Cato Farms Rezoning Request

I attended last night's Polo Ridge Elementary School community meeting regarding the Cato Property Rezoning Petition. 

First Ed Driggs shows up late and meekly wanders in after the meeting is well underway. I suspect he's been suffering from some sort of illness lately. Could we have a city council member who at least came to the meetings on time and maybe even made the effort to greet those citizens who cared enough to attend the meeting. Is that too much to ask?

Then the PA system must be the worst (maybe on purpose) in CMS history.

The developer was promoting "Diversity, Equity and Inclusion" seriously they are bunch of clowns, all you had to do was look around the room (aka cafeteria) at the gathered crowd.  Black, White, Young, Old, Asian and Indian members of our community were represented. And I don't mean just one or two the entire room was a diverse as any public function I've ever seen.

Topics of concern are the staple of Charlotte's past mistakes.

Traffic - misguided ideas which the developer claims are due to the UDO. The developer assuring those gathered that the Golf Links extension to Tom Short would not be a concern because everyone will want to go to Providence Road got a big laugh. 

Here's my traffic take: Decades later it is clear Charlotte City Council has failed to plan for the future. Now in 2023 they despite not having the infrastructure insist on density saturation to ease a perceived housing crisis.  How about we fix the roads and then consider rezoning to higher density.

Unfortunately one neighbor went full NIMBY with the tired old trope of the crime and affordable housing and/or rental apartments connection. Let's not go there again.

CMS Middle School - A slick tactic developers have discovered is to offer up a large parcel of land to CMS for a school. A school that more than likely 20 years from now due to changing demographics won't be needed.

Flooding - Yep it is a concern.

Green Space - The 2020 plan also endorsed by Charlotte City Council promoted green space in the area. It's there a lovely lawn wedged between North and South Rea Park 

There are a lot of promises from developers.

However the continuity of the neighborhood is lacking. 

Currently the property is surrounded on 3 sides by single family housing. Originally zoned R-3. The developer now wants to plop down in the middle of this property a bunch of apartments. More precisely 682 rental units, 211 townhomes and just 24 single family homes.Totally changing the character of the neighborhood. 

Can you imagine buying a home at Stonecreek or Cady Lake and now 20 years later watching your neighbor build a five story apartment building next to your backyard pool?

The plan increases the density by more than 300% but it doesn't stop there. Developers are also wanting to add two more high density projects nearby. Adding to South Charlotte's traffic nightmare as if there was nothing happening south of Waverly. This is madness in the extreme. 

What was not discussed? Fire protection where is the new fire station going to be built? Police? Where will all the needed CMPD Officers come from? Most nights south division has only four officers on duty between 12 midnight and 6 am. Much of the time they are over in Steele Creek lending a hand. 

There much more to dig into but what do you think?