Orange County NC Website
Commission about the application and to ask additional questions. There is also the opportunity <br /> tonight for the applicant to submit additional evidence based on questions they had at the <br /> previous meeting. At the conclusion of whatever we get through tonight, there are some options <br /> within the abstract about convening into another public hearing or directing things to the <br /> Planning Board for their deliberation, as shown in Options A, B, C, or D. There's not additional <br /> staff presentation necessary tonight. The main intent is to hear additional questions so that the <br /> applicant can respond with additional testimony or direct it to where the information is. The <br /> applicant does have additional evidence they would like to provide. I'll turn it over to the <br /> applicant representative. <br /> Bill Hutchins: I'm the attorney for the applicant, and at this time, I would like to call Vic Knight <br /> as a witness who is going to provide testimony as to how the project will affect the value of the <br /> contiguous property. Mr. Knight, if you'll come up and state your name and your qualifications <br /> and confirm that you have been sworn. <br /> Vic Knight: I am a certified residential appraiser here in Orange County and have been <br /> operating Chapel Hill Appraisals for close to 25 years, and have done a number of impact <br /> analyses here in the County, including some of the previous cell tower locations, more <br /> specifically, the Martin-Marietta quarry operation down on 54, we've made presentations to you <br /> before. I do have an analysis here, I'll pass out some copies, and one original. I have been <br /> sworn. Briefly, I was requested by the applicant to do an impact analysis on the surrounding <br /> area of the Buckhorn Village development. These pages will summarize my findings in that. <br /> Looking at the project and making the assumption that it was 100% complete, as proposed, I've <br /> been given copies of a variety of their plans —transportation plans, land use plans, etc. —there <br /> are select copies in your report as well. In looking at that, what we basically did was tour the <br /> location with kind of a bird's eye view of the area and the surrounding communities and started <br /> looking at various plans to make sure we kind of understood what was going to be proposed in <br /> the area. Immediately, we began to look at competing or similar locations. I chose one that <br /> we've used and done considerable amount of analysis with. The Wildwood subdivision, which <br /> is located off of NC 86, just south of Hillsborough, which most folks would recognize being down <br /> across from Piedmont Electric and more or less behind the Wal-Mart shopping center and <br /> Home Depot. That subdivision has been in existence for quite some time, and the reason we're <br /> choosing that as the beginning point was to get a general understanding of what's been <br /> happening in there in terms of its appreciation levels, the market reacting to that location for a <br /> couple of different reasons —one, it is close to the interstate, it is also on a major north/south <br /> arterial here in the County. After looking at the analysis, which is contained on the back side of <br /> the report, the analysis, over approximately the last 15 years, that particular development has in <br /> fact been on average looking at about a 5.5% appreciation level. There have been a number of <br /> sales and re-sales in that particular location that shows that continuation of appreciation in that <br /> location. It also includes sales and re-sales in the Wildwood subdivision after the construction <br /> and occupancy of Wal-Mart as well as Home Depot. In effect, what has happened with the <br /> major commercial operation coming to that area, there hasn't been any negative effect on the <br /> Wildwood subdivision over an extended period of time, including the creation of that particular <br /> Hampton Pointe location. <br /> The next step is to basically look at other locations and see whether or not it might be <br /> unique in its own fashion, what would that do to Hillsborough, or Orange County, or some other <br /> particular dynamic that might be going on. So, the next best location that begins to reach <br /> similarity to this particular project is frankly, Southpoint mall in southern Durham. There are a <br /> number of pages in the report. We looked at three different residential subdivisions in that area, <br /> all of which are immediately south of the Southpoint mall location. If you can visualize a <br /> triangulation between 751 and the east side of Southpoint, in essence come to a "V" south of <br />