Marvin heard on not wanting to be part of herd

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MARVIN – The Village of Marvin’s Council met last week with representatives of 505 Design and Regency Centers in preliminary discussions over Regency’s plans to bring a neighborhood retail center, including a Publix, and town houses to the corner of Providence and New Town roads.

Council members asked questions and provided their input for more than 2 ½ hours on what would be the village’s first commercial development.

The designers explained that they tried hard to incorporate the low-density community’s agrarian and equestrian character into the development’s aesthetics.

Council member Lanny Openshaw, who conceded that he thought the design plans fit in well, was particularly expressive in explaining what he wanted to see.

“We’re not the typical community,” he told them. “For better or worse, we’re different.”

However his audience wasn’t quite sure what to make, at first, of the word he used to describe developers of homes and retail centers who blindly follow trends, resulting in buildings that are indistinguishable from each other and lack character – a portmanteau of sheep and people: “Sheeple.”