By Mark Wineka
mwineka@salisburypost.com
As president of Good Neighbors of Rowan County, Mark Davis led a successful fight last year against one of Salisbury’s biggest annexation attempts ever.
But instead of dissolving the organization that represented some eight different subdivisions, Davis and other leaders of the Good Neighbors group became more active.
“Our biggest lesson learned was stay organized,” Davis said.
Without a wholesale change in the state’s law on involuntary annexation, Davis expects the city of Salisbury to try and annex the residential N.C. 150 corridor again.
“You really got to pay attention to what the city is doing,” Davis says. “Me, personally, I never thought anything like that could happen.”
Salisbury city officials emphasize that, for now, they don’t have any annexation plans in the works after backing away in 2008 from an annexation that would have added 1,699 people and more than 2,000 acres.
It would have been the city’s second biggest involuntary annexation ó second only to one in March 1975 that took in some southeastern suburbs, including the Morlan Park area.
Joe Morris, planning and community development manager for the city, says the city is waiting with others to see how the state’s 50-year annexation law might change in the General Assembly.
“Frankly, it’s not something we talk about,” Mayor Susan Kluttz adds of any new annexation proposal. “I still think it’s important for cities to have that option. … But right now we’re in a holding pattern.”
Kluttz says she won’t mind if the rules for annexation change, as long as they are consistent for all cities.
“We’ve done nothing in Salisbury but follow the state law,” City Manager David Treme says.
As with most N.C. cities, Salisbury has relied on annexations ó voluntary and involuntary ó to grow.
From 2000 to 2007, Salisbury grew in population from 26,462 to 31,023 ó an addition of 4,561 people.
Of that population growth, 92 percent, or 4,203 people, were added through annexations, most of them involuntary.
“We actually have not been aggressive annexers,” Treme says. “I would say we’ve been moderate compared to (other cities).”
Some of the numbers bear him out.
Since 1980, Salisbury’s population has increased from 22,677 to 31,023. Its land area over those same 29 years has gone from 13.35 square miles to 21.87 square miles.
In the same time frame, Concord’s population grew from 16,942 to 71,071 and its land size from 8 to 58.4 square miles.
Similar explosions of growth occurred in Mooresville and Hunters-ville, while both Kannapolis and Statesville outpaced Salisbury, though more moderately. Annexation played a big role, of course.
(See the accompanying chart comparing nearby cities’ growth in population and land size.)
Salisbury would be a completely different city today ó virtually an afterthought ó without statutory annexation.
All the development along Jake Alexander Boulevard would be outside the city limits, as would neighborhoods such as Eagle Heights, Meadowbrook, the Country Club, Country Club Hills, Westcliffe, Livingstone College, Rowan Mills, Rolling Hills and Stonybrook.
It’s not that Salisbury’s population has grown dramatically since 1960, but its land size has.
Salisbury’s population in 1960 was 21,297 ó only 10,000 less than today. But the 1960 city limits took in only 6.11 square miles. The city’s footprint is more than three times bigger today at 21.87 square miles.
In recent years, Salisbury actually has been annexing more than nearby jurisdictions.
Only Mooresville has added more people (5,699) through annexations between 2000 and 2007. Concord added 2,576 people in annexations over the same time; Kannapolis, 806; and Statesville, 117.
City officials still defend the N.C. model for annexation as a necessary tool for growth.
Annexation tries to provide urban services to areas meeting urban criteria, they say.
“This particular model has made for a better state and a healthier economy,” Treme says.
He contends the provision for involuntary annexation prevents the decay of inner cities, the duplication of services and the creation of unnecessary tax districts. Strong urban centers become magnets for jobs, and that doesn’t work in areas splintered among many jurisdictions, Treme says.
Most people in suburban areas such as the N.C. 150 corridor would not be living there if they didn’t want to take advantage of city services, Treme says. Is it fair for them to stop a city’s growth because they don’t want to be taxed?
The argument from opponents that involuntary annexation represents taxation without representation doesn’t work for Treme or Kluttz, the mayor.
The “representation” part for citizens comes from their legislators, and that’s who they should go to for a change in the annexation law, Treme says. The taxation-without-representation argument also has failed in the courts in relation to the annexation law, says Doug Paris, assistant to the city manager.
For now, Treme sees the whole question of annexation as a political confrontation. Salisbury has always followed the law and that won’t change, he adds.
“It really has gotten down to the political end of it, and the proper place for the decision to be made is with the state General Assembly and our governor,” Treme says.
Kluttz says she and fellow council members learned a lot from the failed 2008 annexation.
She thinks any future annexation attempt will have to be different. She wants more discussion among council members, and says the city shouldn’t start an annexation again under the assumption that everyone is aware of its growth plan.
Salisbury 2000 and Salisbury 2020 plans, which identified areas south and west of the city as places into which Salisbury would have to grow, have been in place since 1989. Officials always made the assumption that people in those areas knew they were in the city’s long-range growth plans and had many years to prepare, Kluttz says.
“I honestly think a lot of those people (in the N.C. 150 area) had no idea,” she adds.
Count Davis, the president of the Good Neighbors organization, as one of those people who was blindsided by the city’s annexation attempt. He and others won’t be unprepared again.
Today the Good Neighbors organization routinely sends members to monitor the meetings of Salisbury City Council and the Rowan County Board of Commissioners.
The residents also became more structured, holding monthly meetings, writing bylaws for their organization, establishing officers and becoming members of other anti-annexation coalitions.
Even if Davis steps down from the board, a procedure exists to replace him and keep things going.
When Salisbury quit its annexation attempt last year, the Good Neighbors’ focus shifted to the state level and joining other groups in lobbying legislators for real changes to the 1959 law.
The Rowan group has participated in rallies, fielded an entry in the Faith Fourth of July Parade, attended numerous legislative meetings in Raleigh and contacted officials across the state to let them know their positions against forced annexation.
Speaking for himself and not Good Neighbors, Davis says he would like annexation opponents to become involved in the next Salisbury election.
“If the city came out here to take us over, I think we could help the city (residents) elect the people we like,” he says.