By Carol Cole

Transcript Staff Writer

Several experts weighed in on the effects the proposed 53-acre Sutton Creek Addition could have on the adjacent Sutton Urban Wilderness Park to the Greenbelt Commission Monday.

The developers’ representative also presented their plan and said they’d work to mitigate any adverse effects of the development, which is south of Rock Creek Road, between the IOOF Cemetery and Sutton Urban Wilderness Park.

Greenbelt Commission members pressed ahead on Phase II of its study despite recent news that the property appears to have defaulted to a R-1 or single family residential zoning designation after it was found the property may not have had zoning assigned after it was annexed by the city in 1961.

“We feel like the Greenbelt Commission was given a directive by the city council and we will proceed with that until directed differently,” said Diane Fitzsimmons, commission chair.

The commission is focusing on four factors determined from public input. Those include: maintaining the quality of the visitors’ experience at SUWP, maintaining the quality of the habitat and wildlife population, the condition of the riparian zone and maintaining open space in the subject tract.

Commission member Zev Trachtenberg, chairing the subcommittee working on the issue, said the efforts are modeled on a scientific inquiry method.

“The relevant facts we think are much the same,” he said, of the commission’s considerations if the zoning was in question.

The developers’ attorney Harold Heiple said his clients did not want to harm Sutton Wilderness in developing the property. But he said development the property was within the owners’ rights and they would likely be withdrawing their application for a Planned Unit Development and modifying it for the single family residential zoning, which requires 6,000 square feet minimum per lot.

“(The developers) want to do anything to lessen its impact,” Heiple said, with the exception of not developing the tract. “That’s not an option for us.”

Heiple said its a misconception that pesticides and herbicides would run into the creek.

“The lake in Sutton Urban Wilderness is upstream,” he said.

Heiple said the property owners had conveyed offers for the city to consider buying the property, including one for acquisition of all property and another for the northeast 10 acres. He said there had been no formal response from the city except from certain councilmembers who indicated the price was too high.

“We’ve gone about as far as we can,” he said.