Russell Ledbetter | .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) | Jan. 12, 2008

Beginning his third term in office, Troutman Mayor Elbert Richardson points to the city’s No. 1 goal: “to encourage development of the (town’s) non-residential tax base.”

With the Troutman Board of Aldermen approving annexations and the rezoning of residential land tracts for commercial development at a steady pace, Troutman is moving with hope away from being a town “almost entirely dependent” on residential taxation for survival, Richardson said.

“You have to grow or your town dies,” Mayor Pro Tem Mike Spath said.

“Troutman has always had a large number of starter homes,” Richardson, an 18-year Troutman resident said. “But that is changing now. We’re getting more second- and third-tier levels being built here.”

Troutman moved through a 20-year water and sewer development plan in about five years, Richardson added, but it took the sale of a nearly $300,000 home at end of last year to help the city recoup 2007 utilities costs. Thus plans for future commercial development in Troutman and specifically along Interstate 77 at Exit 42 loom large.

Describing a large water wheel delivering water and sewer that “basically encircles the town,” with growth continuing to expand north from Charlotte expanding into Mooresville, “we’re trying to do our part and not overburden the county or school systems,” Richardson said.

Spath, retired from a 25-year career as a firefighter in Charlotte, first retired to a home on Lake Norman where it became clear to him that poor planning and zoning had led to “horrendous traffic and over-development.”

Spath and his wife moved to Troutman two-and-a-half years ago.

“That’s why I ran for the board,” Spath said. “I thought I might have some say in how things are done in this particular area. Troutman is a popular area for development and I want it done right.”

Troutman currently provides water and sewer from both their own and Statesville wells and have also added increased water capacity from Newton, Richardson said. By contract, Troutman can send up to 455,000 gallons of waste water a day to treatment facilities in Statesville. An agreement with Mooresville will expand capacity an additional 5 million gallons a day.

“We’re nowhere near that close to those figures, but growth continues to come this way, ” Richardson said.

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