Megan Pillow | .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) | Dec. 1, 2007

Mooresville’s suspension of sewer permits affected at least one element of the development community quickly on Thursday.

A commercial real estate agent said business “has come to a screeching halt.” Mooresville’s Bob Wessmiller said he had been showing properties to potential buyers, but after Wednesday’s announcement by the Town of Mooresville, those buyers were no longer interested.

On Wednesday, the town suspended the granting of new sewer permits at least until January to allow the town to come up with a plan for allocating the town’s future sewer capacity.

Two weeks ago, town officials told Iredell-Statesville Schools administrators they would not be able to accommodate yet-to-be-built Coddle Creek Elementary in Mooresville with water and sewer lines in time for the school to open next August.

The current 5.2 million gallons per day capacity wastewater treatment plant now uses 2.9 mgd of that capacity, but Town Manager Jamie Justice said almost all of the 5.2 mgd capacity has been allocated and is projected to max out in 2010.

The town’s proposed $143.5 million wastewater treatment plant, however, isn’t expected to come online until 2012.

At a meeting on Nov. 19, CH2M Hill, the Colorado-based firm that is designing the new plant, said the town would likely need a 2 mgd, $10 to $12 million expansion of the current plant as a “stop-gap” measure until the new plant comes online.

Justice said Thursday that the suspension of permits is a “proactive” measure that the town has taken in response to a recent directive from the North Carolina Department of Environmental Resources to plan for the future.

The state, he said, wants towns to consider the impact of an entire development at once on future capacity instead of a phased permitting system which only counts the number of homes in a development receiving sewer service in a given year.

“This is not a stoppage, it’s a pause to figure out how we’re going to move forward,” he said. “What we’re trying to do is manage this capacity to prevent a moratorium.”

The suspension, said Justice, will only affect developers who are far along in the development process, since sewer permits are some of the last permits a developer receives.

The issue will likely come to a head on Monday when developers and area government and economic development officials will attend the Mooresville-South Iredell Economic Development Corporation Developer’s Council meeting.

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