Washington Board Rejects Love’s
By Debra McCown/Bristol Herald Courier
A large crowd attends the meeting of the Washington County Board of Supervisors in Abingdon on Tuesday.
ABINGDON, Va. – The crowd broke into applause Tuesday when the Washington County Board of Supervisors voted 4-3 to turn down a Love’s truck stop proposed for Exit 24.
Board Chairman Kenneth Reynolds turned the gavel over to Vice-Chairman Jack McCrady so he could make the motion that killed the controversial project; in June he voted against the same motion.
“At that point [in June] I was still learning and still listening, and I did right up to tonight, really,” Reynolds said. “I got a lot of calls today.”
Reynolds, McCrady, Dulcie Mumpower and Tom Taylor voted to deny the re-zoning and special exception permit needed for the truck stop; Odell Owens, Phil McCall and Paul Price voted to grant them.
The controversial project, on which Love’s has spent several years and a considerable sum, would have placed a truck stop at Exit 24, about 1,000 feet from Meadowview Elementary School.
The project has divided the community, pitting neighbor against neighbor over the need for jobs, concerns about traffic and air quality, and competing development priorities.
Reynolds, whose vote ultimately blocked the project, said he didn’t really change his mind and there was no one specific thing that led to his decision; it was based on his overall evaluation of the information.
“I made this motion because we just have so many unknowns that we haven’t been able to address,” Reynolds said during the meeting. “We have unknowns expressed by so many people.”
Rick Shuffield, spokesman for Love’s Travel Centers, said the vote came as a surprise.
Asked whether he’d consider a different Washington County location, and whether he would sue the county over Tuesday’s decision, he said: “We’re just going to explore our options at this point in time.”
Meadowview residents who favored the project had no comment; opponents called it a victory for the children of Meadowview.
“I hope the Board of Supervisors can sleep well tonight because they did the right thing,” said Celeste Gaia, one of the most outspoken project opponents.
“I’d prefer the truck stop go in simply because there are too many people in this county that need jobs,” said Joe Straten, who favored the project and is running for McCrady’s seat on the board.
As board members spoke their piece during the meeting about the meaning of their votes, their discussion was peppered with personal comments.
“They have done everything we’ve asked them to do, and … I don’t think we have a right to deny this permit,” Price said of Love’s. “What kind of message are we fixing to send to people who want to bring business to this county when we’ve got a business that never came with their hand out asking for a penny to create jobs?”
Mumpower said there is no way to know if exhaust from the trucks would float toward the nearby school, but the issued had to be considered.
“The question is, are we willing to sacrifice the health of a child not knowing one way or the other,” she said.
Taylor said the truck stop is “the right use and the wrong location.”
Reynolds and McCrady said the board would likely look more favorably at the project locating at nearby Exit 22, an alternative suggested by opponents many times during the process.
“I wouldn’t be opposed to it,” Reynolds said. “I hope they’ll look at other options [besides Exit 24].” McCrady said he believes the board would “absolutely” be favorable to locating the project at Exit 22.
Now that the decision has been made on Exit 24, Price said, he’s hopeful that Meadowview can heal its divide and move forward.
“I hope after the vote tonight that neighbors can go back to being neighbors,” he said.
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Reader Reactions
surely youre not talking about that sweet old lady and that nice gentleman that lives on HOG FEET CREEK??
Sorry twotooths-
My comment was directed to the peter principle and her sidekick- must be the two most crass, rude, boisterous, crude ignorant people in the state of Virginia.
With them as supporters of the truck stop- no wonder the effort was subterfuged…
Best to you- we needed the jobs.
sorry joe….you got the wrong peter…
Peterbilt, I hope you subtracted your name from that list since you do not live in Meadowview. I don’t consider Hogthief Creek Meadowview proper.
Peterbilt, lost emails addresses, please send me yours again heybill@embarqmail.com
thanks
You better look around average joe…because I had 300 signatures that were (JUST THAT) MEADOWVIEW PEOPLE….that was in favor of the truck stop…sorry to disappoint you…The best is yet to come ...I always heard….
Star Dodger, I understand that there was an additional lane to be built and two traffic light installed, so I believe that there would have been “proper traffic control”. I have seen where a bad wreck on 81 diverted traffic onto U. S. 11 and the truck used Exit 24 to get back on the Interstate. I don’t know of any problems encountered when this happened. Think about the uproar when the shopping center where Roses, Sears and the Super Dollar Saver opened in Abingdon. Everyone was up in arms and didn’t want a entrance on Thompson Drive because of a danger to the students from Abingdon High School, E. B. Stanley Middle School and The Neff Center, That is the road that goes up the hill to Abingdon High School, well they finally let them put an entrance into the parking lot there, well guess what, nothing happened and look at it now, there is a bigger entrance to CVS off Thompson Drive. As for the “fantastic benefits”, you are asking about, if you will read my comments again you will see that I didn’t use the word “fantastic”. I am betting that all of the workplaces down the road in the industrial park where Hapco is doesn’t have “Health Insurance” and 401K plans. The part-time waitress and cashier jobs are all over our country and I am sure someone in Meadowview would like to have one. Now don’t try to tell me that it would not be a benefit to be able to buy a loaf of bread or a gallon of milk without having to drive all the way to Abingdon or Glade. Don’t tell me that it would not have been a benefit for the seniors of Meadowview to have gathered at McD’s to visit and have breakfast together like folks in Bristol, Abingdon and other places. Come down to Abingdon any morning of the week and check out Hardees’s and Burger King, you can’t get into the parking lot. The places are full of old people meeting friends and making new ones. Go up the road to Chilhowie and check out their new Hardees’s.
Commonsense, I don’t appreciate you calling the people of Meadowview, “ignorant Meadowview idiots”, they are far from being ignorant idiots and to whichever one of you making slight remarks about someone’s education, that is low.
I’ll tell you what bugs me about this whole thing is the irresponsible way this thing was handled. Let’s go back a few years ago and think about what has happened. To begin with Meadowview didn’t have a “whole intersection” and neither did Emory. Meadowview had a Southbound Entrance ramp and a Northbound Exit ramp, Emory had just the opposite, several of the local civic leaders, county leaders and state leaders banded together to get the interchanges completed at Meadowview and Emory. The reason being was to attract businesses to both locations. I don’t have figures that would tell how much was spent to make these interchanges attractive to businesses, but I’m betting that it was several million dollars. Now, they have decided that these businesses aren’t wanted at Meadowview and I understand that Emory and Henry owns all the land around the interchange there and nothing will every be built there. Now think about this, if we want to attract businesses that are interested in property near the interstate, then apparently they are expecting customers to come off the interstate to patronize their business. Last time I looked there were only cars, trucks and buses using the interstate and these create traffic, did no one think about this when we completed the interchanges?
Oh, the Truck Stop wasn’t “the prettiest girl at the dance”, but Meadowview doesn’t have any gal to dance with and it would have been a start. A little bit of something is worth a lot more than a whole lot of nothing.
Peterbilt, where is the majority of Meadowview residents who support the truckstop? Your immediate friends do not consist of all the people who live in Meadowview. I am from Meadowview and the majority of Meadowview people I talked to were against it.
common….I dont remember saying anything about Mr. Hopps payng off the board as you suggested….Didnt even occur to me until you mentioned it…About Mr. Hopps that is….
Actually, PB4me and USmarine both referenced ‘incentives’ under the table.
So, try to read carefully and you’ll see them.
I can only IMAGINE who you’ll be nominating for the Board in the future…
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