By Crystal McGough
Copy Editor
The Clay City Council held a public hearing Tuesday night on the Planning and Zoning Commission’s recommendation to rezone 28 parcels of land in Highland Green Sector III from Residential Medium Density to Residential High Density for the purpose of a garden home subdivision.
“This was a subdivision that was originally approved by Jefferson County,” City Manager Ronnie Dixon said. “Even though the city of Clay existed, they did not do their own Planning and Zoning and inspections until 2006, so this was approved as a subdivision as Phase III of Highland Green back in 2004. Since no substantial work had been done on that subdivision, the developer came back to us; there is now a market in Clay for this type of lot, this type of house.”
Dixon said that the proposal by the current developer is to decrease the number of lots to 50 homes, instead of 75 houses on smaller lots.
“We’re looking to finish out Phase III of that Highland Green subdivision that was started back in ‘04,” said Allen Jones III, an authorized agent of Highland Green Development LLC. “We’ve got a few builders that are interested in this size lot and this size house now. It’s in the preliminary stages of where we are with it, and trying to get the zoning back to where we can get this size house in there and get some builders in there and get the project going and finished up.”
Councilor Ben Thackerson voiced concerns about Sectors I and II not being complete. However, Jones said that the lots for Sectors I and II were purchased by other builders.
Councilor Don Baker asked about the style of houses proposed to be built in Sector III, but was informed by Jones that his company is not in that stage of the planning yet.
Many Clay citizens and residents of the Highland Green subdivision attended the council meeting and voiced their concerns during the hearing.
Carol Foster said that she is one of three people who bought houses in Phase II of Highland Green.
“There are 22 houses in the subdivision where I live, and we have at least 10 lots that have not been built on,” Foster said. “I need to know, what are the prices…of these garden homes, because when I moved in Highland Green, the houses started at $269,000 up to $310,000. I’m concerned, and some of our neighbors are concerned, about our property value.”
Foster also added concerns about the traffic that would come from adding 50 more houses to the area.
“It’s going to be a mess,” she said.
Mayor Charles Webster said that he expects the Planning and Zoning Commission will request all-brick, higher-end garden homes.
“I don’t have any objection to the garden homes,” Foster said. “I just want to make sure that it’s not going to deflate our price of (our) homes.”
Webster said he feels confident that it would not decrease the value of the existing homes because the Sector III garden homes would not be used as a comparison to the houses built in Sectors I and II.
“Our goal is that it increases,” he said.
Highland Green resident Sheila Gray said that she felt several of the residents did not have adequate access to information regarding this development.
“We did not get adequate information,” Gray said. “We got information from people, OK? We heard headcounts in the last meeting, last week. All we heard was headcount, more traffic. OK.
“We move out to Clay to get away from it all. There’s a reason why we all move out to Clay. We didn’t come out here for the restaurants…we didn’t come out here to eat. We came out here to work our land, to be quiet, to do our own thing, to have a good place to live. And we do have a good place to live. We just want to know when it’s going to stop.
“The developer, I did talk to him last week, and he said the sewage plant that’s out there now was not the one he was going to use. Is it, or is it not? You said they were just going to use what they have. Are they or are they not?”
Dixon said that the city doesn’t know.
“We are not to that point,” he said. “What I said was it is all governed by the Jefferson County Department of Health.”
Gray said that the citizens “don’t want to look at that stuff.”
“We are out in the middle of the country,” she said. “Why do you have to build in the middle of the country?”
Webster said that the reason is that there are people who want to move to the city of Clay.
Councilor Dennis Locke made a motion to approve the Planning and Zoning Commission’s recommendation to rezone Sector III, which was seconded by Counselor Bo Johnson.
“If I thought for one second this would negatively impact property values, I would have denied this at the Planning and Zoning Commission,” Locke said.
The motion, however, failed to pass in a 3-3 vote, where Webster, Locke and Bo Johnson voted yes, and Baker, Thackerson and Becky Johnson voted no.
“I didn’t have enough information to make the decision that I wanted to make,” Baker said. “When you can’t answer how you’re going to do the sewage portion of it, whether you’re going to build another building or not, there’s people out there that have property and I would not want a sewage facility built beside my house. If they can bring it back up later and give me some more answers, that’d be great.”
In other city news, the council unanimously voted to award the bid for garbage/waste disposal services in the city for the next three years to Santek Waste Disposal.
Thackerson informed the council members and citizens in attendance that on Saturday, March 2, there would be a litter cleanup at Cosby Lake beginning at 8 a.m.
The next Clay City Council meeting will be held on Tuesday, March 5, at Clay City Hall. Pre-council will begin at 6 p.m. and the regular council session will begin at 6:30 p.m.