LUMBERTON — Two major business trends in Robeson County, with profoundly negative effects for some residents, left county commissioners tied up in knots Monday.
Members of the Robeson County Board of Commissioners were told during their regular meeting that a private company has bought 19 mobile home parks in Robeson County, which resulted in the eviction of several hundred low-income residents.
The commissioners also were told that industrial chicken farms, some owned by out-of-state companies, are multiplying and causing problems for residents who live close to the houses and the fields where waste is spread.
Time Out Communities, a limited liability company headquartered in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., bought the trailer parks in the county, mostly in and around Lumberton. Existing tenants are being given the choice of buying their homes or moving.
The parks undergo major infrastructure upgrades, and new and rehabilitated mobile homes are sold to existing or new tenants. On the company’s website, mortgage payments generally begin at $700 a month.
A group of Latino families that live in Eaglewood Mobile Home Park on N.C. 41 East, appeared Monday at the county’s Board of Adjustments session to plead their case. They said they cannot afford to buy the homes, and the company has given them 30 days to vacate.
“This is bigger than Eaglewood,” Commissioner Jerry Stephens said. “I have five of these parks in my district. We need to have a discussion.”
Eviction notices went out in late September, the residents said, just days after Hurricane Florence hit.
County Planning Director Dixon Ivey said the company is making major infrastructure improvements to roads, street lights, water, sewer and electrical systems. Ivey said his role is to see that the mobile home parks are brought up to code.
Resident Alberto Quiroz said 50 to 60 families are being forced out of their homes at Eaglewood. Many have lived there for years.
“I don’t know what we can do,” Commissioner Roger Oxendine said. “There is no way the residents can find somewhere to go in 30 days.”
After two hurricanes, the rental market is very tight, Stephens said.
“It’s a problem that is affecting the entire county, but we don’t want to stop a company from doing business,” he said.
Time Out bought the mobile home parks in bunches over the past few months. The company now owns Abbott’s, Alamac, Bullock’s, Cadillac Ranch, Central Park #2 and 3, Dogwood, Eaglewood, Laiken Estates, Littlefield, Pine Run, Pleasant Hope, Schoolview, Taylor’s, Turner, Victoria Estates, Waynesville Plantation, West Estates and Wysteria Village mobile home parks.
“This is a major human relations issue,” Stephens said. “I hope we can work with the new owners.”
The commissioners got an update on regulations related to chicken farms in the North Carolina Farm Bill from Health Department Director Bill Smith and Ivey.
Unlike industrial hog farms, there are no zoning regulations governing the placement of chicken houses, Smith said. The industry is “self-regulated,” and owners voluntarily agree not to build within 1,000 feet of a residence, 1,500 feet of a school or church and 500 feet of a business.
County zoning rights date back to the late 1950s, but chicken houses were exempted by the state Legislature, leaving no recourse for landowners either near the houses or near the fields where manure is spread. Federal oversight is limited.
“There is a planned site in Raynham with 48 houses and a million chickens,” Smith said. “This is industrialized agriculture.”
Commission Chairman Raymond Cummings said many of the operations are now owned by out-of-state companies.
“This is going to be a problem shortly,” he said. “People come to us with this, and there is nothing we can do.”
“There is something really stinky happening,” Oxendine said. “There has got to be an angle to deal with this.”
Grady Brewington is one county resident with a chicken problem.
“They are building six chicken houses on U.S. 74 West near two churches,” Brewington said. “You are saying the county has no recourse?”
Local real estate agent Natalie Lewis said homes near chicken farms are difficult to sell.
“The people have lost their voice,” Lewis said. “These chicken houses kill real estate values.”
The General Assembly has set the rules for chicken houses and limited the ability of people affected by hog farms to sue. Cummings directed the planning director to write a letter to the Robeson County legislative delegation.
In other business, the county approved tax write-offs of more than $750,000 from 2008. The taxes are deemed noncollectable after being overdue for 10 years or more.
The county also heard a presentation from Marilyn Teague, a Lumberton woman who lost her daughter in a car accident. Teague asked the county’s support in her quest to get 1 million pints of blood donated, noting that blood donations kept her child alive long enough for her to see her before her death.
