Orange County NC Website
happening, you can still hear the noise. The traffic has increased on our road significantly <br /> since I've been up there. That's all expected, we don't expect progress to stop. I never moved <br /> out there thinking that no more houses would be built. But I have to admit, I never expected to <br /> see an SUP, a special use permit, overturn an Agricultural-Residential zoning; not in my <br /> lifetime. We live in a very rural community. I cannot consider that an ideal place to put a <br /> school, though I am a retired educator with more than 34 years of experience and have always <br /> been involved with innovative education. I do agree with Montessori schooling principles. I do <br /> not agree that it needs to be in an agricultural area where our homes are set in private, quiet <br /> tranquility. Somehow, to me, it does not maintain the integrity of my neighborhood. I'm not <br /> really opposed to a school, I'm opposed to a special use permit that allows a business, a <br /> corporation, to be built in that neighborhood, because that's what this is. It is a non-profit, but <br /> it is a business. It's a business that is being built in a neighborhood. I've read the SUP, I <br /> agree that the applicant has addressed all of the cut and dry details that are required by the <br /> SUP. I do believe that in the SUP they are following the letter of the law, but the intent of the <br /> SUP, to me, is to ask permission to change the zoning, and our zoning is being changed <br /> without any input from the community. Yes we've been up here talking, but I guess I don't feel <br /> like I have been heard. The SUP does not address some of the logistical problems presented <br /> by a school. The major one, in my mind, is traffic. In part because I just came by an <br /> elementary school yesterday, just drove by an elementary school yesterday, and stood in line <br /> watching the parents wait. If there are cars parked on Terry Road, there is no way that <br /> anybody can drive by them because there is no turn lane. And it's a dangerous area. I would <br /> hope that you would not approve this SUP, because it will change the entire character of our <br /> neighborhood. The neighborhood is overwhelmingly in opposition to a business being built <br /> amongst our homes. Thank you. <br /> Keith Tilley: I have previously been sworn. Thank you for the opportunity to come <br /> back and speak again tonight. I don't have a whole lot to add since the last presentation and <br /> the last public hearing. I would just like to point out some of the documentation that I <br /> submitted since that timeline. I feel like I've put a lot of time and energy into following the <br /> process that was directed to me by the Planning Department to put everything in writing and <br /> submit that to them and to you guys. I wanted to make sure and just request that you please <br /> read all the documentation that I've submitted, both the presentation, the written letter, which I <br /> think the letter probably was an attempt to realign my previous presentation comments directly <br /> to the three SUP legal requirements for approval. Due to the fact that we felt like, for example, <br /> the impact analysis provided by the applicant didn't really provide any security to me that the <br /> school is going to maintain or improve my property value, I went out and got in touch with <br /> several realtors in the area as well as another appraisal, and actually asked that Everett <br /> Knight's findings be reviewed, because there were a lot of discrepancies that we found in the <br /> report as well as the comments that were made in that report that basically said that no <br /> appraisal value has been stated and no real value of this report. It was just basically a high- <br /> level opinion. I spoke directly with Mr. Knight, and he basically concluded and admitted that he <br /> was not aware of our homebuilding property documentation and he looked at it as a snapshot <br /> in time, basically, and that both sides of that property at that point are vacant land and rural <br /> agricultural land. So obviously, with that view, there would not be a significant impact to the <br /> surrounding properties from an aesthetic perspective. Everyone I've talked to, both realtors, <br /> private citizens, as well as the appraiser obviously had a very different view. I think that any <br /> reasonable and prudent person would attest that if you have a nice house and then suddenly <br /> there are seven commercial buildings built within visual sight of that house, and that it's going <br /> to have a negative impact to your property value, along with the 300 cars per day up and down <br /> the property line beside your house. A 30-foot vegetative buffer that was brought up by the <br />