Council should back commission

Published 12:00 am Thursday, August 19, 2004

The seven Suffolk Planning Commissioners who voted Tuesday against a proposed subdivision did the right thing and City Council should back them up.

With a 7-5 vote, commissioners shot down a proposal by PMP LLC of Virginia Beach to rezone property on Turlington Road from industrial/office to residential in order to build a 191-home subdivision.

Millstone would have offered homes ranging in price from $250,000 to $325,000.

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As commissioners noted, Millstone would have been in the way of the city’s growth plans at Suffolk Executive airport and along nearby Carolina Road, not to mention the obviously questionable action of putting homes in a flight path.

While it’s certainly tempting to make affordable, quality housing available near the core city, there are already too many such developments in the pipeline. We do not need to be creating more stress on city services and the schools.

As the planning commission staff pointed out months ago, Millstone is clearly at odds with the principles of the adopted 2018 Comprehensive Plan. Making such decisions would be short sighted, particularly while the review of the Comprehensive Plan is under way.

The plan is a good one and Council should stand behind it.