Neighbors protest apartment complex
By Ethan Smith
Published in News on March 11, 2015 1:46 PM
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News-Argus/MELISSA KEY
This site, located on Graves Drive across from Georgetowne Professional Center, is where Pendergraph Companies has proposed to build an 80-unit apartment complex. The plan is set to go before city council on Monday night, and has already garnered a petition of protest with more than 60 signatures.
The Goldsboro City Council will hold a public hearing Monday night on a proposed 80-unit apartment complex that would be built on the south side of Graves Drive between Malloy Street and Berkeley Boulevard.
The preliminary plans for the apartment complex show a frontage of 300 feet on Graves Drive with a depth of 780 feet, taking up approximately six acres of land. The complex would also have a community building and recreation area.
Access to the complex would be from Graves Drive and Malloy Street, with no access from East Ash Street.
But the proposal is already running into opposition from business owners in the area where the complex would be constructed.
A petition has been circulated among business located near the property that opposes the building of the apartment complex. Approximately 80 percent of business and property owners along the sides and rear of the property have signed the petition, and more than 60 percent of business and property owners along the front of the property have signed the petition.
The petition, received by the city on March 6, contains more than 60 signatures from property and business owners in the surrounding area on East Ash Street, Graves Drive and Malloy Street.
This invokes the city's four-fifths rule, meaning in order for plans for the complex to proceed six of seven council members would have to vote yes to the project, said Sally Johnson of the city's Planning Department.
Attorney Donald E. Clark Jr., who operates his business out of the Georgetowne Professional Center on Graves Drive, said all but one business in the complex signed the petition against the construction of the apartment complex.
"It was zoned as a business district for a reason," Clark said. "I wouldn't have located here if there were 80 apartments right across the street from the business complex."
Clark also cited concerns over the type of housing being built in the area, as no specific details have been given to the city yet, but Clark said he was informed it would be Section 8 housing when asked to sign the petition.
"When you have a high-concentration of people in low-income housing, it brings crime with it," Clark said. "The city is choosing where to place crime, and they're placing it directly across from one of their biggest tax bases near Berkeley Boulevard. So that's the crime argument against it."
Jennifer Collins with the city's Planning Department said the sketches and plans presented to the city were preliminary and had "a long way to go" before they became finalized, if the proposed plans are approved by the council Monday.
Clark said there also is an economic argument against building the complex.
"If you have 80 units, then you have two to four people per unit, meaning you have 320 people living right near where the Air Force base's property line starts and in the base's flight line," Clark said. "That's just the economic argument against it."
Brian Jones with the Pendergraph Co., who submitted the plans for the complex, was not available for comment Tuesday.