Pittsboro recently adopted an agreement that could help transform its downtown area.
The interlocal agreement with Chatham County, which Pittsboro’s Board of Commissioners unanimously adopted at a meeting on May 12, allows the two local governments to collaboratively decide the future of county and town-owned properties along and near West Street.
The decision stems from the county centralizing its offices at a new campus location along Renaissance Drive, leaving 20 parcels in town for new businesses, residential spaces, and in-town affordable housing.
Pittsboro’s motion follows Chatham County’s, which signed the agreement in April, The town and county also jointly selected Bolton and Menk as the project’s consultant to carry out pre-development analysis and public engagement opportunities.
Speaking on behalf of the consultant team, planner Grant Meacci described the agreement as a transformative opportunity for the town.
“There’s no more important place than the center of your downtown,” Meacci said. “You think about the character of what Pittsboro is, and having lived in North Carolina for 30 plus years, it’s a quintessential main street area. But if you look at the scale of those shaded properties, that’s around four city blocks worth of land. So the transformation of those very much are intertwined with the character and the future of what your downtown is, so we’re happy to be involved in that.”
Meacci said the next three phases of pre-development will take place over the next eight months, including exploring potential uses for the properties, conducting site and building feasibility, and selecting developers for the upcoming projects.
County and town-owned parcels located along and near Pittsboro’s West Street. (Photo via Bolton and Menk.)
And as the town physically expands with the annexation of Reeves Farm and the upcoming Asteria development, Pittsboro Mayor Kyle Shipp told 97.9 The Hill how the board wants to ensure the downtown area can support that growth and continue to be the vital heart of town.
“And I think it’s pretty much everybody — I hear it often in the downtown community — that we feel it’s important that we increase the vibrancy of downtown to remain competitive as these bright shiny brand new properties with lower rents go up all around us,” Shipp also said at the May meeting.
The mayor stated how the agreement does not mean anything specific will happen with the properties, but he said the town can now look at them with a broader view to determine what is best. And with about four city blocks downtown potentially available for development, he said there is an opportunity to set Pittsboro up for a great future.
A key discussion point from the board centered on when the town might transfer properties from public to private ownership. On behalf of the consultant team, Jeff Bandini said different ownership strategies will depend on what the town wants to accomplish with each parcel. For example, he said the town might not want to maintain a liability for a property it has no long-term interest in keeping, while also explaining why it might be beneficial to hold onto them.
“You’ve got valuable property in downtown, which for the next 30 years may be its best use is a retailer multifamily, but that property once it’s gone is gone,” Bandini said. “So I’m always an advocate for — or at least to have a discussion about — the public keeping that property because in 100 years it may be different and you may need that property back, and it’ll be much harder to get it back later than it would be just to keep it and lease it out to begin with.”
Bandini also advised the board to keep properties it plans to make affordable, as Town Manager Jonathan Franklin said Pittsboro wants to explore affordable housing projects in the West Street parcels. But Bandini emphasized how Bolton and Menk will help the town create a long-term plan for the properties as the initiative progresses.
To read Pittsboro’s Interlocal Agreement with Chatham County, click here.
To view the full Board of Commissioners meeting, click here.
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