The Charlotte City Council voted on four annexations Monday, approving at least three, and scheduled a hearing on a fifth. City staff told council that Charlotte has never used annexation to ask a development for affordable housing, and that the city's lawyers have warned that asking could pose a legal risk.
The policy that governs those decisions dates to 2003. At-large Council Member LaWana Mayfield, who voted against three of the four, said council needs to decide what it wants in return for extending city water, sewer, police and fire service to new land.
What the city checks
A voluntary annexation is a property owner's request to join the city. Sarah Hazel, chief of staff in the city manager's office, told council how Charlotte weighs one under the 2003 policy. City departments estimate what it will cost to serve the property, and the city's long-range planners compare that with the property taxes it will bring in. "We only bring forward annexations if we are able to meet the threshold of the resources being brought in through property taxes exceeds or meets what it costs to provide city services," she said.
Asked by at-large Council Member Dimple Ajmera when that cost model was last updated, Hazel said she would get back to her with the date.
Affordability is not part of the review. What gets built is settled earlier, during rezoning, and Hazel said the annexation process "does not include a conversation around affordable housing." Staff, she said, "has never required or negotiated the construction of affordable units as part of the voluntary annexation process to date." When the city attorney's office last looked at the question, Hazel said, it concluded that asking could pose a legal risk under a North Carolina statute that prohibits mandatory inclusionary zoning, the practice of requiring affordable units in new development. That advice, she added, would need to be reviewed again.
She also said the planning department intends to assess the 2003 policy and bring changes forward if the assessment warrants them.
"What type of Charlotte are we building?"
Mayfield raised the issue on the first annexation item of the night, a resolution setting an Oct. 26 hearing on the River Point East of Dixie Road petition. "Will this annexation address our housing affordability needs?" she asked. She pointed to the River District, the large development where, she said, conversations about homes at a range of price points were never written into the agreements. "Unfortunately, that is not what happened contractually," she said.
"We have not had this conversation since 2003," she said later. "The bottom line cannot just be that it's going to generate more sales tax revenue or property tax revenue if a large number of our residents cannot take advantage of whatever that development is."
Council Member Reneé Johnson of District 4 asked for the annexation process to be referred to committee. She cited a constituent email about an earlier involuntary annexation, one the city initiated rather than the property owners, in which, she said, sewer installation was left incomplete and the remainder became the residents' responsibility. The policy should be reviewed, she said, "so our current residents aren't burdened by the growth." Mayor Rob Harrington said council would consider the referral. None was formally made Monday.
The River Point hearing was set with Mayfield opposed.
The four annexations
Freedom Manor at Reedy Creek. Habitat for Humanity of the Charlotte Region plans 37 single-family homes on a little over 12 acres. Mayfield praised it as the kind of attainable housing the city needs, and Council Member JD Mazuera Arias welcomed it to his District 5. It passed without recorded opposition.
King's Grant. The largest, about 335 acres, joins District 4. Bridget Grant, a land use consultant representing the petitioner, described it as "largely an industrial development," with apartments on a smaller part of the site. Holly Cramer of the planning department said conditions set during the earlier rezoning, not the annexation, require 5 percent of the rental units to be affordable to households earning 80 percent of the area median income. Mayfield, who counted 448 units in the plan, said that share "is not addressing the need that we have." The annexation passed with two members opposed. The second was not named on the record.
Taylor Grove at Mallard Creek. Approved in a rezoning last year, it also joins District 4. Mayfield asked the clerk to record her vote against it. The mayor did not announce the result before moving to the next item.
Yardley West Town. It passed with one member opposed, Mayfield.
Council did not vote Monday on changing the 2003 policy. Hazel did not give a date for the planning department's review of it.