The Palm Coast Planning Board denied a request to rezone 37 acres on Hargrove Grade on the west side of U.S. 1 to heavy industrial so a national may construct a concrete mixing facility, citing concerns about air and water pollution.
The property is close to acreage designated for a hospital or medical facility, has 10 acres of wetlands, and crosses over into the protection zone of two public well sites that provide water to the city. In Palm Coast, the batch facility would be the sole one. Board members and members of the public who opposed the rezoning did so for a variety of reasons, including traffic, noise, pollution, and those considerations.
Two moves were attempted by the board. One to accept and one to reject the application. On tie votes, both were defeated.
Along with the possible vulnerability of water sources, one member of the planning board expressed concern about the substantial amount of particulate matter that would enter the lungs. Sandra Shank, the board chair, was particularly worried about the site’s wastewater flowing into wells and its proximity to a potential hospital or medical facility. (The planned rezoning is on acres further west, although the hospital site is really closer to U.S. 1.)
“We want clean stuff,” said Dave Ferguson, a planning board member and former City Council member, “but Palm Coast wants more jobs and they want more commercial.” Data centers are what we desire. We want computers, hospitals, and everything else, but anything that releases anything into the air, water, or earth. Although he said he was conflicted about the plan, he ultimately voted against it.
The rezoning represents an existential threat to our vibrant, specialized business, according to a spokesman of Palm Coast’s Autohaus on Hargrove Grade. The agent gave a description of an upscale vehicle repair facility. Three significant, non-negotiable risks would be introduced by the plant: particulate matter and abrasive dust, which would wash into open bays and stop her operation. She also mentioned the ongoing traffic jams caused by cement trucks.
According to the Autohaus spokesman, we have established a prosperous, specialized automotive ecosystem here that supports local employment and makes a substantial economic contribution to Palm Coast. What we have laboriously built will be immediately destroyed if a cement plant is approved.
Only one other opponent of the proposal received public input, but one board member pointed out that the community had raised some excellent arguments that I believe should be taken into account and that any rezoning approval should come with restrictions.
Currently, the site is undeveloped scrubland with a light industrial and warehousing zone. The Hargrove Industrial Park includes it.
The proposal is still alive. During two readings of the rezoning law, the City Council will have the option to either disregard the Planning Board’s decision or approve the proposal. The city government is suggesting that it be approved.
Even though a much bigger, neighboring site was already zoned heavy industrial, the Bunnell City Commission narrowly rejected an application in January to rezone 1.4 acres at the end of Hibiscus Avenue in that city to permit the development of a plant there. The factory will create unbearable levels of noise and traffic, according to complaints from nearby homeowners. The proposal was unanimously rejected by Bunnell’s Planning Board.
Members of the Palm Coast Planning Board who opposed the rezoning on Hargrove Grade raised identical issues, which the applicant’s representative made an effort to address one by one.
The location was planned and approved for 221,365 opulent condominiums with garages. That didn’t happen.
The national concrete production giant SRM, which operates over 560 factories across 23 states, then expressed interest in the landowner. In 1999, the year Palm Coast was incorporated, it was established. Curt Wimpe, the applicant’s representative, stated that 30 to 50 workers will be employed at the Palm Coast plant, earning between $75,000 and $100,000. According to him, the facility will cost the corporation between $12 million and $15 million.
“They have a very sophisticated operation, so they’re not just coming in and trying one new thing,” Wimpe said the planning board. They’ve done this, they’ve figured it out, and they’re extremely excellent at it, but they’re also very ecologically friendly in everything they do with regard to particulates and such, and everything that goes with a concrete batch plan.
Using water from wells and operating five and a half days a week, the plant would consume about 10,000 gallons of water every day. The planned area for the batch plant shares a 500-foot wellfield protection zone with two existing public well sites. Therefore, in order to make sure that its own well, which would be dug about 200 feet below, wouldn’t affect the two public wells, the applicant would need to get a St. Johns River Water Management District Consumptive Use Permit.
Wimp acknowledged that one of the only worries people have about concrete batch facilities is airborne particulates, but the company is taking the issue very seriously.
The city’s land development language, which states that a land use cannot generate an unreasonable hazard, nuisance, or threaten the general health and welfare of the city’s residents, was referenced in the motion to deny the application. However, according to the city attorney, data taken from the internet to bolster allegations of particles was not the kind of credible, substantial evidence that would stand up in court.
After passing the gavel, Shank seconded the motion, stating that her decision was not motivated by sentiment or opinion. The argument that the location was sufficiently remote from the planned hospital site was denied by her. Both the motion and its follow-up motion to approve failed.
I believe there is sensitivity and a worry that the industrial zoning proposal, as proposed by board member Suzanne Nicholson, may have some negative consequences on the nearby developments, based on all of the discussion and the information that I believe we have all gained here. So that there is some commitment on the part of the applicant to take those things into consideration, I would advise the applicant to consider everything they have heard here regarding health, the environment, the neighborhood, and what is currently there as well as what will be developed in the future when this goes to city council.
