Wendell News Outlet

One of the attendees, Mr. Bruce Lynch, thought that adoption of the ordinance was premature, wondering “why we can’t slow it down a little bit until we can see what some of our neighboring communities are going to be doing.” Two other Wendell citizens echoed Mr. Lynch’s concerns, as did Commissioner Connolly, who asked that the issue be deferred for an additional 30 days in order to see what Rolesville and Zebulon will do. The two other East Wake jurisdictions are also reviewing the same ordinance for adoption.

Commissioner Hinnant, who made the motion to adopt, responded to the concerns of those who were feeling rushed, referring to a number of changes made in response to suggestions from the Planning Board and the public, “We had it open for public comment for 45 days…[also,] there is a thing called an amendment if we find there is something we can’t live with down the road…this document will never be perfect, but somebody’s got to be first, and I hate for us to continue to lag behind our sister cities. Zebulon is growing, Knightdale is growing, and Wendell is sitting here, and I’ll say again we have a perfect opportunity to get a little bit ahead of the curve by approving this.”

Commissioner Baynes was also for moving forward on the ordinance. Responding to a comment made earlier in the evening, said, “I don’t make any apologies for considering some of the decisions we make at this table as life and death decisions…if anybody out here thinks that environmental issues are not life and death issues, you better rethink that, because they are. They may not be for us today, but they will be for the future, so lets get serious…We’ve heard tonight ‘lets wait and hear the experts speak,’ well the experts have spoken - and they’ve spoken en masse.”

In the end, after a tie was broken by the Mayor to defeat the motion to defer, the Board of Commissioners passed the stormwater ordinance by a vote of 4-0, becoming the first of the East Wake communities to take a strong stand in support of this comprehensive package of stormwater rules. “I think the citizens of Wendell can be proud of the decision made last night; it was forward thinking and works to protect the valued resources of current residents,” said Alissa Bierma, the Upper Neuse RIVERKEEPER^®, who attended the meeting to speak in favor of the ordinance. She continued, noting that “this is not an ordinance that does not allow buy downs; it is not something that prevents development; it is something that encourages people to take responsible actions that protect water quality.”

Prior to adoption of the ordinance Wendell had the least restrictive stormwater regulations in County, and that was a cause for concern for some. Commissioner Hinnant noted that sub-par development simply because it was development, was not necessarily a good thing, stating that in the recent past “we had two entities that wanted to be annexed, and the only reason they wished to be annexed was because we had no impervious surface rule and the County did, so they could do more on their property [in Wendell].”

While the addition of these rules does have the potential to add work for review staff, Wake County has offered to partner with the Town to implement the changes. Britt Stoddard, Acting Water Quality Director explained how such a relationship would work, “the county collects the fees and we administer [the ordinance] for you, which we are willing to do, we already administer erosion control and building inspections for a large number of the towns.”

The effective date for this ordinance will be the execution date of an Inter-local agreement with Wake County to administer the rules. The Rolesville planning board has already recommended adoption and scheduled a public hearing for the month of August and indications are that Rolesville will accept the changes made to the ordinance by the Town of Wendell in moving forward in the adoption of their ordinance.

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