Supervisors advance subdivision plat despite backlash

WASHINGTON — The Washington County Board of Supervisors narrowly approved a preliminary plat in a 3-2 vote Tuesday morning, after nearly 80 minutes of discussion at their regular meeting.

Those in favor said the subdivision proposed by Todd Hahn Construction was badly needed.

“That part of the county is the only place Washington County is growing,” Supervisor Marcus Fedler said. “The southern tier of the county is not. In fact, it’s shrinking, so … we talk about the need for housing in the county and so on, and I think this is a good way of doing that.”

Several residents in the area, however, have concerns about the development. Those worries generally fall into one of three camps.

The first is runoff and flooding issues. Some residents nearby said the subdivision would make water issues worse, including George Gerot, a property owner in the area who claimed engineers failed to assess the development’s impacts.

“This will increase flood risk to areas downstream that are already experiencing flooding due to prior developments by this developer,” Gerot said. “The whole purpose of the subdivision ordinance is to stop this kind of development from occurring … I don’t see how this body can approve this plat.”

Fedler said that concern had been addressed, after a consultant to the developer presented plans for water diversion at the subdivision that include a retention pond.

“Not doing anything doesn’t address the situation,” Fedler said. “By doing this, we actually help it, not hinder it. Right now, everything flows over that hill and right into the creek. At least this way, a large portion of it is detained … by not doing this, I think it creates a bigger problem.”

Supervisor Jack Seward Jr. said he was also confident in the thoroughness of county and private engineers involved.

“Any engineer that’s doing this … absolutely puts his license and his livelihood on the line,” Seward said.

Fedler agreed.

“It’s very specific, it has to be,” Fedler said. “It would be unethical for him to twist the numbers just to get a result … getting a second opinion, I think, it would create an unnecessary expense.”

The second camp regards the demand a new subdivision would have on well water.

"That field has not had water for wells in the past,“ said Lloyd Miller, a resident of the area. ”They have storage tanks that aren’t staying full. How are we going to supply water to 24 more homes? I want somebody to address that point.“

Fedler, who has been involved in the development’s previous planning and zoning meetings about the proposed subdivision, said that concern was misinformed.

“My understanding from the meetings was that there are three wells there, only two currently are being used,” he said. “And only one of those, technically, is being used, they cycle the two … they’ve done a report on that and it returned that they have plenty of water for 24 more houses. So I don’t think that’s a significant issue, I think that’s been looked at and addressed.”

A handful of residents said they were also worried about roads. Lloyd Miller focused on the approach from Highway 218.

“They need to kick in and take care of this approach if they’re going to add 24 more homes to the driveway that we all have to use to get onto 218,” he said. “That’s all we’re asking for, so we don’t have chuck holes where people all start in the same spot.”

Area resident Mary Ann Parton said she was worried about the road through the proposed subdivision. 135th street is gravel road for roughly half a mile off of Highway 218. After that, it becomes a dirt, level B road with minimal maintenance.

“It gets more traffic on it than a lot of level B roads,” she said. “But it has more travel on it than a lot of gravel roads. If 24 new houses come in, that’s twice the people that use that road … I just think that road needs to be upgraded before anything is done. I know there’s been talks about it, but I think something needs to be done before we go onto another approval.”

Supervisor Jack Seward Jr. said the county was already in talks with the developer regarding that road, where he expected the company to stay cooperative.

“It’s my understanding that there should be some skin in the game from the subdivision developer,” he said. “They’re the ones that are putting it out there and the ones that are going to be having the advantage of it … we just haven’t come down on who’s going to do what.”

Supervisors Stan Stoops and Bob Yoder voted against the resolution. The two said they needed more time to think on the matter.

“For me there’s some unanswered questions,” Yoder said. “I’m not against the subdivision in itself, but I think we need to do some more discussions, more questions need to be answered.”

Board of Supervisors Chair Richard Young, however, disagreed. He said discussions in prior meetings with other boards were satisfactory enough.

“We have to get figures, we have to know what it’s going to cost us … that’s not going to happen overnight,” he said. “We’ve been having this discussion for quite a while, to make improvements up there.”

Young said the group would have sufficient time for discussion in the roughly two months before approval on a final plat comes up for a vote.

“I want everybody to understand that this is just a preliminary plat,” he said. “We’ve got two more steps to go through before this is finalized.”

Comments: Kalen.McCain@southeastiowaunion.com