Hamilton County’s Commission narrowly approved Plan Hamilton, a long-range growth plan, by a 6-5 vote. This split exposes a divide among residents who see the fast pace of development and the painfully slow availability of supporting infrastructure, such as roads, schools, and community essentials that support good neighborhoods versus those who gain profit from development or government folks who want the property tax base to expand for revenue.
The County Commission debate has been framed around the challenge: Does infrastructure precede development or should development drive infrastructure.
Take a fire at a Chattanooga 280-unit complex on Sunday, July 5, as just one example. The development located just beyond the Northgate area required 21 of 27 fire units from across the city to respond to an emergency. A Florida-based company built these units with some fire hydrants but the hydrants supplied available from the City of Chattanooga were about a mile away. Unfortunately, 70 residents were displaced. Gratefully, the ingenuity of the Chattanooga Fire Department staging relay trucks every 500 feet assisted in water delivery to the critical scene.
But how does Plan Hamilton impact property rights of individual property owners? You do have a constitutional right to private property. Yes. There are zoning regulations and codes. But your elected officials are to represent you, your rights and interests within the framework of government. A comprehensive plan should serve as a policy guide rather than a mechanism that unnecessarily restricts the productive use of private land. If, however, a government approves development, that government is also making a commitment to support that development.
But does it?
The Chattanooga apartment fit the development model of higher density to prevent spread near a major transportation hub. Yet the infrastructure for public safety was still revealed to be an issue in just this one example.
So who are the winners and losers of Plan Hamilton?
Winners will be:
• property owners of land that can now be divided under new land regulations into smaller parcels to maximize number for density and profit;
• developers both locally and from other regions who seek relatively cheap land for purchase and a quick return on investment;
• individuals either moving into the area or choosing to relocate to a new residence to have greater housing inventory and advertised lower costs (which are not materializing yet);
• governments seeing single parcels of land developed into numerous parcels for taxing authority for spending and revenue.
Losers will be:
• existing land or homeowners whose property values may be negatively impacted depending on unelected development board decisions;
• neighborhoods that are not resourced with roads, expanded road capacity, and other infrastructure like schools, public safety, and essential amenities;
• those working in schools and other points of professional contact and service that face greater volume and long wait for schools, healthcare, etc. to be built.
Finally, Hamilton County and Chattanooga have long touted our area’s beauty, natural resources, and wildlife. Will we congratulate the progressive development that make us just like Any City, USA?