Heart of Triad Residents Remain Skeptical
By Paul B. Johnson, High Point Enterprise, N.C.
Nov. 16–GREENSBORO — When it comes to the Heart of the Triad debate, Brad Ring of Colfax feels likes an athlete asked to get into a game after the outcome has been decided.
Ring, a graphic artist, and several other Heart of the Triad residents showed up Thursday morning at the final meeting of the Steering Committee that’s spent two years coming up with recommendations on long-term growth for the area. The Heart of the Triad covers up to 18,000 acres along the Guilford-Forsyth county line.
The 22-member committee, which will hand off the effort next spring to two new study groups, is made up of business leaders and elected officials. But the committee includes no residents of the area.
Heart of the Triad backers envision the area becoming a mix of residential, commercial and industrial uses, with about one-third of the land left for open space. Now, about 9,300 of the 18,000 acres are farmland or open space.
Ring and the other residents peppered committee members with questions about how eminent domain might be used to take land against their will from people in the Heart of the Triad. Ring said he lives at the northern tip of a proposed North-South Connector highway that would run along the county line.
“They want to change everything, but they’ve done it without anyone who lives there being involved,” Ring said about the committee.
One of the two new study groups will include eight residents or property owners from the area. But residents such as Marianne Royle, who lives on Squire Davis Road in western Guilford County, remain skeptical that their inclusion will make a difference.
The residents pressed Steering Committee members Thursday to support a “guiding principal”thateminentdomain wouldn’t be used against the will of landowners in the Heart of the Triad.
Committeemembersresponded that there’s no intention touse eminent domain, and that private property rights will be respected. But they declined to approve a “guiding principal” against eminent domain, saying that it might be necessary in some situations for a road or sewer line. Ring said Heart of the Triad backers keep professing that eminent domain isn’t a main option. But at the same time, they won’t rule out that it could be used, which leaves him and his neighbors anxious.
pjohnson@hpe.com — 888-3528
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