Summerfield residents speak out against major housing and retail project
Residents had the chance to go before the delegation on the possible development project; bringing up future issues like overcrowding damaging the rural community they have grown to love.
By Kara Peters
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SUMMERFIELD, North Carolina (WXII) — The Guilford co-legislative delegation held a town hall meeting Thursday evening to hear concerns from residents on the future of Summerfield.
Residents had the chance to go before the delegation on the possible development project; bringing up future issues like overcrowding damaging the rural community they have grown to love.
“The devil is in the details and the devil is in the de-annexation.” one Summerfield resident explained.
The plan, which has been rejected twice by the town council, would include about 600 apartments and retail space.
Now David Couch, developer for the project, is hoping state lawmakers can de-annex his land from Summerfield.
“If you allow David couch to take his 1000 acres out of the heart of our town I think one, the town would probably collapse.” another Summerfield resident said.
“It’s great pain and angst to our town, it causes a lot of trial and tribulation amongst our citizenry.” Tim Sessoms said, mayor of Summerfield.
Couch also stepped to the podium to clarify things when it comes to his land and the project.
“I have owned a corpus of my farm for 25 years since 1998. And when I acquired that I fell under different counties ordinance that was first adopted by Summerfield as a GDO,” Couch said. And I had no issue with property rights at that point because that’s what the entire county was developed under.”
Overall most community members used Thursday’s meeting to plead to state lawmakers to reconsider what happens with their community to prevent expansion from not just their home, but other similar-sized cities.
One resident said, “The de-annexation of this much acreage would be opening a can of worms in our area and for the states other small towns.”
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