Some developers are swine.

[paulsharvey]

I haven't read the whole post, but are hog farms or chicken houses allowed on your property? Might be a way to get the builder to move some of the houses, if you build your pens on your property line. Especially if you invest in a fan system to keep the critters cool, and it happens to blow the wrong way?
I am not against developments but I don't want them shoved down my throat! We had a 20 home development built up against my property in Switzerland Florida and it didn't bother me a bit.
David from jax

Yeah, but I wouldn't want Rivertown dropped next to me either...

 

[paulsharvey]

My area; pretty much in the 1970s, they laid a piece of graph paper on the western side of the county, and divided 10,000s of acres into 0.08-0.25 acre lots. 90% are still vacant; but there have been recently some guys buying up a couple dozen, and putting some smaller, nicer, homes on double lots (to get required separation between well and septic).

 

[4570Man]

There is no housing shortage in this county. A quick search on Zillow showed over 700 houses for sale in this county, spanning every price range, so that an invalid argument.
One can only criticize the NIMBY argument until it's coming to your front yard.

How many of those homes are currently occupied? If someone sells their house and buys a different one that doesn’t equal not a housing shortage. The population of the country is 3 times what it was in the 40s when most of these farms were started. Most people hate high rise buildings even more. Where do you propose the 3 times bigger population builds?

 

[paulsharvey]

700 homes currently on the market isn't really a huge ammount. You figure a person moves every 5-7 years; lets say they are on the market 45 days. Dont know your county, but lets say pop of 50,000; we need 7000 homes per year; or about 864 homes on the market at any point just to service the 50,000 people.

Then, we need to assume about 10-25% of those 700 arent "really" for sale; they threw a number on it, and if someone offered that, they would sell, but its way above realistic. Probably another 10-25% are Knock down or Major rehabs and not move in ready.

 

[paulsharvey]

"Forgot to mention, I've lived here for 51 years. When I moved here, there were only about 20 homes within a mile of me. Now there are over 700, and almost no farm land is left."

So, with this statement, it makes absolute sense for the commission to rezone it. "700 homes, and almost no farm land left", sounds to me like the area Should be rezoning to atleast R1 or R2 zoning; likely not R4. Maybe RR, or A2 is still appropriate? So, definition changes for area to area, but R2 is typically 0.25 acre lots, 1 home per lot; R1 is generally 1.25 acre lots. R4 allows small lots with multiple units per lot (town homes/duplexes/ect).

 

[4570Man]

It's not "woke", it's greed. I just moved from one extremely conservative town to another and both are encouraging or allowing this kind of unchecked development.

If someone builds high rise buildings you and pretty much anyone else hates it. If someone builds single story buildings close together you and pretty much everyone else hates it. If someone divides a “family farm” and just builds like 5 houses you still hate it not to mention we need to doze over another 24 farms to make up for the lack of density the first 2 options had. The earth is the same size yet the population is more. Can you help me out with ideas on where people are supposed to live?

 

[paulsharvey]

So, you have 700 homes in a 1 mile radius; so a land area of 3.14 sq miles or 2009.6 acres; averaging 2.87 acres per home. So, yeah, 72 homes on 62 acres does change it every so slightly, but not that much. Your area will now have an average of 2.603 acres per home. Or this community/subdivision will reduce the average by 0.267 acres per home; while bringing in $1.5M in instant revenue to the county, and an additonal $432,000 per year in tax. As an outsider, I know what direction I would vote on the zoning board...


Edit: but back to the main point; if im on the board, and given the facts as you list, and you just stomp you feet and make demands, your another nut, development approved. Done.

However, you come in, again with the facts as you described, and ask for a 30 ft buffer instead of a 20 ft standard buffer, interior to the community bus stop, and a 360 ft right turn lane into the community to prevent vehicle stacking in the PM peak; i likely would demand some or most of those from the developer before approving.

 

[kenmbz]

But the news told us the population is going down

 

[dodge man]

I guess a factory, wind farm or solar farm would be a better use?

I’ve seen posts where someone wants to do something on their land, say put up a building, build a bridge, put in a large culvert etc. Someone brings up the point you might have to get government approval for that. Then others post you should be able to do what you want on your own property. I guess not in this case.

You say all those lawns that people would fertilize dumping chemicals on. The last I saw farmers dump their fair share of fertilizers and chemicals on farm ground. Endangered species? Really?

The truth is you just don’t want it there for various reasons. I’m not blaming you, I wouldn’t want it either. Lots of luck fighting it.

 

[paulsharvey]

Fight it, or not; IMO, you're fighting a losing battle, so give ground, and retreat with your forces intact, and live to fight another day.