News

Sale of sewer company would likely block high-density development in Etowah

Etowah residents listen to a presentation about a proposed high-density development in this Lightning file photo from May 2023.

By Bill Moss, Published: July 12, 2024

The potential purchase of Etowah Sewer Co. by Henderson County appears to have created a way for the Board of Commissioners to block a vigorously opposed high-density development at Etowah Valley Golf & Resort.

County commissioners during their regular mid-month meeting next Wednesday are scheduled to take up the purchase of the private sewer company’s assets for $400,000, meaning control of the utility — and the power to permit or deny large-scale hookups — would rest with the elected Board of Commissioners.

“The short of it is, we’ve been negotiating with Etowah Sewer Co. for about six weeks and we have a contract to purchase on the agenda next Wednesday,” County Manager John Mitchell said Friday afternoon. “There are no encumbrances to transfer with the property,” including “any allocations of sewer to developments.”

That’s crucial because plans by Tribute Companies, a Wilmington, N.C.-based commercial real estate developer, can’t go forward without sewer. Etowah Valley homeowners have aggressively fought Tribute's plans for more than a year, when the developer first rolled out a proposal for a 343-unit RV park on some of the golf course’s 27 holes. The most recent plan, which won preliminary approval from the county planning board last October, calls for 400 duplex units.

“I’m actually very excited that the elected body is going to be in charge of Etowah Sewer Co.,” Annette Huetter, a chief organizer of the Etowah Valley Preservation Society, said Friday. “We know we can vote those people in or out with regard to the sewer system.” During the drafting of the county’s new 2045 comprehensive plan, Huetter noted, commissioners said “they were not in favor of any high density development in Etowah. Even before the election, they actually put a blurb in (the comp plan) about how Etowah had concerns about high-density development.”

In the March 5 Republican primary voters turned out incumbents David Hill and Daniel Andreotta in favor of challengers Jay Egolf and Sheila Franklin, who campaigned aggressively for stronger protections against disruptive land uses and pledged to Etowah voters that they’d work to stop high-density development. Egolf has no opposition in the Nov. 5 general election; Franklin faces Democrat Erik Weber.

The sewer system “will become much more reliable,” Egolf said Friday. As for the purchase contract’s specific language barring agreements to serve prospective developments, “I agree that is how it should be written,” he said. “I just don’t think Etowah is the proper place for development of that type.”

It's unclear when or if Tribute and the golf course’s current owners, WNC Resort Properties LLC, could formally dissolve the agreement for sale of the property. Neither Tim Rice, a WNC Resort owner, nor Tribute officials could be reached for comment.

The 12-page contract setting out terms of the sewer system sale requires the seller to affirm that it “does not have any outstanding contracts, agreements, or commitments of any kind, written or oral, with any third party regarding the assets.” The agreement also requires the private sewer company to submit the resignations of all employees of the company upon the sale’s closing and makes the sewer company responsible for the current payroll plus severance benefits, vacation days, sick days, personal days and other compensated time off.

Huetter, who has worked days, nights and weekends along with other activist homeowners organizing the campaign against the duplex development, said she hopes to “take a breath” at some point. For now, she knows where she will be Wednesday morning. “I’m going, for sure” to the county commission meeting.

“We would love to see the community work with whoever owns the land, as a sounding board, to see if there’s a way to create a partnership,” she said.

In a  newsletter on Monday, the Etowah Valley Preservation Society endorsed the proposed purchase of the Etowah sewer system.

"We support the sale of the ESC to Henderson County, making it a public utility controlled by officials we elect," it said. "The alternative we faced this past winter was a utility owned by a large firm based in another state and controlled by the utilities commission in Raleigh. This experience showed us how little control or influence we have with private ownership of a utility."

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