Charlotte City Council Members

The Cato Family Farm property located at 11315 Tom Short Rd in south Charlotte near Polo Ridge elementary school is roughly 120-acre open land. Current zoning ordinance for this property is MX-1 (formerly R-3). It has 2 tracts that are devoted to construct only 3 single family homes per acre, total of 331 units.

Developer Childress Klein Properties along with CMS is proposing to change the zoning ordinance to MX-2 to construct 971 units with 682 rental units, 211 townhomes and ONLY 24 single family homes. Also included a school and some businesses. Here is the rezoning petition - RZP-2023-046. It’s an increase of nearly 300% density for this area.

We the united community members from the surrounding neighborhoods request Charlotte City Council to STOP this rezoning and VOTE NO.

The reasons we are against this rezoning are…

• It will extremely over-crowd areas around Tom Short Rd, Ballantyne Commons Parkway and Providence Rd. During peak hours, these roads become parking lots and takes 20 minutes to drive 2 miles. There is no room to widen the Tom Short. These new constructions will cause additional congestions.
• This will put neighborhood schools under immense stress. Schools are already short staffed and have scarcity of well-skilled teachers and drivers. Most of the schools are running out of space and having various classes in trailers. Due to driver shortage, most days school buses are running late. Kids are spending more time on roads at the expense of their family and school time.
• Developer is claiming that 900 units will have less kids than 300 single family homes. Data and fact are NOT supporting that. New multi-family homes in the vicinity of these schools will worsens the situation. The new middle school that CMS is planning to open will be over populated before it opens.
• Developer is also arguing that these new units will make housing affordable. That is not the case. Other apartment complexes (The Links & The Sawyer) in the area charge $2,000+ for two bed-rooms unit, it will make impossible for low-income families to rent it. When did developers start caring about affordability and not their own profits?
• Infrastructure in these areas in NOT equipped to accommodate plethora of new families. The city’s utility infrastructure (Power System, Water and Sewer Systems, and Storm Water Drainage system have all already been overloaded, and adding more apartments in the area will only worsen the situation.
• This will also impact utility workers serving our areas. To accommodate current needs, USPS staff has already been working late in the evenings and on Sundays.

Since we are facing so many challenges, there is absolutely NO need for a new multi-family housing project in the area. We citizens urge city council NOT to change current zoning ordinance and vote NO for this rezoning.

Fellow Citizens…

*** Please help us STOP this rezoning by signing this petition. City council will meet late summer or early fall to vote on this project. Please spread the words to get as many signatures as we can.

*** Let's show-up in council meeting.

*** No need to make any donation to sign this petition. All the funds donated will go to Change.org and not to this effort.