Those opposed, or neutral, on McFee spending were heard
“This whole thing seems hasty and stinky,” said Adam Atherton, a Town alderman candidate in 2022. “The sinkhole that you show here (on the property) wasn’t in the package showed with the Board of Mayor and Aldermen on the night they voted.
“... Another concern is on the night of the vote, three (members) were present, two were absent; the vote was 2-to-1. … we don’t know where the other two stand, so I’m uncomfortable with that,” Atherton added.
He also said the motion, which passed 2-1, “did not include that there is this kind of superpower for the mayor to execute on his own, which is a surprise to me. It seems a bit unusual.
“... When Mayor Williams was challenged with why did the county walk away (from buying the land), the primary reason he stated was the county was concerned about a train wreck,” Atherton said. “We know now that’s not the case; that it was really the cost of the road.”
Also, “we’re going to have to spend tons of money ripping out trees,” he said.
“That’s one of the reasons why we want to go to the Board on (Thursday), Oct. 26, have them re-look at this and ratify everything and be able to look at all this information that the geotech is now giving to us,” Smoak said. “... The motion you were talking about was definitely in the packet, something they all could review.
“They are all clearly stated in the packet — they always are,” he added.
Citizen Mili Bass said part of her land abuts the Scott property.
“Mr. Scott, I think, is an honorable man,” she said. “... We very much appreciate the fact that the Town is stepping up and creating a park (with that statement a number of residents applauded)”
She said she didn’t want to see further development “in an already overcrowded corridor.”
Citizen Kimberlie Parks said, “... From my point of view, no matter what, there’s goint to be, probably, over 700 homes built on the land back there, which means, by their math, that’s over 7,000 trips daily.”
Parks said she’s compared land values in areas of Town without a nearby park (within 1.5 miles) versus McFee Road and Watt Road. She gave a difference of more than $200,000 more, on average, being near a park along Watt and McFee, versus “Concord Road area.”
“... If we’re going to talk about equality in our Town … I think it’s better if we put some more equity on the east side of Town when it comes to amenities,” she added, asking BOMA to approach homeowners in those areas about acquiring land.
“The main thing is we need to have available land for sale that somebody wants to sell us,” Smoak said. “I think it’s a great idea to have parks all over our Town, all over our community.
“Our original goal was to have a park in all four main quadrants of our community, and we accomplished that,” he added. “So, now it’s where can we add to that in the future? Where can we get land available in the future?”
Citizen Meredith Oravitz said, “I’ve lived on McFee Road for 40 years. I believe it was about 20 years ago ... that Farragut came through and wanted to widen the road. ... The road was widened. But before they started it, they asked us to form a homeowner’s association. ... So we did form the homeowner’s association, which was just maybe a matter of 30 or 40 homes at that point in time.
“When we were asking about this expansion, where they widened McFee Road ... we didn’t want it to be widened. They told us it was grandfathered to be a five-lanes. ...”
“I wasn’t here 20 years ago when all that happened,” Smoak said. “I know that McFee Road is considered an arterial road on our major road plan.
“Is there any way that we can find out if it is a grandfathered law and can it be expanded to five lanes?” Oravitz asked.
“So it’s more of, would the Town ever think that we need to widen that road in the future?” Smoak said. “And that would be a very public discussion about that and decide whether that’s something that we do need to do or not. ...”
Citizen Michael Wilson said, “I wanted to first thank you, David, for one of the comments that you said that this will be back in front of the BOMA on Oct. 26. I think that’s really important because when this issue came up about giving this authority at that June meeting when it wasn’t discussed, it wasn’t briefed as part of the item, it wasn’t made in the motion.
“It was moved to approve, and there was no discussion at all about this. That appeared very suspect. I’m not saying that was done knowingly. It could have been done unknowingly. It could have been an oversight. But that was suspect. I came back and questioned that as far as open meetings.
“... The second thing that I want to say is I really want to thank Alderman White from the South Ward. He fought for this meeting. He sat at meetings and argued that we needed to do this. I appreciate that I hope this becomes more of the standard practice when we’re talking big items like this.
“I appreciate the other alderman that’s sitting in the back of the room (Alderman Drew Burnette). And I’m a little disappointed that the folks that represent me aren’t sitting here, but that’s OK. This is in the South Ward, and I understand why these two gentlemen felt it important to be here.
“The one thing I would say is we showed a lot of numbers up there about how much money we have in the CIP, how much money we have in the budget. I would ask one of the things in the CIP budget that upset me was that we were looking at $1.25 to $1.5 million, depending on the number you look at, to address the additional turn lanes in the Town Center.
“In the same CIP meetings, we said, ‘Oh, we don’t have any money for that.’ So that got wiped off the agenda, got postponed until 2026.
“I think anyone in here that drives to Farragut High School or the other schools in that area in the morning that tries to leave Concord Hills in the morning would really appreciate the Town going back and looking at all that money we have in the bank and say, ‘hey, could we fix these turn lanes?’ ...”
Citizen John Aiken said, “my concerns were that not all of the Alderman were present for the vote ... of the property. The other thing I was kind of concerned about, too, was what Mike Wilson was talking about just a minute ago.
“During one of the CIP meetings, I believe it was the $1.5 million for the road improvement at Campbell Station.Road and Kingston Pike, was pushed back to 2026 because there was not enough money in the budget for that,” he added.
“However, now we’re going to spend over five-and-a-half million dollars for a park ... how do we push that to the back of the budget, but then we push this forward?”
