Signed, Sealed – and Conflicting

Moore County provided one density schedule, later relied on another, and still has not completed Gateway’s appeal

#Opinion • 3:44 a.m. July 23, 2026

“Handing them the wrong information is our mistake.”

Metro Council member Peggy Sue Blackburn said that during the July 21 Board of Zoning Appeals meeting.

Then she made the point even more plainly: “It’s not their mistake,” Blackburn said. “The county was inaccurate.”

That should be the starting point for any honest discussion of Gateway and its long-running effort to build housing behind the Moore County Co-Op.

Not whether you like apartments. Not whether you would prefer 20 homes, 42 homes, or no homes at all.

Start with the county’s records – and one council member’s public acknowledgment that Gateway was given inaccurate information.

I have sat through these meetings. I have listened to the questions, watched the votes, read the court filings, and tried to follow each new explanation as it came.

This stopped being a normal zoning disagreement a long time ago.

Gateway received written confirmation that apartments were allowed on the property. The Metro Council later changed the ordinance. Gateway came back with townhomes. Planning and Zoning interpreted the county’s townhouse definition differently, but the BZA voted that Gateway’s units met the written definition.

The project still did not move forward.

Each time Gateway gets close to an answer, another question seems to take its place.

That is not how a reliable process is supposed to work.

Gateway relied on what it was told

Gateway did not choose property where the written zoning rules clearly prohibited its proposal and then demand an exception.

Before moving forward, the company received a letter signed by Mayor Sloan Stewart stating that apartments were permitted under the zoning then in place.

Metro Utilities confirmed that water and sewer service were available. Duck River Electric confirmed electrical service.

Gateway President Josh Mandell said THDA’s scoring system ranked Moore County as the state’s highest-scoring rural county when the company began looking for a project. Gateway secured control of the Main Street property, confirmed zoning and utility service, applied for federal Low-Income Housing Tax Credits, and received the award.

It did the work developers are expected to do before spending millions of dollars.

Then the ordinance changed

The Metro Council later removed apartments from R-1 residential zoning and placed them in C-1 commercial zoning.

The council had the authority to amend the zoning code. Ordinances are not frozen forever, and elected officials have the right to reconsider what kinds of development belong in each district.

But the change came after the mayor had provided written confirmation, Gateway had spent money preparing its application, and THDA had awarded tax credits tied to the site.

When Blackburn later tried to send the matter back to Planning and Zoning, no one seconded her motion.

Gateway had relied on what it was given, moved forward, and watched the rules change.

The first plan never received a full review

Gateway initially tried to proceed with the apartment development it had been told was permitted.

That plan never received a complete public review on its merits.

Officials cited a filing deadline and Gateway’s lawsuit against Moore County, although the application had been submitted before the suit was filed. In the public explanations I heard, no official identified a zoning provision requiring the review to stop because Gateway had gone to court.

Gateway then redesigned the project as 42 attached townhomes, a residential use that remained permitted in R-1.

Instead of resolving the dispute, the redesign created another one.

Then came the townhome plan

Even getting the new application before Planning and Zoning became a struggle.

The dispute eventually centered on how Moore County’s written townhouse definition applied to Gateway’s design.

Gateway said the plan met the definition printed in the zoning ordinance. Planning and Zoning read that language differently and denied the plan. Gateway appealed.

On July 21, the BZA voted 3-1 that Gateway’s proposed units met Moore County’s written definition of townhouses. Blackburn, Chairman Keith Moses, and Patrick Maynard voted yes. Houston Lindsey voted no. Board member Josh Cook was absent.

The board then considered whether to overturn Planning and Zoning’s denial.

Blackburn and Moses voted to overturn it. Lindsey and Maynard voted against it.

The 2-2 tie left the appeal unfinished. The board tabled the matter until a special-called meeting could be scheduled.

Gateway went home without a final decision – again.

The county’s own records conflict

The most troubling part of the July 21 hearing was not the tie vote. It was watching the county’s paperwork come apart in public.

Gateway attorney Madison Haynes brought the zoning book the company purchased from Moore County. She also brought ordinance records from the county clerk’s office.

County Attorney Bill Rieder had sent Gateway the same density language in two February emails after the company asked what standards applied in R-1.

The zoning book said one thing. The stamped R-1 record said the same thing. The language Rieder supplied matched those records.

Gateway designed its townhome plan around that schedule.

The county later relied on a different record – a document that was signed but not stamped – to argue that the property could support only about half of Gateway’s proposed units.

During the BZA hearing, Rieder said the signed but unstamped document reflected the council’s wishes. He called the discrepancy a clerical error and pointed to Metro Council and Planning and Zoning minutes as evidence of what officials intended to approve.

That explanation identifies the version the county prefers.

It does not, by itself, establish which text was lawfully enacted or explain why the signed but unstamped record should legally control over the stamped version, the zoning book, and the language the county attorney previously supplied.

Intent does not erase conflicting signed records.

A landowner should not have to buy a zoning book from the county, compare it with signed records in the clerk’s office, check both against emails from the county attorney, and then dig through months-old meeting minutes to find out which version the county plans to enforce.

The law should not be a scavenger hunt.

When government gives someone inaccurate information, it cannot simply place the consequences on the person who relied on it.

Blackburn also said the council discussion she remembered concerned apartment complexes. “I didn’t vote on a townhome,” she said.

The county has identified the record it prefers: the signed but unstamped document Rieder said reflected the council’s wishes.

It should explain how the conflicting documents were created, why that version legally controls over the stamped record, and what steps it will take to correct the zoning code going forward.

What it cannot fairly do is hand an applicant one density schedule and reject the plan under another without first explaining the legal basis for treating the signed but unstamped record as controlling.

Two signed documents, two different answers

The county’s records contain two signed documents purporting to amend the same R-1 land-area provision.

Both state that the Planning Commission recommended the change on May 6, 2025. Both list April 21 as the first-reading date, May 19 as the public-hearing date, and Aug. 18 as the second-reading date. Both carry the signatures of the recording secretary and Mayor Stewart.

One bears the county stamp. The version Rieder said reflected the council’s wishes is signed but unstamped.

Describing May 19 only as the public-hearing date also leaves out an important part of the county’s position. In its answer to Gateway’s lawsuit, the county says the April 21 Metro Council agenda was made publicly available more than 48 hours before the meeting. It says the ordinance was considered on first reading in April but was not enacted then.

According to the county, the ordinance was adopted on second reading at the May 19 council meeting after a properly noticed public hearing. The county says that hearing began at 6:20 p.m. and that the regular council meeting convened at 6:30, with the ordinance adopted afterward.

That creates a problem in the legislative history.

The signed documents label May 19 as the public-hearing date and Aug. 18 as the second-reading date. But after reviewing video from the April, May, and August meetings, I heard the ordinance described as being on second reading in May – and again in August.

That leaves two meetings publicly described as the second reading, while the county’s court filing says the ordinance was enacted in May.

And the two signed documents do not contain the same density standards.

The signed but unstamped version requires 15,000 square feet for one unit, 30,000 for two, 35,000 for three, and 50,000 for four. It then says developments with “more than 5 units” require 10,000 square feet per unit and refers to a 25-unit cap and a six-acre minimum.

The stamped version cuts those figures roughly in half: 7,500 square feet for one unit, 15,000 for two, 17,500 for three, and 25,000 for four, followed by an additional 5,000 square feet per unit for developments with “4 or more units.”

Under the stamped schedule – the same language appearing in the zoning book and supplied by Rieder – Gateway calculates that 42 units require 215,000 square feet and fit on its approximately 223,550-square-foot tract.

Using the signed but unstamped schedule, the county calculates that 21 units fit.

But that version contains its own problems.

The phrase “more than 5 units” leaves the requirement for a fifth unit unclear. The same document says “Total 25 units with minimum lot size of 6 acres,” although Gateway’s tract contains 5.132 acres.

No six-acre minimum was mentioned during the April, May, or August council discussions.

That raises another question: How did language never discussed during those meetings appear in one of the signed records?

The math is not especially complicated. The recordkeeping is.

The county has two signed documents carrying the same legislative dates and official signatures but producing sharply different answers for Gateway’s property.

Notice is at the heart of the lawsuit

The dispute over how the ordinance moved from April to May and then August is not a side issue. It is at the heart of the lawsuit Gateway filed in November 2025.

Gateway contends the county failed to provide the legally required public notice and a meaningful hearing before changing the zoning rules that affected its project.

The county denies those allegations.

In its answer, the county says notice of the May 19 public hearing and council meeting was “published in the April 23 edition of The Lynchburg Times, a local newspaper of general circulation.”

That claim is central to the case. Posting a council agenda more than 48 hours before a meeting is not the same thing as publishing the specific notice required before a zoning amendment is adopted.

Tennessee law also requires newspapers publishing covered legal notices to post them on their own websites and on the statewide public-notice repository.

The Times operates as a digital news outlet rather than a printed newspaper. That raises a central legal question: whether publication through that outlet satisfied Tennessee’s requirement that zoning notice appear in an official county newspaper or a newspaper of general circulation.

During that period, the Moore County Observer and Moore County News were the county’s local printed newspapers. Neither published a notice of the zoning amendment. A search of the statewide public-notice repository found no corresponding notice of the zoning amendment.

The county’s position is that it gave proper notice and held the required hearing before adopting the ordinance May 19.

Gateway’s position is that publication through a digital outlet did not satisfy the statutory requirement and that the public was not given the legally required notice or a meaningful opportunity to respond before the rules changed.

Among the questions raised by the lawsuit are whether the county provided the notice required by law and whether the zoning change was validly enacted.

Chancellor J.B. Cox later denied Gateway’s motion for judgment on the pleadings, finding that factual disputes prevented a decision at that stage.

The ruling did not resolve whether the required notice was provided or whether the zoning change was validly enacted. Those questions remain before the court.

Litigation alone, however, does not explain why the county could not complete its administrative review of Gateway’s separately submitted townhome application or issue a final decision.

Unless a court order or an identified zoning provision prevented the county from proceeding, the public deserved a completed review and a clear vote.

Legitimate questions still deserve answers

There are serious questions to ask about Gateway’s proposal.

What would 42 homes mean for traffic on Main Street? Can the water system provide the fire flow required for a development of that size? How would drainage and stormwater be handled? Would the entrance meet state requirements? Could the schools absorb additional students?

Those questions belong in a responsible review. The county has the right and obligation to examine fire protection, traffic, drainage, school enrollment, density, setbacks, and road access.

The testimony so far has not established that ordinary water service or school enrollment would prevent the project.

Metro Utilities Manager Ronnie Cunningham said water was not a factor. Interim Fire Chief Hunter Case said an engineering review would be needed to determine the required fire flow and whether the system could provide it while meeting daily demand.

That is a legitimate issue. It is not a finding that the system cannot support the development.

Director of Schools Chad Moorehead said the system enrolled about 865 students and gained 44 during the 2025-26 school year. Those figures provide context. They do not establish that Gateway would overwhelm the schools.

TDOT will decide whether the Main Street entrance qualifies for a state driveway permit. Engineers can evaluate fire flow, drainage, and stormwater.

Those reviews may require Gateway to change its design, perform more work, or spend more money. They could uncover a valid reason to deny part of the proposal.

What they cannot justify is applying one set of written rules when the plan is prepared and another when the vote is taken.

This reaches beyond Gateway

People cannot reliably follow the rules when the government’s signed documents conflict, the public meetings do not explain how those differences entered the record, and the adequacy of the legal notice remains unresolved.

Gateway does not have an automatic right to build whatever it wants. The county may ultimately have a lawful reason to deny the project.

An engineer could identify a problem Gateway cannot solve. TDOT could reject the driveway. The ordinance determined to be legally controlling could impose a lower density.

But applicants have the right to know which rules apply.

The next person caught in a process like this may be a local landowner dividing family property, a business owner trying to expand, or a homeowner seeking a permit or variance.

That person may not have Gateway’s attorneys, resources, or patience.

Residents can disagree about whether 42 homes belong on this property. That is why plans are reviewed, hearings are held, and boards vote.

The problem is not that the county has failed to identify which record it prefers. Rieder did that when he said the signed but unstamped document reflected the council’s wishes.

The problem is that the preferred version conflicts with the stamped record, the zoning book, and the language the county previously supplied.

Finish the process

Finish the BZA hearing with a full board if possible.

The board should decide Gateway’s appeal under the ordinance the county maintains is legally controlling and take a final vote.

Gateway may eventually build 42 homes, build fewer, or never turn a shovel of dirt. Courts, boards, engineers, TDOT, utilities, and state agencies will each decide part of that.

The county’s larger obligation is already clear.

People must be able to trust that their government will provide the notice required by law, preserve an accurate legislative record, explain the rules governing an application, and apply those rules consistently.

When government gets something wrong, it should correct the record rather than transfer the consequences to the person who relied on it.

Gateway may not be entitled to an approval, but it is entitled to an answer.

So is the public.