Beach landowners, officials spar over Burton Station property

VIRGINIA BEACH

To Willie Martin Sr., the swath of pasture on Barrs Road represents his family’s rich past and what he hopes will be a promising future for his children and grandchildren. But until last week, that future seemed in doubt.

On Tuesday, after months of delays, the City Council granted the family a permit to relocate their auto repair shop to Burton Station, where the Martins have owned land for 95 years. With that kind of history, the family never figured it would face a fight.

“I don’t see what the problem is with me being able to build on my property,” Martin said. “We’re not trying to make a lot of money. We’re mainly trying to keep the land in the family so we can create jobs for the offspring.”

But the Martins’ case and others before it illustrate the perpetual dilemma over a community with roots that reach back to freed slaves and an area that the city has long coveted for an office and industrial complex.

There’s no money to buy out property owners, so city officials cling to a study from 2003 that lays out a multimillion-dollar economic vision for Burton Station. The neighborhood is part of a 400-acre corridor wedged between Norfolk International Airport and Northampton Boulevard, with rail and interstate access nearby.

“Until we get some strategy for assembling the land, that’s why it’s sitting there today,” said Rob Hudome, a project manager in the city’s economic development office. “We can’t get anything done.”

Hudome’s staff has asked for $4 million in recent years to jump-start land buys in Burton Station. The council has never approved it.

“If we’re not going to buy those people’s property, we ought to let them go ahead and do these things,” Councilwoman Reba McClanan said. “At some point, we should either adopt the plan or move on.”

She may soon get her wish, as a renewed push for the area has begun.

In October, the City Council committed to a study of the neighborhood and the acreage around it as a “strategic growth area.” Jack Whitney, the city’s planning director, said a consultant will likely be hired soon, and a plan could be ready by spring.

The solution, however, is not as simple as just buying some property. One look at the color-coded map in Hudome’s office shows that. The 2-year-old tableau resembles an Etch A Sketch, with boxes of blue, green and yellow bounded by Burton Station and Baker roads, the airport and Northampton Boulevard.

Chunks of real estate are awkwardly divided by the 23 acres the city already owns, the 182 combined acres owned between Norfolk and the Norfolk Airport Authority and the remaining residents’ properties. The map also illustrates what the city had hoped to avoid – a hodgepodge of mismatched uses. “Staff feels that a piecemeal approach … falls short of the city’s ultimate goals,” reads one recent planning report.

Ken Scott, the airport’s executive director, agrees that an office park is an appropriate fit.

But the onus is on Virginia Beach to make a decision on the area’s future, he said.

“You keep it compatible, and we’ll work with you,” he said.

The impending announcement of the Lake Wright East Office Park, sandwiched between the regional headquarters of USAA, Interstate 64 and Northampton Boulevard, shows the viability of the corridor, said Roderick S. Woolard, Norfolk’s economic development director.

“As far as connectivity,” Woolard said, “there’s probably not a better location in all of Hampton Roads.”

Residents don’t see economic vitality, though. They see government pushing people out of homes built by their families’ hands.

“The bottom line is, they can’t do anything until they get all those people out of there,” said Brenda McMillian, whose 84-year-old mother has lived in Burton Station since 1958.

Once a close-knit neighborhood of about 100 black families, Burton Station now has about 20 remaining. Many residents moved out years ago after growing tired of waiting for public water and sewer service. The city has declined to provide it, partly to prevent more homes from being built.

When Virginia Beach began eyeing the area for a future industrial park, some residents accepted city relocation offers. Many of the holdouts say the city hasn’t offered fair prices for their properties, maintaining that values should be based on potential use of their land.

Without any formal plans, city officials said, they’ve had no other choice but to support, albeit reluctantly, development requests, including the Martins’ proposal.

In 2005, the city approved a second hotel near the community’s intersection with Northampton Boulevard. Last year, council members approved a 16,000-square-foot office/warehouse building on Burton Station Road. Like the Martins, Travis Baker, the former landowner, waited out months of delays before getting the go-ahead to sell.

The city wanted to purchase his land, but Baker said the offer fell far short of the $325,000 he received from a local businessman. Still, the process left Baker reeling and suspicious of city motives.

“I know people play the race card, and I don’t like it, but there are times when there are justifiable accusations,” Baker said.

Whitney understands that perception and said city officials will work to convince residents that land-use policy, not race, is what drives conversations about Burton Station.

“What we can do is try to demonstrate an open and honest process,” he said. “Make sure everybody has an opportunity to participate and try to come up with something that is the collective wisdom of a lot of people.”

Still, residents say, terse connections between the neighborhood and city leaders are steeped in history.

In 1962, the Princess Anne County Board of Supervisors rezoned much of the community for industrial uses without telling residents. It took 20 years before residential zoning for most of the land was restored.

Years of stops and starts on redevelopment plans followed, perpetuating residents’ frustrations.

“My feeling is they want the remaining homes to dilapidate so they can condemn them and then you have no choice but to accept what they give you, and it’s just not fair,” McMillian said.

City officials say they’re not working on the neighborhood’s demise, they’ve just been unable to agree on a plan. Those indecisions, said Joyce Martin, the matriarch of the Martin family, have held residents hostage for far too long. “It’s time people got some justice and consideration,” she said.

Richard Quinn, (757) 222-5119, richard.quinn@pilotonline.com

Susan E. White, (757) 222-5114, susan.white@pilotonline.com