Developer will seek new spot for apartments
Many locals opposed firm’s first choice for complex
Bowing to local opposition, a developer has given up on one Texas-side site for a new apartment complex and will seek a more agreeable spot.
Georgia-based firm The NuRock Cos. last week withdrew requests for city support of the project but still sees opportunity in the Texarkana market and is working to find the right property to build on, said Len Vilicic, a senior development analyst with the company.
“I’m going to be working with city planning and the council to find a site that they would approve, so I can go back there next year and hopefully get a project going,” he said.
NuRock had sought a resolution of support from the City Council to help it get state tax credits for the project. It also withdrew an application to rezone the site—between Interstate 30 and Moore’s Lane, just across I-30 from Spring Lake Park—for multifamily housing.
NuRock’s plan to build 88 apartments there had drawn objections from neighborhood residents who feared the complex would disrupt traffic, decrease property values and raise public safety concerns.
A group of neighbors spoke against the apartments during the City Council’s meeting Feb. 27 and delivered a petition asking the council to reject the project.
Ward 6 Council Member Josh Davis received emails from several of his constituents in the neighborhood requesting that he oppose NuRock.
“The constructions of multi-family residential housing in this area would, I believe, have a negative impact on the value of the professional buildings in the area and greatly increase the traffic volume and street problems,” said one typical email, sent by Troy Lemons.
Vilicic rebutted those objections and more, saying studies have shown multifamily housing raises property values,
NuRock would have helped the city pay for road improvements, and apartment residents would have been thoroughly vetted.
Using the acronym for “not in my backyard,” Vilicic said locals often oppose new development. The solution is better upfront communication than NuRock engaged in here, he said.
“You see that kind of NIMBYism everywhere. A lot of it is getting out in front of it and getting people together, explaining what you’re trying to do and how it benefits the community. We didn’t really get out front there in Texarkana.
“I did talk to some folks … trying to find somebody, some neighborhood association we should have talked to. They said, ‘No, we don’t know of any … .’ And it turns out that there was a country club about half a mile north of our site that we didn’t know about. That’s where the opposition there started.
“Given that location, I don’t know that we would have changed their minds, anyway, but it would have been good for us to at least gotten out in front of them and known beforehand what their feelings were,” Vilicic said.
On Twitter: @RealKarlRichter