By Bruce Henderson - CharlotteObserver.com - Posted: Monday, Apr. 22, 2013
Charlotte City Council unanimously approved a rezoning Monday for a
Steele Creek outlet mall without some hoped-for promises of help for
Lake Wylie residents who live with mud washed away from earlier
developments.
The developers of Charlotte Premium Outlets say they will take extra
precautions to see that Brown’s Cove residents don’t again become
victims of muddy runoff.
Residents saw the 82-acre mall site as a potential threat and a
chance to seek tougher erosion standards and the city’s help in fixing
the old silt problems. They left disappointed and hinted that legal
action might follow.
“Nothing occurred that made me think anything has changed since
last week,” when the council held a rezoning hearing, said cove resident
Jan Beasley. “It appears nothing more than a charade.”
For more than a decade, residents watched their 23-acre cove fill
with silt as a segment of Interstate 485, a Charlotte Douglas
International Airport runway and a sprawling residential development
were built around them. More than 4 million tons of silt a year poured
into the cove in the mid-2000s, according to one study.
Residents have asked the city to make the mall developers post a
performance bond to cover erosion damage, hire an erosion manager for
the project and set aside tax revenue from development in the watershed
to restore water quality.
The mall’s developers agreed to measures that include paying for a
monitoring station to detect muddy runoff washing off the site, an
enlarged sediment basin, double-row silt fences and an erosion-control
manager.
But the other conditions the cove residents sought do not appear in rezoning paperwork.
Beasley said city staffers have told residents that officials are still discussing their problem.
The residents also asked for a city staff liaison to push for
dredging the cove. A dredging plan to be funded by developers around the
cove fell apart last year when the N.C. Department of Transportation,
which built I-485, refused to help pay for it.
Mell Nevils, chief of the N.C. Land Quality Section, said there’s again renewed interest in dredging the cove.
“We have been in discussions with some folks,” including DOT, he
said last week. “I don’t know where it’s headed. I’m hopeful something
can come of it.”
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