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Eagleville Council Votes On Rezoning
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Eagleville City Council voted 4 to 1 on rezoning a 12-acre parcel next to the new city park from general industrial to heavy industrial to allow a concrete mixing plant to come in.
The action took place at the regular council meeting on Aug. 23. A public hearing and two more readings of a rezoning ordinance will be required before a final vote can be taken on the measure.
Councilmen voting for the proposal on the first vote were Harold Vincion, Terry Zumbro, David Rigsby and Ronnie Hill. Councilman Greg Buchanan voted against the proposal and Councilman M.A. Smitty was absent from the meeting.
The rezoning is being considered at the request of Metro Ready Mix, which has 14 plants in Middle Tennessee including two in Murfreesboro. If the current proposal goes through, the concrete facility would be located on Highway 41-A between Tru-Line Tool and Manufacturing Co. and Kelley Creek.
The council’s vote was based on a recommendation from the planning commission to change the zoning of the 12-acre parcel of land owned by Robert Poe of Franklin from Industrial 1 (I-1) to Industrial 2 (I-2).
The planning commission met in a special called meeting Aug. 20 to hear Metro Ready Mix representative’s request and then voted to recommend the rezoning to the city council at the Aug. 23 meeting. Mayor Nolan Barham and Councilman Harold Vincion are the only council members on the planning commission.
Vincion, who brought the rezoning recommendation to the council meeting, was reluctant to tell the remaining council members the name of the company that triggered the rezoning request.
At least two of the councilmen, Ronnie Hill and Greg Buchanan, said they had no knowledge of the rezoning proposal before they reached the council meeting because the agenda they received before the meeting did not mention the item.
The agenda given to them at the council meeting referenced the rezoning proposal as "recommendation for planning commission – zoning change for parcel 7.04 property."
"So we are to vote on changing this and we don’t know what goes there," Hill asked. "When it is making an impact on the zoning we do need to know what is coming there."
Upon questioning by Hill, Vincion said that the rezoning would allow in such businesses as a concrete plant, asphalt plant and other uses but he would not name the specific company.
After more probing by Hill, Vincion said "let’s say for a ready-mix or batching station" and added that he had only said the "possibility" of a new business coming in.
"If I could tell you there is a company that wants to come in here and do that I would say, ‘Yeah, this company wants to come in but we don’t know," he said.
After Hill continued to press for a company name, Barham revealed that Metro Ready Mix was the company making the request that led to the rezoning issue.
Barham also announced that the Board of Zoning Appeals (BZA), which is made up of the planning commission members, also met the same night as the called planning commission meeting and granted a special exception to allow the concrete plant in an I-2 zone.
"The BZA did meet and approved the usage of it," Barham said.
Eagleville’s zoning ordinance does not specifically name concrete mixing operations in its list of uses permitted in the I-2 zone, but does permit such an industry as a special exception.
The Eagleville Times, however, could not get any clear answers by its deadline on other provisions in the city’s zoning ordinance that might keep a heavy industrial operation such as the concrete mixing plant from locating on the Poe property.
The zoning ordinance is the official document that guides the planning commission’s and BZA’s actions.
The zoning ordinance’s site location criteria for the I-2 zone says, in part, that the proposed site will be located apart "from community facilities where concentrations of people will be present," which appears to describe the city park.
Mayor Barham said in an interview last week that the city would be investigating any issue that might hinder the concrete plant being built on the Poe property, which is next to the park.
"There are several facets of this thing with the rezoning being just one aspect of it," he said. "We can go through the public hearing and two readings but until this is clarified we will not have the third and final reading. If some of this stuff doesn’t come through it will not pass."
Another provision in the zoning ordinance is that a heavy industrial (I-2) usage can not be put on a site located within a 100-year floodplain or wetland. Placement of buildings and activities in a floodplain or wetland is also governed by federal and state rules.
Vincion indicated in the council meeting that the city is aware of the floodplain issue and that planning officials have already told Metro Ready Mix that the company will have to have an engineering study done on the proposed site.
"FEMA takes precedence over everything else," Barham said, indicating that without the go ahead from FEMA the rezoning process would stop. The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) is associated with defining the 100-year floodplain areas.
Barham indicated the planning commission went ahead and made the recommendation to the council at this time to get the rezoning process in place so Metro Ready Mix could move forward on the engineering study and other aspects.
"If people come in and they want to have a business here, we want to try to accommodate them the best we can," he said. "We are not going to run over anybody or do something illegal but are going through everything we have to have and just trying to cut down on some time limits for them."
Barham also said he called the special planning commission meeting two weeks before the regularly scheduled one because someone involved with the Metro Ready Mix proposal requested it.
"If anyone asks for a special meeting on that and they are trying to buy property and have a deadline we have always done that," he said. "We try to be accommodating to people."
Barham said notice of the special meeting was posted outside city hall as required.
The zoning ordinance also says that an applicant requesting a rezoning pay for a notification sign to be placed on the property to be rezoned "14 days prior to consideration of the planning commission meeting which will remain in place until action by the city council."
The planning commission considered the item on Aug. 20 and the city council took action Aug. 23, but as of Aug. 28, no sign was visible on the property.
Barham suggested the sign did not have to be in place until after the council had its first vote concerning the rezoning.
"If the council did not vote on it in the first reading, there was no reason to put it up there," he said. "Once the council votes on it the sign will be put up and stay up there longer than needed anyway."
Councilman Ronnie Hill said he voted for the rezoning initially because he didn’t want to vote against a new business coming to town.
"I didn’t like what I knew about it as far as it going next to the park," he said. "After further thought I don’t think it is a good idea."
Councilman David Rigsby said he did not vote for the concrete company to come in but just voted to rezone the property.
"We are going to have to do something in the city of Eagleville because look at the businesses we have lost," he said. "I am 100 percent toward progress."
Zumbro and Vincion or a representative of Metro Ready Mix could not be reached for comment.