Hillsborough Street rezoning vote delayed

RALEIGH -- RALEIGH - The City Council delayed voting today on whether to rezone eight lots south of Hillsborough Street from industrial to residential.

The property owners had opposed the rezoning, and the council agreed today to try and find a compromise before its next meeting on Jan. 6.

Last week the eight properties were unexpectedly added to a larger request for rezoning in the area. The properties had been excluded from an earlier version that was approved by the city's Planning Commission.

A handful of residents who live on Stanhope Avenue filed the original petition for rezoning. They are seeking to change the area's zoning from industrial to residential in order to protect their neighborhood from encroaching development.

In recent months the City Council approved the construction of a private, 10-story dormitory and a parking deck for N.C. State University students on land next to the neighborhood.

The city's Comprehensive Planning Committee, which includes council members Mary-Ann Baldwin, Nancy McFarlane and Russ Stephenson, decided to add the eight properties to the area being considered for rezoning.

But at today’s meeting Stephenson said he believes the city and the property owners can agree on some other zoning that will satisfy both surrounding residents and the property owners themselves. “I do think there’s an opportunity to find an alternative, compromise, zoning,” he said.

Most of the property owners who asked not to be included in the rezoning own the lots closest to Hillsborough Street. V.G. Murray, whose 92-year-old mother owns two of the lots, said the properties should be left alone or given more flexible zoning so that they can more easily be included in future redevelopment projects.

"I do not want to make it more difficult for future redevelopment to occur along Hillsborough Street," he said.