Several multimillion-dollar road and sewer projects proposed for Macon County are poorly planned because the county is not planning for the future, according to county Planning Board Chairman Lewis Penland.

“We’re not planning,” Penland told The Smoky Mountain News. “We seem to consistently be doing knee-jerk reactions.”

County Manager Jack Horton balked at that statement.

“I don’t think that’s the fact at all. In what respect are we not planning?” Horton said.

Planning Board member Susan Ervin said there have been detrimental effects as a result of poor planning, including loss of aesthetics, polluted streams and rivers, and poor developments. Moreover, Penland and Ervin said a recent restructuring of the planning department that led to the resignation of County Planner Stacy Guffey is a step back.

“We need to take the planning department and let it plan,” Penland said.

But County Commissioner Ronnie Beale, who has served on the planning board and is the current liaison to the planning board, said the county commissioners and the planning board are working well together on growth.

“My opinion is that we have a good relationship with the planning board,” Beale said. “We have one of the best planning boards.”

Horton also said the county commissioners have a good relationship with the planning board.

“There’s no wall between them,” Horton said.

Beale said, “I don’t have a contest with Lewis (Penland). He’s valued. That’s the reason he was appointed chairman of the planning board.”

County Commissioner Bob Simpson said the county has done a good job planning, pointing to the passage of ordinances that deal with development.

“I think we’re working toward a comprehensive plan of what the county will look like in 20 years,” Simpson said.

However, Simpson admitted that sometimes planning and development conflict.

“There’s definitely a conflict because planning could go the opposite of what needs to be built,” Simpson said.

Poorly planned projects?

Penland said the county has proposed running a $4 million sewer line north of Franklin to a new K-4 school when an on-site sewage system could be used. However, he said the county is now considering an on-site system.

Macon County Planner Guffey said that his office has not been involved in planning that sewer line.

Beale said the reason the planning department isn’t involved is that “we haven’t gotten that far yet.”

Guffey said he does not resent the fact that his office isn’t involved but said it would have made sense to do so. Guffey said whenever new infrastructure is put in the ground, growth will follow, and the planning department should be discussing that growth.

Penland cited a $12 million road project planned south of Franklin as another example of poor planning.

Beale said the project, the Siler Road extension, is headed up by the state Department of Transportation and is intended to ease traffic flow from U.S. 441 South.

Simpson said the Planning Department did not take part in that project.

“I don’t know what they would have to do with roads,” Simpson said of the planning department. “This is more or less state stuff.”

The road was well planned in that county commissioners reviewed several options presented by DOT for the road before accepting one, Simpson said. The project would extend Siler Road from Southwestern Community College to Dowdle Mountain Road.

The road would include a bridge that crosses the Little Tennessee River, and Guffey said he recommended a different bridge design than the county commissioners went with. Guffey said his suggestion would have been cheaper and more sensitive to the river.

Guffey said it didn’t bother him that the county commissioners didn’t take his recommendation, saying the county commissioners do not take all staff members’ recommendations.

Another project that Penland criticized as poor planning is running a sewer line through “prime farmland” in the Patton Valley between Franklin and the industrial park.

Simpson said there are no sewer lines proposed to go through farmland.

The sewer line was initially proposed to go to the industrial park, but now it has been cut in half to stop at the Whistle Stop bridge in Franklin, Simpson said. Simpson said the project had to be cut in half because state and federal environmental agencies delayed the project to the point that the price increased because of inflation.

Simpson agreed that if the sewer line was fully constructed it would have gone through some farmland, “but it (sewer line) would be 20 feet in the ground.”

The primary reason the line is proposed is that there is a moratorium on development in west Franklin due to a lack of sewer capacity, Simpson said.

Guffey said water and sewer projects used to be “handled” out of the planning department but were shifted over to the county manager’s office.

Guffey said the planning department should be involved with such projects, however.

“It has an overall vision of how the county should be developed,” Guffey said.

Penland also questioned the county’s decision to build a new fifth and sixth grade school next to the middle school that is already experiencing heavy traffic.

Simpson agreed traffic will worsen but said the county has asked DOT to do a traffic study for the area.

Planner resigns

Penland and other planning board members were highly critical of the county commissioners’ recent decision to combine the planning department with the inspections department and put it under one director, Code Enforcement Director Jack Morgan.

The decision led to the resignation of Guffey (effective Oct. 7), who said the restructuring did not fit with his view of the future of Macon County.

Penland said much was being accomplished with Guffey as planner.

“We had a system that worked,” he said. “Why mess with it?”

County Manager Horton said the reorganization was done to make the departments run more efficiently and said the role of the planning department is not changing. The shake-up comes less than a year into Horton’s tenure as the new county manager.

Penland also criticized the structure saying he cannot find another example of a planning department being set up like that.

Horton said each county is different in how it organizes its departments.

Planning board member Ervin said there has been damage to wildlife habitat, bad road designs, erosion and sediments in creeks and rivers because of poor planning.

Ervin said she is taking a “wait and see” attitude on the reorganization of the planning department.

Ervin said she understands that Horton and the county commissioners were trying to streamline the planning department, but she thinks it created an “extra layer of bureaucracy.”

She said the resignation of Guffey “definitely set things back.”

Planning board member Evelyn Owens also said she does not know if the reorganization was a good idea, but said she does not think the county commissioners are anti-planning.

Horton and county commissioners Beale and Simpson said they will miss Guffey

More planning needed

There needs to be more planning for roads, water and schools, said Owens, an area Realtor.

“I don’t know if we have the plans in place to handle growth,” she said.

Owens said she believes the county should have zoning but realizes there are strong feelings against it among some county residents.

Ervin said she has been on the planning board for more than 10 years, adding the planning board has a “dedicated” chairman with Penland.

Ervin said the county commissioners have to deal with “economic” forces, such as developers and real estate officials, in the community that are not necessarily in favor of planning and more regulations. For instance, a developer may not favor a subdivision ordinance because it may require more work and investment, she said.

“I think most people in politics try to satisfy most people,” Ervin said.

When it comes to planning, which looks 20 to 50 years down the road, the county often has to weigh the short-term benefits versus the long term, she said.

Ervin said she would like to see the county commissioners be more enthusiastic about planning. For instance, sometimes regulations that come out of the planning department, such as land-use rules, are not taken as seriously as regulations that come from other departments, Ervin said.

She said the county needs more manpower and “teeth” in its ordinances so they can be enforced.

The county has no regulations for storm water, which runs off from parking lots and highways to pollute the rivers and creeks, she said.

“We are seeing a lot of sediments in our streams and rivers,” Ervin said.

She also said the planning board needs to begin working on a steep-slope ordinance to control development in the mountains. Building homes in the mountains damages the aesthetics, she said.

Commissioner Simpson agreed a steep-slope ordinance is needed to ensure that homes built in the mountains don’t slide off cliffs.

The planning board is almost finished developing a junk ordinance, Ervin said.

The county also needs a plan so that there will be adequate water supply in the future, she said.

“We need to make sure development is not going where there isn’t adequate water supply,” she said.

Commissioner Simpson agreed that acquiring more water for the future may be the next big issue for Macon County. Simpson said the Little Tennessee River could be a source.

There is not a water supply shortage now, but if growth and drought conditions continue, there could be a shortage, Ervin said.

She also said the county should be planning so there will be “corridor protection.” She said corridor protection involves developing the county’s heavily traveled roads in a responsible fashion so they are aesthetically pleasing and have good traffic flow.

Some things accomplished

Guffey said there have been several things accomplished in his four years including a “progressive” flood plain ordinance, a subdivision ordinance, a high-impact ordinance that regulates industrial development, a building-height ordinance and a sexually-oriented business ordinance.

But he said his fear is that with the reorganization of the planning department that it will be even more difficult for the department to have input.

The county commissioners have worked with the planning department in the past, Guffey said. He noted that the Watershed Council has one of the best flood plain ordinances in the state and that the county commissioners were “quick to pass it.”

But Guffey said planning could have been more involved through the years.

“There’s not a tradition of that in Macon County,” he said. “In a small rural county things are done differently. It’s taken a while to get where the planning board and planning department take bigger roles. I think it’s just an evolution.”

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