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| From WSOCTV News |
It means putting a hotel over someone's back yard looking at their child's swing set.
It means increased gentrification and pressure on a vulnerable neighborhood.
It means forcing citizens to be pitted against the town they love.
And why is this being done? Of course the answer is money. It is always money.
Immediately after the November 14th lame duck approval by Davidson's outgoing Board, hotel developer Nish Patel was quoted by Bisnow.com on why his firm was interested in Davidson.
Beacon President Nish Patel said his company is focused heavily on hospitality in Davidson in particular, as its high barrier to entry means competitors will have a harder time breaking into the market.
"That makes it more exciting for us because it’s more of a protected investment,” Patel said. “If you go into another market and there’s plenty of land everywhere, and they are pretty loose on the zoning, then we wouldn’t have interest — because that means as soon as we build, somebody else will come in and build something else.”
So, let's be really clear. This hotel has nothing to do with walkability or land use or parking standards or any of the other nonsense the Davidson Planning Department and former Commissioners would have you believe. It has nothing to do with doing what is right for the town or its citizens.
It is about protecting a developer's investment.
Patel goes on to say in the Bisnow piece...
“Davidson is a unique market where there’s multiple demand-generators,” Patel said. “There’s not much competition in that space, which is wonderful for us.”
By "demand generators", the developer means Davidson's corporate citizens: Davidson College, MSC, Sherwin-Williams, Ingersoll Rand, and Lowes. These are the entities where the developer plans to mine his money. In fact, the developer's zoning attorney used many of these institutions in her sales pitch to the Town to gain the project's approval.
Now that it is clear what this hotel means to the community and why the developer wants it so badly, do these corporate citizens stand behind it? Do they stand for hotel guests overlooking swing sets? Do they stand for gentrification? All to put more money in a developer's pocket?
The PR departments of these types of institutions don't like answering these types of questions. They say things like "XYZ Corp does not take a position on local zoning matters." The time for that is over. The developer has used them repeatedly as his reason for this hotel in this location. The public deserves to know if these institutions approve of that and support the outcomes of this project.
Now is the time for Davidson College, MSC, Sherwin-Williams, Ingersoll Rand, and Lowes to answer. Do they support this hotel in this location knowing the consequences of their support? Will they commit to not using the new Hyatt Place if it is built?
Please contact these entities at the below addresses and ask them. Let them know their silence is acceptance and that that is no longer acceptable. Be polite, but let them know you as citizens of the town are watching for their response.
Jay Pfeifer, Media Relations at Davidson College
Paul Mason, Director Corporate Communications at MSC Direct
Misty Zelent, Director External Communications at Ingersoll Rand
Jaclyn Pardini Hartzell, Director of Public Relations Lowes
Mike Conway, Director of Corporate Communications at Sherwin-Williams
japfeifer@davidson.edu
paul.mason@mscdirect.com
jaclyn.pardini@lowes.com
mzelent@irco.com
mike.conway@sherwin.com
Also, as reported earlier, the new Davidson Board of Commissioners is on record in the Town's court filings saying they were "opposed to the decision to approve the application for a conditional amendment to the master plan for a hotel". Citizens should ask the current Board to pass a resolution or take some other concrete step to ensure our local businesses and institutions know this location is not what is good for the town.
The entire Board can be reached at Board@townofdavidson.org.
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