What’s the future of Huntersville? 3 takeaways from mayoral forum ahead of election

Huntersville mayoral candidates still have questions about statements contained in a Norfolk Southern letter offering to explore a deal with the city of Charlotte for a rail line through the Lake Norman area.

Candidates’ questions during a Friday forum included whether northern Mecklenburg County will get a fair shake, exactly what the train company meant by its letter and whether Huntersville voters are interested in the proposed Red Line.

The forum at Red Rocks Cafe in Huntersville’s Birkdale Village was a partnership between The Charlotte Observer, Neighborhood TV and WSOC-TV. All three of Huntersville’s mayoral candidates — current town commissioners Derek Partee and Dan Boone as well as former state Rep. Christy Clark — attended the event.

Moderators for the forum were WSOC-TV reporter Joe Bruno and Observer local news editor Josh Bergeron.

Mayoral candidates were asked Friday whether they support the city of Charlotte’s efforts to implement a one-penny sales tax to help fund a mobility plan that includes the Red Line — a long-planned passenger train that would take people from Charlotte through northern Mecklenburg towns, all the way to Mooresville.

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Clark said she supports the Red Line for people to get to work and to see Carolina Panthers football games, but money has to be “equitably distributed to the north Meck.”

“That’s something I advocated for in Raleigh and something I want to bring back here — is a more regional approach to transportation and making sure that up here we have what we need to get folks from point A to point B without having them take three hours to get to work,” Clark said.

Boone called the letter from Norfolk Southern “very vague.” In it, the company’s senior vice president, Michael R. McClellan, told Charlotte Mayor Vi Lyles, “We have not decided upon what form such a transaction might take, whether an outright sale of the O Line, which extends further north than Charlotte’s Red Line, or some variant of a lease.” The letter solely reflected the company’s “willingness to engage,” McClellan said.

“I really couldn’t really support a one-cent sales tax, or any type of tax, until I know what Norfolk is telling us,” Boone said. “We’ve heard from them before and it’s still a little bit gray to me.”

Partee said there’s no commitment from Norfolk Southern and that the letter does not verify its intent.

“I would go to the voters here in Huntersville,” he said. “As mayor, I represent the voters, I don’t represent myself, and I want to hear from them exactly what their position is on this one-cent (tax). Would it benefit us? Would it benefit Charlotte, how we’re going to move people back and forth between Huntersville and Charlotte? Do we want that?”

Here are other notable moments from Friday’s forum.

Partee denies demeaning comments

Partee responded to a question addressing a report earlier this month on WBT radio about comments described as “aggressive, demeaning and offensive” in emails written by fellow Huntersville Commissioners Amber Kovacs, who is running for reelection, and Stacy Phillips, who is not seeking another term.

WBT obtained emails in which Phillips and Kovacs described Partee’s behavior in a closed session as “the definition of a hostile work environment” and said they didn’t want to work with or be alone with him.

“I emphatically deny their accusations. There are also witnesses that are in the same room,” Partee said. “Now, mind you, as a retired homicide detective, I may have a strong sense of authority and presentation. ... I, in my life, do not raise my voice to anybody. So, you would have to ask them, ‘What is that coming from?’”

Birkdale Village building, parking deck

Candidates responded to a question about a proposed office building and parking deck in Birkdale Village that was turned down by the board earlier this year. The office building would have added six stories of offices and hundreds of parking spaces.

Boone said he voted against the Birkdale Village project because it would affect the quality of life for people who live there. The office tower, parking deck and other nearby projects would make life in the area “not the quality of life I would want to have.” But he’s open to hearing the proposal again if developers “finish what they’ve started before they’re asking to build additional parking or retail space.”

Partee referenced a part of the project that was removed from the final proposal — a convention center and hotel — when saying the community overwhelming spoke in opposition. If the proposal returns, Partee said he’d take action based on what “the community says.”

“Listening to the community is part of what we do and what I do as a representative, as their commissioner” he said.

Similarly, Clark said the Birkdale Village developer needs to ask what nearby residents want before bringing back another plan.

“They are going to be the ones impacted by it, and it really does come down to what the folks that live in Birkdale want,” Clark said.

Lagoona Bay

Candidates also answered a question about a controversial project that never made it to a town board vote — Lagoona Bay.

Developers pulled the project after a scaled-back version didn’t meet financial goals. The $800 million, 270-acre development could have added hundreds of single-family homes, apartments or condos, a hotel, convention center, retail space, and, most notably, a 10-acre freshwater lagoon off of N.C. 73 in northeast Huntersville.

Partee described his vocal opposition to the project as “respect for the board.” There were too many issues with the project to begin with, he said.

“That’s insulting to me as a commissioner, thinking that you want to get your project across, you want to get your acceptance of the zoning change, when the planning board says you have 63 issues to correct,” Partee said. “... So, therefore, I just questioned it, and when I questioned that particular issue, the ceiling opened up.”

Boone said that Lagoona Bay was an out-of-the-box project that got more people involved. It was “an excellent learning tool,” and it was positive because of the public involvement it generated, he said.

Clark said Lagoona Bay shouldn’t have been proposed in the first place. She clarified the dozens of issues noted by the planning board were ways the project didn’t match up with Huntersville’s 2040 plan — a blueprint on how to manage the town’s growing population.

“It was never going to meet what we have planned for our town,” he said.

Clark said she also didn’t like the project because of the “use of our water.” The project’s name came from a lagoon it proposed to build adjacent to N.C. 73.

“We don’t have unlimited water. We need to make sure we’re protecting that natural resource,” Clark said. “It would have been a big impact on our community to put that much water in a man-made lake, and I think it would have had a negative impact in the long run.”

The Observer’s next candidate forum with WSOC-TV and Neighborhood TV will feature Mooresville mayoral candidates Chris Carney and Bobby Compton. That forum will be published on charlotteobserver.com later this month.

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