Triangulator

An update to a post earlier this week on new commitments Southern Durham Development is making in its 751 South pitch, which county commissioners are voting on Monday:

In our original post (below), we forgot to mention that the developer is considering another element that could be finalized by Monday's public hearing. Draft plans for 751 South currently only offer one building that is vertically integrated, or has multiple stories with different uses, such as shops or offices on the bottom level with apartments above. But Southern Durham Development President Alex Mitchell said his group is considering adding more vertically integrated elements and could tell commissioners about those elements Monday.

The other commitments Southern Durham Development has made are now in writing, as provided by the planning department early Saturday. (PDF)

ORIGINAL POST, Thurs., Aug. 5, 6:50 p.m.

Southern Durham Development President Alex Mitchell told the Indy Thursday that if allowed to move forward, his 751 South development pitched for southern Durham would meet even more stringent standards for managing nutrients that would wash from the development into Jordan Lake. The commitment to tougher environmental standards came with 11 other promises Southern Durham Development will make Monday, when the company appears before Durham County Commissioners seeking permission to move forward plans to build the community of as many as 1,300 residences and 600,000 square feet of offices and shops.

Mitchell said 751 South would meet future rules for Jordan Lake, which state the development could discharge no more than 2.2 pounds of nitrogen per acre, per year, and no more than half a pound of phosphorus per acre, per year.

Nitrogen and phosphorus are two naturally occurring nutrients that have been found in high concentrations in Jordan Lake. When levels rise, they fuel algae in water bodies, which can wreak havoc on the ecosystem. Standards for these pollutants in Jordan Lake are currently less stringent, but are anticipated to change over the next two years. If Southern Durham Development does not build its development to meet those projected standards, taxpayers would be footing the bill years from now, as the city would have to pay to retrofit the development to meet environmental standards as they change.

Southern Durham Development President Alex Mitchell told the Indy Thursday that if allowed to move forward, his 751 South development pitched for southern Durham would meet even more stringent standards for managing nutrients that would wash from the development into Jordan Lake. The commitment to tougher environmental standards came with 11 other promises Southern Durham Development will make Monday, when the company appears before Durham County Commissioners seeking permission to move forward plans to build the community of as many as 1,300 residences and 600,000 square feet of offices and shops.

Mitchell said 751 South would meet future rules for Jordan Lake, which state the development could discharge no more than 2.2 pounds of nitrogen per acre, per year, and no more than half a pound of phosphorus per acre, per year.

Nitrogen and phosphorus are two naturally occurring nutrients that have been found in high concentrations in Jordan Lake. When levels rise, they fuel algae in water bodies, which can wreak havoc on the ecosystem. Standards for these pollutants in Jordan Lake are currently less stringent, but are anticipated to change over the next two years. If Southern Durham Development does not build its development to meet those projected standards, taxpayers would be footing the bill years from now, as the city would have to pay to retrofit the development to meet environmental standards as they change.

To reduce the pollutants generated by the development, Southern Durham Development will have to use both management systems for stormwater and runoff, and nutrient offset programs, Mitchell said, which would reduce the net impact of nutrient runoff from the development.

The commitment is an expensive venture for the developer, but also one that many opponents had asked Southern Durham Development to consider. Members of Durham's Planning Commission had even asked the company in April to meet the new Jordan Lake rules, but the developer would not compromise at that point.

But as Monday's vote nears, Southern Durham Development has now made this and several other offers to help generate support and good will from both commissioners, and the public.

"We're trying to make this a plan that all of Durham can be proud of," Mitchell said. He said he has tried to address as many concerns as possible for the project with commitments that show residents that Southern Durham Development will build what it is promising.

• Durham County Attorney Lowell Siler

Despite mounting public interest and calls for an urgent announcement, it could be Monday before the public hears the opinion of Durham County Attorney Lowell Siler on a legal matter that's holding up a county vote on the controversial 751 South development.

All eyes have been on Siler since July 26, when Durham County Commissioners were scheduled to vote on whether to rezone land that would allow the huge mixed-use development to go forward. But a last-minute wrinkle—a legal disagreement over who has rights to a 3.3-acre strip of land on the developer's property—caused Siler to ask the board to defer the vote until August 9 so he could consider the matter.

But the two-week delay hasn't lent much insight, as Siler said he's still waiting for information from the attorney general's office that is central to the legal matter. Siler said he requested information from the state office on July 28, and still hasn't received a response. (Siler's e-mail, PDF)

Noelle Talley, spokeswoman for the office of the attorney general, told the Indy Thursday that attorneys in her office are working on a letter to Siler that answers his questions. Time is of the essence, here, because whatever information the attorney general's staff gives will be central to how county commissioners proceed with their vote on Monday night.

The issue at hand revolves around that small strip of land, equivalent to just 3.3 acres. On July 13, Southern Durham Development, the proponents of 751 South, granted the rights on that land to the N.C. Department of Transportation so that highway N.C. 751 could be widened. If their project was approved in the future, Southern Durham Development would eventually have to give the state the right-of-way.

But the timing of granting it early was advantageous: with the state taking over the right-of-way, it would invalidate a protest that neighbors of the property had lodged with county commissioners. A valid protest petition would have required four of the five commissioners to vote in favor in order for 751 South to move forward. Without a valid protest petition, only three commissioners—a simple majority—must vote favorably for the project to go forth.

When the state realized its acceptance of rights to that small strip of land inadvertently sabotaged protesting citizens, it tried to remove itself from the situation by rejecting the land gift just before the July 26 meeting, when the commissioners originally were supposed to vote.

That's when Siler questioned whether the N.C. DOT could really give the land back. The attorney general, on behalf of the N.C. DOT, had filed notarized documents (PDF) with Durham's register of deeds rejecting the property. But Siler, and others, want the attorney general's office to show specifically where in the law they may do that.

"I would like to at least see where they're coming from," Siler said. "I would like to see their reasoning."

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The N.C. Department of Transportation has until tomorrow to respond to a letter (PDF) from a Durham developer asking it to rescind on action it took last week, rejecting rights to a piece of the developer’s land. This is according to a letter filed by Patrick Byker, attorney from firm K&L Gates, representing Southern Durham Development.

The firm is threatening to sue N.C. DOT if it doesn’t accept Southern Durham Development’s donation of an easement along N.C. 751. The letter insinuates the transportation department is to blame if Southern Durham Development doesn’t get approval of its monumental and controversial development, 751 South.

Byker said he sent the letter July 30. Greer Beaty, spokeswoman for the N.C. DOT confirmed the department received the letter this week, and said Gibson was out of the office this week, and that the department would not be responding to the letter.

"We're not going to comment on an alleged, impending lawsuit," Beaty said late Thursday. "When a lawsuit is filed, the attorney general's office would be the ones to respond to that. But our position has not changed. We believe that politely removing ourselves from a local zoning discussion was the right thing to do."

The controversy is the latest twist in the ongoing debate over whether the county should allow developers to build 751 South, a complex of as many as 1,300 residences, a shopping center and offices for a 167-acre swath of southwestern Durham County. The land is mostly rural, and staunch opponents of the project say it will create traffic nightmares and that runoff from roadways and the development itself will further pollute the already contaminated Jordan Lake, which is a mile away.

Commissioners are scheduled to vote on the development at a meeting that begins 7 p.m. Monday, Aug. 9. The meeting had been continued from July 26 due specifically to disagreement over this land easement, which Southern Durham Development gave to the N.C. DOT on July 13.

• This is a corrected graph of home values the appraiser sent after the report was distributed. She said this graphic was left out of the report.

To gain support for his controversial project, 751 South, a developer recently sent a letter (PDF) to residents in a South Durham neighborhood alleging that living near mixed-use and commercial development, such as the one he’s pushing, could help boost their property values.

But there’s a problem: A central statement in the letter, written by Alex Mitchell, president of Southern Durham Development, is incorrect. So are conclusions in an accompanying letter and analysis by a Durham real estate appraiser, which misstate the appraiser’s own findings.

The documents tell homeowners in Chancellor’s Ridge, a community of 450 homes near The Streets at Southpoint mall, that their home prices haven’t appreciated like those in similar communities, such as Fairfield and Hunters Wood, despite being located near new commercial development. However, 751 South would boost home values, the appraiser’s statement says. The letter also suggests that neighborhood residents should encourage their homeowners’ association to stop trying to block 751 South. The homeowners’ group signed a protest petition that could prevent the developer from getting county approval for the project—1,300 residences, plus a shopping center and offices proposed for a rural corner of Durham County. County commissioners are scheduled to vote on the project Aug. 9.

Here’s the truth: The values of single-family homes in Chancellor’s Ridge actually have increased at the same pace as those in similar developments; it’s the prices of the 88 townhouses in the development that haven’t risen as much, said appraiser Susan Copeland, who prepared the study.

But that’s not clear from the letter or conclusions in Copeland’s name distributed in South Durham. Statements in her report are inconsistent with the data she gathered in her actual analysis. Copeland said she carefully prepared a 13-page analysis (PDF) that was proofread by more than 40 people—but was then “hacked” to seven pages and reassembled by attorneys for Southern Durham Development and, later, by Mitchell.

Copeland, an appraiser with 32 years of experience, could now be called by the state to answer for the findings bearing her name. When the letters were mailed the week of July 19, John Gunter, a resident of Chancellor’s Ridge and an opponent of 751 South, filed a complaint (PDF) with the N.C. Appraisal Board. He included notes from a conversation he had with Copeland about the letter, and her acknowledgement that incorrect information and an erroneous graphic were included in the report sent to nearly 500 people.

“My reputation is on the line,” Copeland told the Indy this week. “I didn’t like what happened. I had put so much work into the entire thing. It had been proofed by so many people. And at the last minute, everything got changed and run over to Kinko’s and sent out 500 times.”