Vance County officials’ plans to implement zoning regulations have aroused opposition by an organized and vocal citizens group who became enraged when they learned that planning of the zoning ordinance had progressed for years without their knowledge.

County Planner Ken Krulik pursued countywide zoning for two years after the Board of Commissioners approved the policy in 2003. Krulik conducted public information meetings about zoning’s progress in May 2004 three months after he was hired and encountered no public resistance.

But some citizens became enraged by the time he led another round of meetings in November 2005, when the ordinance was nearly complete. What the citizens group perceived as secrecy established an initial mistrust between property owners and county leaders. The mistrust has continued to grow.

Most commissioners support zoning, but Chairman J. Timothy Pegram said in October that he opposed it because it would limit property rights. Further, he said, he would sell all his property in the county except for his home.

“This is America,” Pegram said at a commission meeting Oct. 5, according to the Henderson Daily Dispatch. “A man is supposed to put anything he wants to on his land.”

But five other commissioners have pushed for zoning. A seventh commissioner, Danny Wright, said that he personally supports zoning but that he would endorse a public referendum on an ordinance.

Where it all started

The commissioners began the process in 2003, when they approved $175,000 for the Planning Department to start what was expected to be a two- to three-year project. The total cost to create the ordinance and implement zoning was about $458,000, Krulik said.

Opponents of zoning said the county has spent more than $1 million to implement the policy. Krulik said in August that the cost of the project was much less, most of it being the cost to pay his salary over the past 2 1/2 years.

The commissioners approved the expense despite a tight budget, the Daily Dispatch reported in 2003. Wright said at the time that Vance County was “bankrupt” in its ability to handle new capital projects. But other commissioners saw zoning as a vital way to attract growth and development.

“You wouldn’t have some of the problems in the county if you had countywide zoning,” Commissioner Tommy Hester, a real estate developer, said at the time. “Most people looking to develop in the community look to see what will go up next to them.”

The four public meetings were conducted in May 2004. Krulik, who conducted the meetings, said about 80 citizens turned out for the sessions. The Daily Dispatch characterized the attendees at one meeting as “agreeable,” which Krulik confirmed.

Just over a year later, Krulik presented a 50-page draft of the zoning ordinance to the commissioners. No action was taken, but a series of informational meetings about the plan was scheduled in November 2005.

Property rights activists catch on

The first three of those November meetings were similar to those conducted the previous May: poorly attended and relatively uneventful. But on Nov. 20, a Sunday, the Daily Dispatch published an impassioned opinion article against zoning. The commentary was written by Joseph “Rusty” McMahon of Kittrell, a local middle-school teacher.

“Vance County landowners,” McMahon wrote, “no one person, no board, no council, no committee, no commission can manage or utilize your land better than you can. Nor do they have that right. As a landowner, you are sovereign. By all that is good and proper, do not forfeit your property rights to freeloading collectivists by allowing countywide zoning.”

The following day, Nov. 21, another public information meeting on zoning was scheduled.

Word of mouth and McMahon’s opinion inspired a turnout of about 75 property owners at what was supposed to be the final meeting the following evening. Zoning opponents questioned why a zoning officer had already been hired, and alleged that officials concealed their plans, despite the earlier news reports and public meetings.

Draft ordinance concealed?

After the November 2005 public meetings, members of the citizens’ group sought a draft copy of the zoning ordinance in early December. But commissioners voted against making the document available to the public.

“We need to allow our staff to develop the best document it can,” Commissioner Deborah Brown said. “If we turn something out there now when it is a work in progress, it would be detrimental to what we are trying to do.”

North Carolina’s public records law does not address exceptions for draft documents. Nevertheless, commissioners moved to have their planning committee consider the issue. Although County Attorney Stubbs Hights could cite no provision in the law that allowed the government to withhold the document, officials did not release it to the public until Dec. 22.

Members of the citizens group organized under a county chapter of FreedomWorks, a property rights and taxpayer advocacy grass-roots group. They viewed the withholding of the draft ordinance as further evidence that county officials tried to keep their plans from public view.

Group says information lacking

Meanwhile, skeptics complained that Krulik failed to inform them about zoning specifics. They also alleged that he presented only positive information about zoning, but failed to address any negative effects for property owners.

Krulik denied that he kept people in the dark about the zoning plans. “I told [the public] from the get-go we were implementing countywide zoning,” Krulik said.

He said he did the same amount of notifying the public about informational meetings in November 2005 as he did in May 2004, including the posting of notices, alerting the newspaper and radio stations, and advising civic groups.

Despite the opposition, zoning appears to be moving forward. Opponents think their only hope might be with the election in November, in which two of the pro-zoning county commissioners’ seats are being contested: Tommy Hester’s and Wilbur Boyd’s.

By CJ’s press time a working session of the commissioners was scheduled to further study the merits and problems with the ordinance. Two public hearings must be conducted before the commission can vote to pass the ordinance. Those had not been scheduled by press time.

Paul Chesser is associate editor of Carolina Journal.