Commissioners OK Plan for Carolina Eye Expansion
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Carolina Eye Associates’ expansion plan received a 4-1 nod from the Moore County Board of Commissioners Tuesday.
The plan, which actually covers a fire protection requirement of the village of Pinehurst, will enable the clinic to proceed with plans to expand the practice and add a minimum of 15 jobs.
At an estimated cost of $724,800, the expansion will be paid for with assistance from a $150,000 grant from the N.C. Rural Center. Carolina Eye has agreed to pay $166,600 with the remaining cost to be covered by Moore County Public Utilities and through assessments of future customers generated by the expansion.
The plan calls for running a water line from Memorial Drive to the Midland Road site, thus allowing the proposed expansion to meet Pinehurst village fire flow requirements and opening the area for new customers along several streets.
County Manager Cary McSwain said the extension would eliminate a bottleneck and allow the county to buy additional water from the town of Southern Pines.
Commissioner Tim Lea, who cast the dissenting vote, said that the plan would be costly to existing ratepayers and noted that other private developments have paid a greater percentage of the cost when water main extensions were needed. Lea commended Carolina Eye for the expansion but called the cost too high to the county and other customers.
In other business Tuesday, the commissioners agreed to call a public hearing for their next meeting to consider a rezoning request for the Pine Forest development near West End. They also approved plans for Phase 3 of the East Moore Water District, opening the way for a contract to be awarded in March.
More details will appear in the print version of The Pilot.
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Comments
CSmithson 2 years, 4 months ago
I wonder if the Pilot, Commissioners, ratepayers, and all other affected parties know the real story behind this.
The REAL story behind the story is that Southern Pines already had a water line in the area with sufficient capacity to serve Carolina Eye's needs.
Southern Pines was willing to supply the capacity (mainly needed for fire protection systems) if it was OK with MC Public Utilities. Any volume/revenue from adding this one customer would have been negligible to the SP utility, but it made a lot of sense to look into hooking up to Southern Pines due to the line and capacity already being there.
The County refused to allow Carolina Eye to hook up to the adequate existing line from Southern Pines. Again, no big deal to SP, but it made sense to see if it would work. Instead of allowing Carolina Eye to hook up to Southern Pines lines, the County insisted Carolina Eye help fund the upgrade of the lines coming all the way from the hospital.
This means Carolina Eye had to spend an extra $160K+ to get enough water capacity. The Rural Center kicked in another $150K. MCPU ratepayers will cover the balance of $400K+.
Mr. Lea doesn't seem to know the whole story here. MCPU and the ratepayers are actually VERY lucky here. If they had not forced Carolina Eye to hook up to County water instead of the adjacent SP water, the needed expansion of the water line would have cost ratepayers ANOTHER $316K+ that was covered by Carolina Eye and the Rural Center money that is tied to the new jobs.
The County "won" here by forcing Carolina Eye to hook up to MCPU and help pay for expanding the lines. Carolina Eye "lost" as if they had been allowed to hook up to Southern Pines' lines they'd have spent $160K less on their expansion.
GeorgiaMan 2 years, 4 months ago
Chris Thank you for the additional information.
Questions - The other properties that will benefit from this water line extension, who owns them? Why do they get to benefit from the taxpayers of the United States, Moore County and Carolina Eye Associates? How did that much pressure get brought to bear to extort the money from those 3 parties/
Also - Mr. Lea brings up some interesting points, and many people may have to re-evaluate how they feel about him. I for one am beginning to believe in him more and more. He seems to offer insights on County decisions that are not always popular, but hitting very close to the mark.
SoPinesNo1 2 years, 4 months ago
Thanks for the detailed explanation Chris. I would hope that this is an indication that the County will stand up for the Water Districts as well, and stop letting surrounding or adjacent entities take away from the customer base.
ncsnafu1 2 years, 4 months ago
@CSmithson:
You fail to reference in your post any existing contract between Carolina Eye & MCU and its associated terms & conditions, which in your words, "forced" Carolina Eye to act in the matter it did. Without knowing the t's & c's one can speculate either side of the issue as you've done and make a convincing argument either way.
I also wonder why you failed to reference that the new line will remove the current bottleneck in the area of Carolina that will allow SP to now sell more water to MCU, when needed. Let's also not forget that the removal of the bottleneck is a McGill study recommendation that has been long needed.
All in all, the deal is probably a win-win for all parties if all factors are evaluated.
ncsnafu1 2 years, 4 months ago
@mauiman:
I would guess that the potential number of water taps the new line will provide along Midland will allow MCU assessment of approximately $400K for those taps. It true, MCU then ends up essencially with a free line and no need to incude its cost in the rate base that all MCU customer rates are based on. The deal benefits all MCU customers not Moore County tax payers who have no involvement.
temperanceprudence 2 years, 4 months ago
@ncsnafu1 - I usually find your posts informative, but my opinion on this one is at 180 with yours - where are all these 'new taps on Midland' going to go? That is a doubtful proposition at best that the County will make up the cost of the line. Water service is already along Midland all the way back to the Traffic Circle, so most everyone who wants water, has it already. Thus, it appears this new waterline is a parallel line, perhaps more to improve overall flow ( note references to fire flow reqs in article) or to allow more bulk water purchases from Sou Pines. Not a lot of land to be developed in that corridor, other than if that site next to the Eye clinic decides to finally move forward - but doubtful that would produce $400k in tap fees by itself. On the other side of the circle pretty much developed out, so no new fees between that side of the circle and Memorial Dr either....at current County tap fee rates that would require many a tap to total out $400k...and if the main was needed to remove a bottleneck in order for the County to buy more water for Pinehurst or 7 Lakes, then it seems like the County stuck it to an outstanding business/employer (clinic) in this area instead of having the system absorb the cost as should be done as part of a proper Capital Improvements plan and merely getting some reasonable cap recovery or acreage fee for the expansion from the clinic to offset the clinic's incremental increase in demand.
@CSmithson - can you provide more background on the original post re: County refusing to allow the eye clinic to tie onto Sou Pines water? What specifically was done to block or otherwise impede the eye clinic?
CSmithson 2 years, 4 months ago
@ncsnafu Doug, I did acknowledge the expansion as "needed." I also pointed out that the customers who are not Carolina Eye benefitted by the extra $316K in the pot that they won't have to cover.
Regarding any contracts, all I know of are the existing service area boundary agreements between different parties. Clearly, Carolina Eye is an existing customer of MCPU, but they are literally "at the end of the line" and very close to SP lines with the adequate flows needed for fire protection.
I believe it was Carolina Eye who asked Southern Pines about hooking up to SP lines. Basically, SP said that was fine if MCPU was OK with it. MCPU said "no." I believe they did this for two reasons:
First, they seem to be afraid of losing or missing out on even one customer despite the fact that revenue impact would be negligible and it could make a lot more sense in some cases to allow another system to serve a customer.
Second, the McGill study does recommend upsizing the line in question in order to allow for more water flow from SP to the Pinehurst system. By not allowing the the Carolina Eye facility (and whatever future commercial development goes on next door) to hook up to the already-adequate SP lines, MCPU got a lot of money towards the project. That's why I said ratepayers, except for Carolina Eye, "won" when MCPU wouldn't let Carolina Eye hook up to nearby SP lines rather than having to help pay for 1.5 miles or so of new lines all the way to the hospital.
How one feels about the facts will depend on their prespective. Among these might be:
-If one is part of the "let business do aboslutely whatever they want because we need the jobs and tax revenue" crowd, one might be appalled that MCPU didn't allow Carolina Eye to save significant money by running a few hundred feet of pipe to SP lines instead of 1.5 miles to the hospital. After all, they're still bringing millions in tax value and 15 or more jobs.
-If one believes more in a creative, problem solving government that aims to find new ways to benefit muiltiple parties, they might applaud this as providing Carolina Eye with needed fire protection capacity while also improving the Pinehurst water system at the same time. Clearly, the $166K was not a deal killer for the project, so the public has seemingly benefitted to a greater degree than if the only interest was in saving the business some money.
ncsnafu1 2 years, 4 months ago
@temperanceprudence:
There are two significant items I didn't reference in my initial posting that support my belief that if all factors are evaluated that MCU and its existing customers benefit with the cost sharing arrangement proposed.
The first item is the fact that the line was going to be needed for the development of the area surrounding the clinic that was to be named Midland Green. This need continues today and it was this area that will need the taps I initially referenced. I readily admit that this project is currently stalled; however, that does not eliminate it's need for water not currently available.
The second item I didn't reference but considered when I stated that the deal was basically good for all parties was the fact that the new line should correct a LONG standing problem wrt the distribution of water within Pinehurst Trace. The current problem, as I understand it, is that the current PH Trace distribution network does not allow for a continual circulation of water within the area which is not desirable. This issue would have been corrected with Midland Green; however, given its status, the Eye Clinic project now corrects the problem.
I maintain that it was financially proper to allocate project costs as agreed and that MCU was correct in sharing the expense. Time will tell if MCU is able to assess the Midland Green project some portion, if not all, of the $400K I believe they are planning to do so.
ncsnafu1 2 years, 4 months ago
@CSmithson:
Chris, good response which I basically agree with although I would add that what MCU did, wrt its customer base, seems to me to benefit the majority of that base at negligible cost. Correcting the Midland Road bottleneck is by itself, a long needed project, benefits PH as well as Seven Lakes. It's a shame that the recent MCU project on Rt. 73 that provided water to the new course wasn't written about as much as this issue was. If it had been, far more outrage would have been voiced. See you 18th.
SoPinesNo1 2 years, 4 months ago
Why would there be outrage about the Hwy 73 project? It was funded with Grant funds and by the developer. Any customers that are added should be East Moore Water District customers. I'm not sure that they are, but they should be, versus MPU customers.
ladylane 2 years, 4 months ago
15 JOBS I hope they won't be as hard to obtain as in the past I've applied there several times with experience and education never called I hope someone is blessed to get one of the much needed jobs.