DISTRICT 7: Charlotte City Council candidates talk about development

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SOUTH CHARLOTTE ─ They are a financial planner, an economist with impressive academic bona fides, a sales consultant in workplace safety, and an outspoken Tea Party organizer.

And in the race to win the District 7 Charlotte City Council seat being vacated after two terms by Warren Cooksey, one of the four candidates is a very brave Democrat, Bakari Burton, the sales consultant.

He has no opposition in the Sept. 10 primary, but will be hard pressed to win in November’s general election; Cooksey, who represents Ballantyne and other well-to-do sections of South Charlotte, has proven to be the most conservative member of the current City Council.

Burton will face the one of the three Republicans who survives the primary: Ivy Leaguer Ed Driggs, Tea Partier Jay Privette, and Duncan Wilson, a young financial planner with an MBA and a law degree.

Because the incumbents representing Charlotte’s two Republican strongholds have been strong supporters of development, the eight candidates running for the District 7 seat and the District 6 chair being vacated by Andy Dulin are of particular interest to real estate, construction and development professionals.

Last week, The Mecklenburg Times ran interviews with the four candidates for District 6: Developer-turned-history-teacher Ken Lindholm; Kate Payerle, a litigator for Robinson Bradshaw & Hinson; James Peterson, who works in financial services for the Bank of America; and commercial real estate broker Kenny Smith of New South Properties of the Carolinas.

(Since last week, The Charlotte Observer ─ which endorsed Lindholm’s failed primary bid last year for the District 5 Mecklenburg Board of County Commissioners seat vacated by the late Neil Cooksey ─ reported that some of Lindholm’s development projects were foreclosed on during the recession, and lenders were awarded judgments of $6 million and $12,000 against him. “No bank held a gun to my head to borrow,” Lindholm told The Observer. “The music stopped and I didn’t have a chair.”)

Warren Cooksey declined an invitation to discuss his record on development for this story. He also said he had no comment on the proposed $200 million mixed-use development by Providence Road Farms LLC — a partnership between Crosland Southeast and Childress Klein Properties — to be developed at the southeast corner of Providence Road and Interstate 485.

Although the 90 acres the developers want to rezone are not within city limits, they fall under the planning and zoning jurisdiction of the city, which means Cooksey could possibly have a voteon the project before he leaves office. He said he never comments on quasi-judicial zoning matters outside the City Council meeting chambers.

But because the project would have an impact on District 7, which borders on the acreage, and because the development could potentially be annexed, we asked the four candidates for Cooksey’s seat to weigh in.

Here’s what the District 7 candidates said about it, and about development in general in their district and across Charlotte.

Bakari Burton. . .

. . .is a sales consultant who helps businesses comply with OSHA regulations. He has also worked in advertising for AT&T and Bank of America. He responded via email; this is an edited version of the text.

I would consider myself development-friendly; I have always admired developers for their creative minds and ideas. There should be balance. Not all developers have the same business practices. Some believe in clear-cutting but leaving tree saves, and others want to clear cut 100 acres. Again, I think there needs to be balance. On the other hand, excessive codes from the city, for example, you need so many certain types of trees and alternate tree-types, can be overreaching and costly to the developers.

I can think of areas, such as the corner of Johnston Road and Lancaster Highway, (where) before development you had a vacant (parcel) of land.  Now you have an area that has businesses such as Goodwill, IHOP and other stores that are patronized weekly.

At a glance, the most intriguing project going on citywide is the work being done to the Beatties Ford corridor in preparation for the streetcar project. Regarding my district, I am intrigued with the $200 million mixed use project being proposed in the Providence and Ardrey Kell roads area. Lastly, there have been projects approved such as the Brookline project, which was approved against residents’ wishes.

The one thing I can appreciate about the development projects, (the) $200 million mixed(-use) project and the LightWay project (to build 53 townhomes on 6.5 acres in Ballantyne), is that they all include some type of residential development.  I like to see that the LightWay project has increased the number of homes within the project. I like to see the population growth, but most importantly, the housing market continuing to rebound.

While I support development, there are concerns that I have with projects in my district. First of all, we need to take a look at the traffic flow and safety of both cars and pedestrians on the main roadways. Secondly, I want to make sure we are not just focusing in one area for all development projects.

To me, development means creativity and growth, something I will always support as long as we are doing it in a responsible manner. I will be willing to work with developers to ensure a balance approach is taken to development here in District 7.

Ed Driggs. . .

. . .is retired from finance, where he worked for Goldman Sachs. He holds degrees in economics from Princeton and Oxford universities, and tried to unseat Mecklenburg County Commissioner Bill James in 2012.

In the big picture, we need a concept of how we are developing as a community, and there is an important role for District 7 in that, for South Charlotte and Ballantyne. I’m a fiscal conservative when it comes to financial incentives and public-private projects. I like having a plan and following it, letting the private sector do as much as possible.

Job creation is on everybody’s mind, and saying no to all public-private projects is not a good position. But you have to try to get as good a deal for the public as an investor would in the private sector.

I can mention the synthetic tax increment financing for the North Community House Road flyover of Interstate 485, allowing the widening of the 485. Bissell (Cos.) is helping to improve public roads and is a good example of a good private partner. That’s a productive use of taxpayer funds.

I think in general that growth is good for the city, that you have to be open to proposals for development. But you also have to see whether the overall infrastructure will support the overall use. When development is done within a concerted plan, considering traffic and other considerations, it should be encouraged. A free market should be encouraged.

Specifically, (about the Providence Road Farms project), I guess I would have to comment that development of that kind, when it is done with awareness of the surroundings, my initial disposition on it is favorable. But I would more like to see more details before I could comment about the specifics.

I live in Piper Glen, and I’ve only been here 11 years, but I used to be able to bike south of there and see cows and horses. That’s a prosperous kind of development.

One thing I’d like to say is that the county and city don’t cooperate or coordinate enough. If they did, we would see an improvement in creating jobs and lowering the cost of housing without compromising any of the standards. This is one of the biggest obstacles of people who want to build. I’ve heard from a number of builders that that it takes six months or more to deal with all the processes, and I think there is room for a possible win-win in the way things are done.

Jay Privette. . .

. . .is a member of a local Tea Party who ran against Cooksey in 2011. He has been endorsed by Mecklenburg County Commissioner Bill James and former Charlotte City Councilman Don Reid, both of the far right.

I’m for free-market development. When people own a piece of property, they should be free to develop it as they see fit, so long as they conform to existing zoning laws. But when it requires a rezoning, then the community does have a say.

I have seen incidences where a development goes against the way a property it is already zoned for, where the community stands up and says no, we don’t like that approach. With rezonings, I think we should basically keep as it simple as possible: I trust the community.

As a member of council, I would be well-informed environmentally and about traffic, whatever the concerns are involved in a development. You can’t come up with ordinances and laws that cover everything with a broad brush; if you do that you become too restrictive.

I have heard people talk about some obscure law or edict in development issues that they might not like that holds up a project, even if the community is all in favor of the development. I’d keep it as simple as possible; I have great trust in the common sense of the community to do what is right.

I get concerned when taxpayer money is involved; we need to step in and be involved when taxpayers‘ money is at risk.

The (Providence Road Farms) project is not too far from where I live, and was brought to my attention before it hit the press. I personally don’t see anything wrong with it. It’s private developers putting their own money at risk. They’re paying for this thing, which means they’ll be a lot more cautious than if taxpayer money was involved.

I live in Cady Lake and often go to the shopping center at Providence and Ardrey Kell roads, across from that property. My dentist is there and my wife and I enjoy going to the Wendy’s there. I haven’t seen that property beyond the street view, but what I see is a normal development outside the center city, one defined more by suburbs than downtown.

Duncan Wilson. . .

. . .is, at 29, the youngest District 7 candidate. He graduated from UNC-Charlotte and holds an MBA and law degree from Wake Forest University. He is a financial planner for Sterling Financial in Matthews.

No. 1, I am pro-development and pro-growth. Having worked for Doggett Concrete Construction in college, I know that building and construction creates jobs and tends to make communities better. At the same time, you want to make sure that we’re growing in the right way and doing the best things for neighborhoods.

Even though I worked for three days as an undergraduate and was in class two days, I had to borrow, and now have a mortgage on my head.

Even though I was born in Durham and spent my first three years there, I consider myself a virtual native Charlottean. It’s the only place I remember being. Durham used to not regulate growth at all. You can drive around and see places that did not benefit from that, whole areas clear-cut. We need to be careful of that. But if it costs a developer $100,000 to move a tree that you are legally required to save, that’s ridiculous.

In a business class at Wake Forest, there was a guy who built CVS’s for a living, and he told me had to spend $75,000 to move a tree. If you’re a big company like that and have a profit-margin that’s big enough, that’s not too much of a problem. But if you’re talking about a small business, they might not be able to swing that, and we’d have an old ramshackle building full of asbestos instead of a new business there.

There needs to be flexibility in the law. One thing (former Charlotte Mayor) Anthony Foxx said, when he wanted the tree ordinance passed, that he wanted the law to be strict but to be enforced with flexibility. I think we need the law to be flexible, not a law with flexible enforcement,

I think the (Providence Road Farms) development looks great. I assume it will be a Publix or other upscale grocery story in there, and that’s fine. It’s a good (site plan), and it looks like they have the traffic issue under control. It fits in with the area quite well.

There is a lot of overlap between the city and county, and it doesn’t always go so well for developers and builders. The council needs to address some of the redundancy issues with the county. I think there almost needs to be a summit conference with the county. The permitting system is not good enough in Charlotte-Mecklenburg. The permits themselves are not the problem; that’s a pretty streamlined thing. The problem is getting to the “Yes”; the process is the problem.

That’s why QuikTrip is putting up gas stations and convenience stores all around Charlotte but not in Charlotte. People forget that Charlotte is a border city. In Union County, in Gaston, and in South Carolina — those people are more than happy to get our development and our population growth. I grew up in Weddington, so I know.

On the state level, that’s a whole other mess. Look at what’s going on with the airport, for example; that’s just bizarre. I have a feeling there’s something there we don’t know about. But on the state level, we need to rebuild those relationships, and getting new faces on the council will help do that.

I’ll be a friend to developers. Their goals and my goals are very much alike.