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Commission won't back incorporation

By Sharon McBrayer | The News Herald

Published: July 29, 2009

Morganton - The Joint Legislative Commission on Municipal Incorporations will not recommend incorporation of the village of Lake James.
Jim Powers of Morganton, along with about 18 other opponents of the proposed village, traveled to Raleigh for the commission meeting Wednesday. He said the commission voted 4-2 to send a negative recommendation to the General Assembly.
The commission advises the state legislature on the creation of new towns and cities in North Carolina.
The reason for the negative vote, Powers said, was because the proposed village's components aren't contiguous. The lake's waters split it several places. The most conspicuous example is at the eastern end where a bay separates the SouthPointe and East Shore neighborhoods. Because Huntertown falls between them on land, the two neighborhoods aren't contiguous on land.
Howard Morgan, a proponent of the proposed village, said the commission's negative recommendation won't stop his group.
"We're not totally disappointed," Morgan said. "We're going to move forward."
He said the village's proponents believe the boundaries are contiguous under N.C. law.
State statute 160A-53, which defines "contiguous," says, in part, that the area should either join directly on the boundary or can be separated by a street, right-of-way, railroad, other public service corporation, creek or river .
The law doesn't mention a lake.
Proponents have said they believe the boundaries are contiguous because the lake is an impoundment for a public service, Duke Energy, which manages the lake.
Opponents argued the boundaries aren't contiguous. If that were true, one speaker said at a recent public hearing on the incorporation, the proposed village conceivably could incorporate sections on the lake's north.
Powers said, "Of course our side is very excited" about the joint commission's decision. However, Powers said, he knows proponents of the village will come back in the future to try to incorporate the area.
Morgan is looking ahead to the legislature's beginning action on Senate Bill 538.
State Sen. Jim Jacumin, R-Burke/Caldwell, filed the bill in the Senate in March to incorporate the Village of Lake James. The bill remains in the Senate Finance Committee.
The legislature is not statutorily required to adopt the Joint Commission's recommendation.
Morgan said the village's supporters will prove their case when the legislature considers the bill.
No one knows when that action might happen. The legislature is in the first year of its two-year session and is already running late because of the on-going debate over the current year's state budget. Jacumin's bill possibly might not come out of committee until 2010.