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Home My WebLink AboutZ-8165-A-2 MapI iA - Cf,,VTf,? Z5--t-r/o/v ao 7- r- ", R- 13 -.41 .. IHFMMMF-W=�� irr m, 0. 6�N--R4L A/07'-= Z-1/7C3 .9.-9Z7'0 6-C PA R Arkansas Democrat ° lOazette • FRIDAY, AUGUST 15, 2008.5B OUR TOWN HL notebook BY JA E SANDLIN ARKANSAS DEMOCRAT -GAZETTE.. Candidate filings for fall trickling in There hasn't been a rush of candidates to' file for election to North -Little Rock city goverri- ment positions, despite several potential candidate's having an- nounced they would seek of- fice. The November general elec= tion will include races for mayor; four aldermen's positions, city attorney and city clerk/collector in North Little Rock: - Filing of petitions at the Pu- laski County clerk's office -began Aug. 6 and ends at noon Aug. 26: Only one. candidate has filed since five turned is petitions on the first day. Steve Baxter, who previously posted. campaign ma- terial online, filed Thursday for Ward 3 alderrnan,:a position held by John Parker. Parker was one of four incum- bents and one challenger who filed -Aug: 6. Others were Mayor Patrick Hays, Ward 4 Aldearian Charlie Hight, City Clerk -Diane Whitbey and Beth White; who will bid to unseat alderman Neil Bryant in Ward 1: . Bryant has said he will seek re-election but hasn't filed. Ward 2 Alderman Olen Thomas isn't seeking reelection after 28 years on the council, leaving that race open. . Both Walter "Bubba" Lloyd and Michelle McLelland have issued statements saying they would challenge Hays, who is running for a sixth term as mayor: Sam Baggett -and Jim Ard also have said publicly that they would challenge Parker in Ward 3. The Northlittle Rock City Clerk's_office has a list of 14 potential candidates who have picked up election petitions, but forms are also' available else- where. Petitions aren't a valid indication of whether that per- son will actually seek office. - Annexation plan "�'o� L�E. ��a t-l-,"af.-fic as is, say foes of Deltic plan BY AMYJO BROWN ARKANSAS-DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE . A Deltic. Timber Corp. plan to develop 94 acres in west Little Rock drew criticism Thursday from neighboring property own- ers who said their streets can't bear any more traffic. About 75.people turned out fQr a meeting in west Little Rock with representatives of the El Dorado company. The land Deltic owns is on the east side of Rahling Road, south of Pebble Beach Drive, and the company is asking the city to irezone it so-that'it can be devel- oped into a mix of offices, shops and apartments, The"property is zoned now for single-family homes.. - At the meeting, property owners told Deltic's two repro:- sentatives that. they bought their homes in the that. Beach Es- tates subdivision and in the Chenal Ridge neighborhoods be- cause of the low density planned around .them. They also said traffic clogs their neighborhoods on streets that were never intended to serve as major.thoroughfares and that more development in the area would worsen an al- ready bad problem.. "'Phis has a direct effect on the bottom line.of selling my Nome," said Kim Meldrutn, who lives on Lorian Drive, near Pebble Beach Drive, one of the streets neigh= bors say is a problem. . Homes in that area of west Little Rock are near Fulbright Elementary School,' one of the Little Rock School District's more popular schools, and cost from $90 to $105 per square foot, said Eleanor Burress, a real estate agent with Crye-teike, before the meeting. Burress lives. in the Pebble Beach Park -subdivision and opposes Deltic's plan. "1'm very concerned," she said. "Traffic count is a huge, factor when people are buying homes, and homes in that area are primarily marketed to fami- lies with young children." Bill Spivey, a Deltic attorncy, said the land is one of the last pieces of the large tracts Deltic has to develop in the area and that the rezoning is intended to mix well with the existing neigh- borhoods. Adding neighborhood retail to the area, as well as office buildings, could lessen traffic, he argued, malting more convenient the services the residents of the neighborhoods need. - As for the apartments, "multi- family is more valuable property than single family," he said. Deltic, a publicly traded tim- ber and real. estate company, typically sells its land to devel- opers and then, in some cases, brokers:the sale• or lease of the developed land. Dana Carney, Little Rock's zoning; and subdivision manag- er, said his staff has not yet done an analysis of Deltic's proposal, NL p to lamr hos site del Plan -to sell property, raze building to go to City Councit BY JAKE SANDLIN ARKANSAS DEMOCRAT GAZETTE 4i} An agreement to'scll the for- ;5 mer Baptist Meniorial Hospital to SC£Nf } l 'S'!� _ R. a partnership in. Little Racic•will be. presented to the North Little Rock 1 , Roo I _ City Council at its Aug, 25 meeting,, �`!'� � ,] T� p a city official said. - The city owns the abandoned,, -_ •FORT' 46-ye� ar-old building and its 46. `R.Uurs 'Former site of acres of surrounding land atop an overlook at 1 Pershing Circle. firvart+iety Baptist Memorial American Diamond, a ited Par limi� �? Hospital liability corporation led by Rus- sell Huckaby to Little Rock, will buy the property and building for Arkansas ``��! ,::Y �mm ace id Joe Smith, who nego 5 �, Rover, /11, l �� N R 1 ated the transaction. Arkansas Democrat -Gazette -The developers would then raze the six -story building with- in 18 months and redevelop the property, Snuth said The city had two groups it was receiving offers from in the past iwo months, he added. "We've agreed on the price, . agreed on what they will do, agreed on the performance bond," . Smith said. "We're ready to pres- ent it to the council." asbestos removal from the build- ing, built-in 1962, was estimated at $1.5 million later that same year, Smith said. • ` ' "We feel like the -price of $200,000, plus them fearing it down, is probably a pretty fair price," Smith said. The ,property would need to be rezoned for any development, though a city agreement with Bap - there'" "I think we would feel comfort- able with residential or a dense residential use;' Hays said. 'My. major concern is,that the city ob- vi6usly have the say-so. in what goes there!' The land could be developed into a.mixed-use residential prop- erty or a corporate campus for a business interest, Smith said, but no plans have been presented. The hospital closed yin No- vember 1999 when Baptist Health Medical Center -North Little Rock opened its complex on Springhill Drive off Interstate 40.- The city built the hospital from a 1957 bond issue approved by city voters and leased it to the Baptist hospital system. Between April 2001 and April 2006, parts of the 222,106-square- foot building housed several state government offices. Since 2006, the city has had the building's elec- trical and plumbing systems shut down to avoid the then-$30,000 monthly cost for utilities and maintenance. Its most recent use was as a The application was originally to go before the city's planning commission this montli, but the review has been postponed to October. Three Little Rock directors attended .Thursday's meeting:. at -large Directors Joan Adcock and Gene Fortson and Ward 4 Director Brad Cazort, who rep- resents the northwestern part of the city.. Adcock said after the meeting that she was happy with the back and forth between Deltic and the residents of the neighborhoods. "I think this is how the process is supposed to work;" Adcock Spivey told the residents that more meetings would lie field on the proposal and that he would take suggestions back to Deltic for more parks and trails in the area. -He said the rezon- ing application submitted to the city would be revised, but he couldn't guarantee it would address the concerns the resi- dents have. He said -none of the property is under contract, and there are no immediate plans to build. "We don't have people lined up to buy this' property;' Spivey said. 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