New Hanover Looks to Future Growth, Future Needs

New Hanover officials spent their meeting Monday looking at development plans and planning ahead for the future of the township and its residents' needs.

As New Hanover Township officials contemplate the future, which includes as many as 37 housing developments and as many as 5,000 more residents, they decided they need to devote at least one entire meeting (and probably more) to preparing for the future.

Fortunately, they are in a good position to do so.

Its been more than 10 years since they raised property taxes and yet, there is a surplus of nearly 58 percent of the total budget available, according to Township Manager Jamie Gwynn.

"Either we lower taxes or use this money to prepare for the future," Gwynn told the supervisors.

The township, particularly the 12-officer police department, is outgrowing the space in its building on Route 663 and Monday night, the supervisors explored three options ranging in price from $3.8 to $5 million.

Some of those options include using the township's recreation center on Hoffmansville Road, others include renovating and/or building new structures at the current location.

Most of the supervisors favored keeping the township "campus" -- public works, police and administration -- together in a single location. Doubts were also raised about the Hoffmansville Road location being located further away from the southern part of the township where most of the new residents will live.

No decisions were made and an assessment of the current building, which is 40 years and and has a very leaky flat roof, will need to be undertaken before an informed decision can be made, they said.

The supervisors also got more informed about how best to preserve the open space that remains in the fast-developing township.

Gwynn used large maps to outline where the current developments in the pipeline are located, where the major open space parcels are located and suggested -- which the supervisors seemed to support -- the need for the creation of an open space committee.

The township has an earned income tax dedicated to preserving open space which now has $1.3 million. At the current rate, it will be $3.2 million by 2023 unless the township starts spending it on preserving open space.

The best way to stretch those dollars, said Peter Williamson, from Natural Lands, is to leverage conservation easements, which are cheaper than outright buying, and will also allow the leveraging ot state grants.

Here are the Tweets from the meeting: