Rahma Center of Charlotte  (RCC) want to make the barn a "call for prayer", with a goal to build their mosque there one day. Click here to learn more https://www.rccharlotte.org/about/

More than likely, if RCC is  approved, the historical home and buildings would be demolished one day for a new mosque. From my understanding, a mosque, according to their faith would remain a mosque indefinitely. Once it's a mosque, it will always remain there, even if the members move on to another location. 

7112 Newtown Road should have never been approved for a weddington venue and  it should not be approved now for the current proposal, as it's zoned residential. 7112 should remain residential as its on a busy corner area, where the traffic is bad and would not be conducive for any type of business or any worship center. Our land use plan states the home site and buildings are historical and should be protected as residential. 

Another example where voting went against Weddington citizens, was the proposal for Residential Conservation Development (RCD) by Mayor Ed Howie in the early 2000's. Weddington citizens came out in huge opposition against clustered homes on smaller lots. Weddington citizens wanted to stay at one acre. Weddington town council voted to approve RCD.

 At the time, those who advocated for RCD wanted to give Weddington residents an option to choose a one acre lot or a smaller RCD lot which on average is around 1/3 acre. Developers can save more money on building infrastructure such as roads and sidewalks as opposed to R40. It didn't take long for over 75% of the developers to start building exclusively RCD. This caused predominantly R40 neighborhoods to be a thing of the past, as the developers showed their preference for RCD. Per Mayor Howie, RCD was to entice developers to build in Weddington. Howie was voted out in the next election. 

Weddington's current town council and Mayor have recently started discussing increasing the lot size for RCD to 20,000 square feet. This is prompted by Weddington buyers want bigger homes. A half acre lot can accommodate a larger home in scale while offering more outdoor living space. 

We continue to encourage town council and the planning board to vote on behalf of Weddington citizens.