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Council Rescinds Vote On Property Rezoning By Glenda Dyer Eagleville city councilmen voted unanimously at their Sept. 24 meeting to rescind their previous vote to rezone 12 acres next to the city park from light (I-1) to heavy industrial (I-2) to potentially allow a concrete plant to build there. Before a much heavier than normal audience, Mayor Nolan Barham declared the proposed rezoning a dead issue before the council meeting, held in the school gym, got started. Many in the audience were participants in a Sept. 18 informational meeting organized by the Eagleville Citizens for Responsible Government, which opposes placing a concrete plant in the city. "Officially it was a dead issue when the planning commission voted on Sept. 6 not to pursue it any further," Barham said, noting the zoning ordinance would not allow such a plant at the 12-acre site known as the Poe property. But some residents pressed for assurance that a concrete plant would not be allowed at another location in town. "In all of Eagleville, you are going to make a promise to the citizens that this will not be an issue?" Davina Tompkins asked. Barham said he was not making a promise but was just telling what the law says. Later, he indicated that the Poe property was located in the industrial park area set aside by the city in the 1977s and that the city has no other location for such an industry. Wes Fitzgerald, an organizer of the citizens’ group, questioned whether the rezoning was truly a dead issue because of the possibility that the planning commission could change the zoning ordinance. "We sat at the planning commission the other night, and the city planner suggested there be a third (I-3) zone," he said. "In that case the planning commission can change the ordinance and let it be voted in at a later date. It may be a dead issue at this point, but in six months it may not be." Bridget Fitzgerald pressed Barham, who is also a planning commission member, about whether he would ever vote while he is mayor to change the zoning ordinance. "No, I’m not going to," Barham said. "I have an issue the same way that you do. I have a wife who has asthma very bad, and I have that issue just as well." Barham reasserted that the concrete plant was not the issue in the debate but the question was whether the proposed property could be rezoned from I-1 to I-2. However, the reason the planning commission considered rezoning the property was because of a request from the Metro Ready Mix company, which was looking at possibly placing a plant there. About 100 people attended the informational meeting on Sept. 18 where speakers told of the potential impact of a concrete plant on a community. Murfreesboro Attorney Frank Fly said a ready mix concrete plant would dominate Eagleville "in every way." "And it will repulse any small, clean industries that thought about coming here," he said. "They won’t come because they don’t want to be located next to a concrete plant anymore than you do." Fly said bringing in such a plant would be the "worst thing you ever did if you want to recruit more industry to Eagleville." Another speaker, Jim Ambrose of College Grove, who spent about 30 years in the concrete industry, estimated how many trucks would be coming in and out of a plant per day. On an average, a ready mix concrete company needs to produce between 500 and 1,000 yards a day to be profitable, and to bring in the cement, sand, stone and other materials to make that much concrete and to deliver it would require about 150 loads a day, he said. "So you are looking at about that much traffic going up and down Highway 41A and these small connector roads," he said. He also said that concrete plants cannot contain the dust no matter how much they try. "And if they have been working all night with someone unloading a load of cement or fly ash, and your car is parked within distance of where the wind can blow the dust, you can forget about the paint finish on your car," he said. And the materials would be hazardous to children playing on the park equipment, Ambrose said. "Can you imagine these materials being on the equipment the children play on?" he asked. "You can actually get cement burns from the cement when it mixes with water." Ambrose said the city park equipment would not last long with that kind of dust falling on it. The third speaker, Eric Casebolt of Tullahoma, operates a recreational vehicle business next to a concrete plant and is involved in a lawsuit against the company next door to him. "So far as cleaning up, you might as well forget it," he said about the dust. "You might as well live with it. If you put a big bag over that whole thing you might have a chance." Casebolt said the concrete trucks weigh between 50,000 and 70,000 pounds and have "beat the road to death" between him and the plant’s silo. "It is something you ought to very much pay attention to, listen to the people who are trying to stop it and do everything you can to help," he said. Quotes concerning concrete plant: "My plea to the council as we move forward is that if you plan to rezone or change an ordinance to allow a business to come in, consider what it is going to do five, ten, 15 or 20 years from now when most of you probably will not sit on this council, but most of our children will still be here at Eagleville school and we will still be living in the area "My second concern was the editorial, which is someone’s opinion, indicates there was some "bungling of reading of the ordinance." I would plead to the council that before you progress into even voting on something or finding out whether you can rezone a piece of property please, please, please understand the rules you made for yourselves 16 months ago. "I’d just beg you to please understand where you are going with this city and please make sure you are following our own rules and our own regulations. And I’m sure the attorney can assist you in that matter." Kelly Feasel, Eagleville
resident "Eagleville is a special place, and we all enjoy its quaintness and country setting. That is why we all want to live here. While industry is not a bad thing, the concrete industry is not representative of the Eagleville ambiance. "After attending the meeting last week, it is clear that the direction that Eagleville should take is toward a calculated and measured growth of our town but not at the expense of the town atmosphere that we all love. It is possible to have business growth in Eagleville without compromising our quaint country setting. "We have the power as citizens and you our city council to stop Eagleville from becoming a dusty spot that people drive through in order to get somewhere else or where families do not want to live. While it is true we want and need a measure of growth in Eagleville to sustain our city, we also need to be mindful of what kind of growth is best for our town’s future. "We have the power to enact ordinances that promote the uniqueness of Eagleville. We can work toward a sewer system on Main Street that will attract small businesses that would add to the atmosphere of our town. We can require businesses within the city limits to build to a historic code to maintain that ambience that we enjoy. We can create an Eagleville where people would enjoy shopping and dining. "The cost of big business and heavy industry is the sum of all the things that make Eagleville a special place for families to live and go to school. In summary, the people of Eagleville feel that the tranquil and historical value of our town is greater than any revenue heavy industry can bring. "We the people implore the city council members to act responsibly by voting against any rezoning that would allow the concrete mixing plant or any plant of that nature to locate in Eagleville. Please do this for all of our children. They will be here longer than we will be." Davina Tompkins, Eagleville
resident "I don’t like to talk about law stuff much because I get tired of it after a while but I want to say one thing. There is no doubt in my mind, and I don’t think there is any doubt in the world, that under the present wording of the Eagleville zoning ordinance it is not legally possible to put this concrete plant on that 12 acres of land. If they try to do that, we will sue them and we will stop them. "But here is what I want to warn you about -- the possibility of amending the zoning ordinance. Here is the question. If they amend the zoning ordinance and change the rules for this applicant where do we draw the line? The next time somebody comes in and wants something that is not allowed by the zoning ordinance, do we amend the rules again and change them again, and what about the time after that and the time after that? "You see where we are going here. Before you know it, we don’t have a city of laws. We have a city of men making decisions for us, and that is not representative democracy." Frank Fly, Murfreesboro
Attorney "That is what we need to do, let’s get involved. I am not here tonight to bash the people who are elected. I just want things done right. I want (the elected officials) to follow their own rules and their own policies and their own regulations to make this community a better community. I live here and that is not going to change and I will talk that until I am dead in the ground. That is all I want. Whether it is you that are running next time or whoever, (elected officials) owe a responsibility to the voters that voted them in and all of us here to do what is best for the community." Wes Fitzgerald, Moderator,
Eagleville Citizens for Responsible Government "It seems to me in a representative democracy that we have in Eagleville, Tenn., that what you need to do first is to come together and define your town. You need to decide what do you want Eagleville to be in the next 10, 20, 30, 40, 50,100 years and hopefully you can come to some kind of consensus about that and based on the definition you come up with then you can plan and grow accordingly. "It is true that Eagleville is going to grow. Every place is going to grow, but how you do it is going to make the difference in your quality of life. "Quality of life is what we are talking about, and I tell people do you really know what matters in life beyond family and God is what you see when you look out the kitchen window when you are washing dishes. Think about it and ask yourselves if you want to see a concrete plant. "I don’t think anybody does, so you have to take stock of what you have in Eagleville, compare yourselves with other places and see who you think you could compete with. I don’t think Eagleville, Tenn., can compete with Murfreesboro, Franklin, Nashville, Shelbyville or Lewisburg. I do think you could compete with Lynchburg and Bell Buckle and Nolensville and Chapel Hill. You can compete with those places." Frank Fly, Murfreesboro attorney |
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