Tellico Durhamtown...it gone

If they weren't making more laws, wtf else would they do?
You really can't 'own' land, can't pick it up and take with you, can't do whatever you like with it, so we all stfu and keep paying taxes....

It's probably going to take anarchy
 
@Ron thank you for referring to Smokey Bear instead of Smokey "the" Bear. Big pet peeve of mine...
 
"DEMLR has agreed to let the land owner continue to cut his timber until Sept 30 then must move out only if we stop the riding on the property on sept 8 if not fines begin immediately only Politicians with more power than us can apply pressure to get DEMLR to work with us....

$700/ linear ft for a 20 ft pipe or a rock stream or drainage run off
this is for the permit only not included is the construction to their specifications. Some areas it is impossible to to get crushed stone up that high... this is their way of taking the blame away from them by making it impossible to meet their request and demands so we stop using the property for any type of recreation.... ..."


Anyone know what that is about?
 
As much as I hate loosing a place to wheel and govt control over our lives and what we do and having some environmental work background, this sounds more like pushing the blame all on the govt rather than the owner and his responsibility to go through the right processes (regardless how ludicrous) to make it happen.

DENR and other related agencies are not ones to screw around and definitely not ones where you want to ask for forgiveness later. To get what you need, it's best to make sure they know the expectations and get the required permits. There are engineering firms that are very familiar with the regulations and processes and can help unknowing owners that have ideas but no idea how to implement.
 
I can't comment here publicly but ^^ he is dead on.
Knowing the characters involved (from both sides) personally there is blame to go around here.

But in short there are very few places as backward/corrupt as rural GA.
When you are an aristocrat in that environment, rules don't apply. When you leave you neighborhood you better adapt. Otherwise you are just high and mighty ordering another man's dog around...
 
Just posted

From Mike McCommons:

First, I want to thank every one of you for supporting the project I began. I did not do this because I had to, but because I fell in love with the property, the area, and the people. I have enjoyed meeting many of the guests and my time on this mountain as well. It is unfortunate that it came to this, but I wanted to give a brief explanation of what has happened over the past two years.

A former friend, Dan Northington, from my area invited me here along with Mark Rogers from the television show “Moonshiners.” I fell in love with the property and was introduced to the land owned by Tom Thrash. Tom wanted to see the property maintained and utilized for recreation and the enjoyment of others. With all my experience from Durhamtown in Georgia, I saw a way to make this happen and enjoy it myself. Dan Northington wanted to capitalize off of my connections to sell real estate and make large profits from the land he had bought during the recession from struggling land owners. My “connections” were not interested in his land, they only wanted to come and enjoy Durhamtown Tellico. He became jealous and began an attack on me by calling the different government organizations claiming false accusations. Thus, they began their investigations. I have met all of their requests over the past 8 months and was ready to move forward with more marketing for Durhamtown Tellico. He also brokered some timber sales below Tellico and the loggers created a massive amount of soil disturbances and muddied the Little Snowbird stream. Several other timber sales created even more sediments over the past 4 months causing a lot more problems. Dan rallied all of his friends with property downstream (mostly Floridians with vacations houses) to generate excessive calls to the different government agencies. This relaunched a new investigation with one of them connected to one of the agencies. Dan and his rally group continued to point their fingers at Durhamtown Tellico visitors as the source of all the sediments, not the logging jobs of over 300 acres or raw soils. I fought for 3 months proving where the problem was coming from --- not the riding but negligent logging practices. Two of the government agencies agreed with me and we established a simple compromise and Durhamtown Tellico remained open. However, The North Carolina Department of Environment and Natural Resources continued the attack by claiming that the logging on Tom Thrash’s property was solely for the purpose of building ATV trails. This put the property into a commercial category with extreme demands. Just permitting the water to cross the trail or road for runoff or a seasonal wet stream cost averages $14,000 per permit. With over 20 crossings, the cost would exceed $250,000 and that is not including building them to their specs. Also, it would need a certified land disturbance permit for the entire 3000 acres, which would cost over $150,000. This is all because I would not buy their expensive land and I removed many of the 18 who were part of Dan’s rally group on Little Snowbird from my property when they were trespassing. Some became aggressive when I asked them to leave or pay to ride on my property. A lot of this has also come down on the loggers as well and he began confronting the 18 land owners along Little Snowbird and they commented, “we are sorry we just wanted to run Mike away from the property so we could have it back to trespass on.” The government agencies were prepared to begin to levy massive fines if we did not stop the riding. Therefore, we had to agree; however, we hope they will see once the riding stops the sediment will still continue to come from the logging sites.

We have contacted our legislators to help with this, and other political parties have also asked for information. Everyone is in favor of Durhamtown Tellico as an economy booster and a place for family fun. We do not plan to lie down and walk away so easily, but this will take time.

Dan Northington and his fellow followers are the reason for this as they have been spreading false accusations for over 12 months. If you would like to discuss this with him or purchase some of his land, his number is (706) 318-1509.

Thanks for your support,
Mike
Click to expand...
 
Meh. Could be truth, part truth, but maybe not.

There are a lot of permits that relate to clearing and stream crossing if they are considered jurisdictional waters of the state. The USACOE must sign off on your plans then DWR of the NCDENR will usually fall right in line with the Corps. For logging, there is a NPDES national permit that is there but you must follow guidelines. For continued/permanent operations, a specific permit is typically required. Whichever permit you use (national or project specific) E&SC plans must be developed and approved prior to use and construction or you face a NOV and typically fines.

Trying to do all this regulatory hoop-jumping after the fact is nearly impossible and very expensive. Given this and what has been posted, I stand by my original opinion previously posted.
 
Goes to show.
1. No matter where you live and how much property you own, you still got neighbors to contend to.
2. You can only get away with what your neighbor's allow you to. Cool neighbors = good night sleeps.
3. NCDENR = BIOTCHES!!!!

Lessons learned for the process:
1. Get to know your adjoining neighbors first. Present to them what you are going to do in person and try to work out any complaints. TAKE GOOD NOTES!
2. Go to the town with a concrete plan and schedule a board meeting.
3. Follow up with the board meetings and neighbor discussions / complaints with the best lawyer you can find.
4. Get approval from your town and NCDENR with your concrete plan after solutions to all the complaints are met.
5. Follow your plan as close as possible for the duration of the business.
6. Continued professional private water monitoring is pretty cheap insurance to be used as a weapon against the real culprits.
7. NCDENR = BIOTCHES!!!!

And the gimme's:
1. Plan to only disturb streams when you absolutely have to. $14,000 isn't chunk change.
2. Follow the process to the end and get all approvals and permits required before starting early and going a stray.
3. Permits, procedures and "red tape" is only going to get more stringent and more expensive as time goes on.
4. People who's work involves Civil Engineering firms in NC are only going to have longer work hours, less hair from pulling it out and less time to wrench and wheel as time goes on...
5. NCDENR = BIOTCHES!!!!

I'm working on Wetland/ Stream/ Buffer Impact Maps for 2 sites in Raleigh area now with a 3'rd on the list. We're finding it's alot cheaper for one of our clients to pay for 28 LF of 36" reinforced concrete pipe and install 2 drop inlets to pick up a pocket of runoff than it is to disturb an additional 17 square feet of outer 20' Zone 2 Buffer to ditch it in.

The towns have absolutely no say-so after water reaches a buffer / unbuffered stream or wetland. It's entirely governed by the BIOTCHES. They can have additional buffers beyond the buffers but that's the extent. The town is mainly just where you get the approval for operation and make arrangements to please the neighbors. Most the time we just have to offer a bigger buffer just around the complaining neighbor and plant more trees. But once that is approved, you get approval for all the impacts from DENR.

NCDENR is broke. Pat McCrory slapped them on the wrist this year pretty hard. They had to lay off 1/3'rd their work force. They are only after money...

BIOTCHES!!!!

:beer::beer::beer::beer:
 
I hope it gets straitened out. It's not like other businesses haven't gotten away with worse practices and had a blind eye turned to them by the government, etc. I could spill some examples that would surely ruffle some feathers.
 
rockcity said:
They can be if rules and regulations are not followed
Click to expand...

This is so true actually. The only time we've been denied is when they see a better way. It boils down to money to get something approved.

And I guess Corps of Engineers have their say-so as well? Have no idea who is over what but it just states "and/or".

Thing is though, most of this could have most likely been avoided and this place could possibly have been still in business.
 
Here is what I know.
Mike has more former friends than current friends.
 
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