By Becky Johnson & Andrew Kasper • Staff Writers

For two years now, Jackson County’s planning board has systematically combed over and rewritten some of its development rules once hailed as the most protective — yet restrictive — in the state.

Aimed at reining in the previously unbridled and laissez-fare construction industry, the regulations put on the books six years ago ushered in a new era of oversight and standards.

A grand and engaging vision for Western Carolina University’s Millennial campus as a place where academics, research, private industry and college life intersect has stalled almost since its inception seven years ago, but there might finally be signs of movement.

The $46 million Health and Human Sciences building slated to open in the fall has sparked interest from private developers who are exploring the idea of building a medical complex that would house doctor’s offices or health clinics. Indeed, that was the hoped-for affect of new health care teaching facility — to become the epicenter of a health care consortium where students and professors study and teach alongside private health care providers, medical device companies and specialized clinics.

WCU Chancellor David Belcher said that as the economy improves he believes development plans for the campus will move forward.

“By virtue of this facility I think that we are setting ourselves up as a hub for rural public health,” the chancellor said. “And what I want is medical services for our region.”

However, the economic climate to date has suppressed such growth, he said, because in turn “it’s a matter of them being able to court people willing to lease the space.”

Seven years ago, using $2.87 million in state bond money, WCU bought 344 acres of land across N.C. 107 from the main campus. The idea was to build the Millennial Campus, a showcase of how academics, research, private business and housing could be combined to enhance education. But so far, the campus is home to just the $46 million, 160,000-square-foot Health and Human Sciences building, set to open for classes this fall.

It will bring under one roof 11 programs from the College of Health and Human Sciences ranging from physical therapy to nursing, serving about 1,200 students, including 300 graduate students.

A new College of Education and Allied Professions building was next on the list but has been sidelined because of funding shortfalls in the state budget.

“We’ll need to re-examine and affirm that building or not — it has been four or five years since the decision was made,” Belcher said.

The chancellor said that he is certain that as the economy rebounds there inevitably will be growth taking place in the Cullowhee area. He said the university, for its part, would be forced to deal internally with such planning issues as transportation, sidewalks and the development of infrastructure that includes water, sewer and roads.

“And will there be residential halls there? Dining halls? It takes a lot of advance planning,” Belcher said of the future Millennial Campus.

Cullowhee poised for growth

Millennial Campus isn’t the only area likely to see growth in Cullowhee. The commercial districts around campus could attract new businesses to located following the recent passage of countywide alcohol sales.

Even without those two elements Cullowhee is already the fastest-growing township in Jackson County. The community grew 47 percent between 2000 and 2010, according to the latest U.S. Census.

The prospect of unbridled growth has some in the Cullowhee community calling for the county to start some sort of land-use planning process. Meetings are being held in Cullowhee under the auspices of the Cullowhee Revitalization Endeavor (CuRvE), a community group dedicated to revitalizing and beautifying Cullowhee.

“My hope is that the people of the Cullowhee community will come together and develop a plan for the future of Cullowhee that takes advantage of the natural resources and attributes of the area,” said Mary Jean Herzog, the chair of CuRvE.

Herzog sent a letter to county commissioners asking they consider instituting planning efforts and that they make the revitalization of old Cullowhee a priority.

“As Cullowhee continues to grow, CuRvE is concerned about the lack of planning that has a negative impact on ‘Old Cullowhee,’” Herzog wrote in the letter. “If you walk along Old Cullowhee Road, you can see how this uncontrolled development looks. There are attractive, new houses on the river and on the opposite side of Old Cullowhee Road that add to the beauty of the area … But there are significant sections of disrepair and deterioration that drag down these efforts to beautify and revitalize.”

CuRvE has not heard back from county leaders, but Jackson County Planner Gerald Green is now working with members of that group and other Cullowhee residents at commissioners’ request. The group’s members are studying community-based zoning as a possibility for the area, though it would require gathering the signatures of one-third of the property owners who would be in the planning district. The signatures are a county requirement before commissioners will consider instituting community-based zoning.

Per state law, the designated zoning area would have to be at least 640 acres and be made up of at least 10 separate tracts of land.

Robin Lang, a business owner in Cullowhee and member of CuRvE, said she believes “now is the time to act” when it comes to planning Cullowhee’s future..

“I think the alcohol referendum is waking a lot of people up,” Lang said. “You have to manage growth or it’s going to be a mess. We’ve got to be smart and savvy about it.”

Lang is an advocate for a planning board or council, similar in scope to one now operating in Cashiers, to oversee Cullowhee.

Cashiers in 2003 was divided into two districts, a “village central” and a general commercial zone. In addition, Jackson County commissioners created a five-member Cashiers Area Community Planning Council to review amendments to the zoning plan and to make recommendations to the county planning board. The council also votes on requests for conditional uses and variances in Cashiers.

Like the CuRvE members, Belcher, too, believes growth in the Cullowhee community will present challenges in coming days.

“I don’t want to see it destroyed,” he said. “Our collective challenge is how we as a region and as a community deal with economic development.”

As an aggressive spring thunderstorm brewed over Waynesville this March, causing power outages around town, Erika Stansbury received a frantic call from her elderly in-laws who had lost power at their gated apartment complex.

“Grandma’s on oxygen, and she gets very anxious,” Stansbury said. Her mother-in-law gets nervous her oxygen supply will run out if the power stays off too long.

Stansbury and her husband drove across town to pick up the grandparents and let them stay at their home, which still had power. But, when they reached the gated apartment complex on South Main Street, the gate wouldn’t open. No code, no amount of force or no magic words would pry the electric-powered hinges from their closed position.

The problem is not just this single gated community.

Dozens of gated communities pepper the mountainsides of Western North Carolina. Getting through those gates in an emergency has presented a host of problems for the medics, volunteer firemen and law enforcement officers charged with protecting public safety in Haywood, Jackson, Macon and Swain counties.

“It’s a problem. There is no doubt about it,” said Randy Dillard, chief of the Cashiers-Glenville Volunteer Fire Department. “About everywhere we go, we have to deal with one.”

To help mitigate the problem, Haywood and Macon counties have passed standards within the past two years requiring new developments to install gates with fail-safes that allow emergency service officials to gain entry without an access code.

“It’s a life-safety issue,” said Haywood County Manager Marty Stamey, who formerly served as the county’s emergency service director.

However, older communities, like the one Stansbury’s in-laws live in, were built prior to the rule. As with most gated communities, the Stansburys could go around the gate and get inside on foot, but that would mean walking the elderly couple back out through the storm to the van, which they ruled  out.

“We could get to grandma, but we had no way to get her to us,” Stansbury said.

So, Stansbury called the emergency maintenance number for the apartments. The man who answered was more than an hour away and did not seem too excited to help, she said. The other maintenance employee was on vacation.

“There wasn’t anyone on-site,” she said.

When her first option failed, Stansbury called the Haywood County Sheriff’s non-emergency number.

A sheriff’s deputy drove to the scene but admitted that he did not know how to open the gate without going to extreme measures such as taking the gate off its hinges or ripping it open — something that emergency services would consider if the blocked path meant the difference between life and death.

Luckily, power was restored as the Stansbury’s discussed the problem with the deputy.

“The power came on. But, we had no way of knowing (that it would),” Stansbury said.

The following day, Stansbury took her concerns to the county fire marshal who said he would call and strongly suggest that the owner of the apartment complex exchange the current gate for a newer model, which includes several fail-safes. But, the fire marshal cannot force the owner to replace it, and to the best of her knowledge, Stansbury said the gate has yet to be changed.

“It upset me. That’s for sure,” Stansbury said.

Bust ‘em down

Ideally, the county’s dispatch office maintains a list of gate codes and can give fire, police or emergency medical services officials the accurate code.

“Dispatch, 99 percent of the time, has the gate code,” said Jimmy Teem, the Macon County Fire Marshal. “We have not had any really big issues with that yet.”

Haywood County’s 911 center likewise keeps a record of all the gate codes in the county. Most communities periodically change their gate codes for security reasons, so county dispatch has the hassle of constantly updating its system with the latest codes for dozens of gated subdivisions. But it seems to work.

“Most are good about calling and letting us know (about code changes),” said Chanda Morgan, 911 supervisor for Haywood County. “We’ve not had any problems getting in.”

Indeed, many communities — if they are diligent about reporting gate code changes to dispatch — never see a hitch.

“To my knowledge, they never had a problem getting in,” said George Escaravage, a resident of The Sanctuary in Waynesville.

Their gates are also equipped with modern fail-safes: they open automatically in a power outage and have a special audio-trigger mechanism that recognizes the sirens of emergency service vehicles.

Other places aren’t so lucky. Cashiers has one of the highest concentrations of gated communities in the area, and emergency services rarely goes a day without getting a call from within a gated community.

“We probably have more gated communities than anywhere in Western North Carolina,” said Cashiers Fire Chief Randy Dillard. “There is no telling how many gates we have.”

Like other counties, Jackson County tries to keep an accurate list of gate codes but relies on homeowners’ associations to provide them.

“Most people are very, very willing to work with us,” Dillard said.

The Cashiers-Glenville volunteer firefighters usually keep a list of codes stored in their personal phones as well. They are sometimes driving to a fire in their own vehicles rather than first going to the fire station and riding in the fire truck.

Many of the volunteers also work in the construction industry, and luckily already know the codes because they are building a house in a particular gated community.

Still, they occasionally encounter a gate they don’t have the code for, and dispatchers have to track down a resident of the community to get a code.

“They change the code, and we don’t know the code,” said Todd Dillard, director of Jackson County’s Emergency Management Office.

In rare cases, the emergency service officers must take the gate off its hinges.

“Usually, we can pull the pins on them,” Randy Dillard said.

Randy Dillard said he did not remember a time when the fire department has to destroy a gate to gain access — such as busting through it with a truck. And, usually, there is time to find out the correct code.

“It’s hard to justify tearing down a $10,000 gate if its not life threatening,” Randy Dillard said.

Unlike Haywood and Macon, Jackson County does not have any standards on its books requiring gates to be equipped with fail-safes, to the chagrin of some.

“Unfortunately, we do not have an ordinance,” said Todd Dillard.

Todd Dillard said that Cashiers is “where we have most of our problems.”

“There have been some delays. Luckily, there has been no loss of life,” Todd Dillard said.

Bold that message

Neighboring Highlands — which also has a high concentration of gated communities and lies across the county line in Macon — has not had as many problems. Highlands is an actual town, with a paid police department, and officers keep an updated list of codes provided by homeowner’s associations.

“All of our gated communities, we have gone and talked to the people in charge of those gates,” said Capt. R.L. Forester of Highlands Police. “So far, we have not had an issues where we could not get into any gated community.”

The police also patrol many of Highlands’ gated communities on a regular basis so they already know the codes. However, if there were a major gate malfunction during a crisis, the police would waste little time.

“We would crash the gate and go in,” Forester said.

Swain County does not have any sort of ordinance or standards either that require gated communities to install fail-safes, but it rarely has troubles.

“When we know there is gates, we ask the homeowners’ association to give us an updated gate code,” said David Breedlove, director of Swain County’s Emergency Services.

The codes are linked in the emergency service’s database of addresses and phone numbers so that it pops up when a resident in a gated community calls. Dispatch then relays the gate code to the right emergency officials as they are en route. Homeowners’ associations are good about keeping dispatch abreast of any changes to their access codes, Breedlove said.

Indeed, that’s the best way to avoid problems: informing their county dispatch of any changes to the code to ensure that when a fire truck or ambulance rolls up to the gate, there won’t be any obstacles standing between them and those who need help.

“If they would keep the 911 center updated … that would be the biggest thing. That would be the words that I would say put in bold,” said Todd Dillard.

Back-up plan

A back-up fail-safe many gates now have is an audio activation that recognizes a specific siren call of ambulances and fire trucks to prompt some gates to open. Some of the newer models even allow emergency vehicles without sirens to use their dispatch radios to unlock a gate.

“The radio-controlled are the best way to go because they get all the first responders,” said Randy Dillard, whose fellow volunteer firefighters will arrive on a scene in their personal vehicle.

Other gates have a Knox-Box that sits near the entry. Emergency officials have a key to the box, which holds a master key to the community.

But, if these measures fail or a gate doesn’t have them, emergency management employees assured people that they won’t let a little thing like a gate stand in their way during an urgent situation.

“If they can’t get in the gate and they’ve got a call, they are bound to get in there,” said Teem, the Macon County Fire Marshal. “They will assess the situation (and) they would take the appropriate action — cut a lock, pull it down or whatever.”

Mike Forbis worked for the state fire department for 10 years before recently becoming the fire marshal in Jackson County but would respond to fire alarms in the county during that time. He would sometimes ran into locked gates.

“That is just par for the course for emergency services,” Forbis said.

Several years ago, firefighters had to sit outside the gate of a community where a brushfire was burning until dispatch could find a resident to let them in.

“We had been called to a fire, and when we got there, the front gate was locked,” Forbis said. “And, none of the codes worked.”

It was late fall or wintertime, Forbis recalled, and many of the second-home owners who lived in the subdivision had already left for the season. The dispatcher had to call half a dozen houses before someone answered and opened the gate.

“You had to keep dialing numbers to get somebody to answer,” Forbis said.