Board votes 3-2 to move forward on Beaty Street park

"On Tuesday, March 13, the Davidson Board of Commissioners voted to create a task force to develop 100% of the town-owned land on Beaty Street as a park. The compilation of the task force will be discussed at the March 27 meeting. The Davidson Board of Commissioners directed staff to work on the application process for the task force."

The above comment is from Christina Shaul, Public Information Officer for the Town of Davidson.  It comes after what was at times an unexpectedly raucous Board meeting Tuesday evening where the Davidson Board effectively ended the debate over what will happen with the 19 acres of Town land that has been the epicenter of much swirl and controversy over the past 18 months.

The previous Board's attempt to turn the wooded land off Beaty Street into a mini Birkdale known as The Lumonous project gave rise to the Save Davidson movement.  It sparked protests at Town Hall and led to repeatedly packed monthly Board meetings.  Multiple rounds of staff orchestrated feedback sessions could not make the sale to the public that the Luminous was a good idea.  The controversy eventually was a significant contributor to an election day rout at the polls for those who had pushed the project and other bad decisions.

At Tuesday's Board meeting after hearing again from several residents on the original purpose for the land being purchased for a park, particularly the bulk of it purchased from Venie Clontz, the new Board took a split vote to charge a new task force with deciding what type of park it will be and made the somewhat surprising move of saying 100% of the land will be as a park rather than charging the task force with determining how the land will be used.

The vote was 3-2 with Commissioners David Sitton, Matthew Fort, and Autumn Michael voting "for" the move and Commissioners Campbell and Fuller voting "against".  It should be noted that Campbell and Fuller weren't voting against the idea of the park but more the decision to have the vote last night and the idea of charging the task force with exclusively looking at the land as a park.

While clearly there is much to be decided before any final disposition of the land is determined, the decision last night takes some of the uncertainty about what will happen with this property out of the equation. Even coming as a split decision, this was a decisive move by the new Board.  It is sure to engender some consternation from the handful of people who supported the failed Luminous project, but it is hopefully a move that begins to close the book on this controversy.