12/21/2025
Meanwhile, the Danville IDA recently loaned $2 million to out of town developers (one of their principals served on a credit union board of directors, couldn’t they get financing elsewhere?) for 200+ apartments spot zoned (not noticed in accordance the City’s own ordinance and contrary to the City’s Comprehensive Plan) on landfill of toxic brownfield industrial debris (from the polluted IDA owned textile mill now the Casino site), spot zoned based a housing study with dubious housing projections written by a bankrupt consultant (for over $10 million for Greensboro and other US projects) and not so much as a courtesy notice to the dozens of local residents who strongly opposed the rezoning from single family homes to high density apartments and a Planning Commission that unprecedentedly “null vote” rejected the development plan, then after improper directives from the City’s Attorney, re-voted to approve (disappeared in written minutes, but not in the video). And, to top it all off, there are one or more well documented bald eagles nests on 1700 W. Main Street protected from Dec. 15 to July 15 from disturbance, where the forest was clear cut and burned (owned by a former Captain of the City’s Fire Department engaged in landscaping the casino). Furthermore, internal documents of city management question the compaction of the fill materials done by casino heavy equipment contractors. And, traffic studies promised, have not been presented to the neighboring community. Conflicts of interests with similar projects need investigation, such as the IDA sale of a elementary school for ONE DOLLAR to the same developer and loans to affiliated short term rental and motel developers, including the sale and lease back of high profile properties including the police station facilities and a rezoning influencer who now operates a casino restaurant. Just try finding the agenda items and minutes on these public agencies web sites, doesn’t it makes you wonder if the placing a notification sign behind a guardrail (not visible and against city code) wasn’t intentional? Well connected people told us “it was a done deal” before the zoning change letters were hardly opened. Was the fix already in for the IDA/casino development all the way up to the top? Did that include the judicial level that dismissed our lawsuit, before evidence could be presented of the hundreds of uncovered truckloads of toxins dumped at six other Danville areas, also not properly zoned or notified?
