Residents fight back against potential zoning changes in St. Charles Parish

ST. CHARLES PARISH ( WGNO ) — Industrial plant LMTT owns 600 acres of land between the Davis Heights neighborhood and the Davis Pond Diversion in St. Charles Parish. The company is looking to rezone about 250 acres of that property.

LMTT plans to replace the current commercial and residential zones with 200 acres of a light manufacturing zone as well as a 500-foot-wide buffer zone separating the property and neighborhood.

“Part of the purpose of the rezoning effort is to clean up some of the residential and commercial zoning that isn’t what we do. We’re not residential or commercial developers. We look at more industrial development, and then being able to market that newly rezoned property to potential customers,” IMTT CFO Matthew Rosenboom said.

However, many residents living in the area fear that this potential zoning change could cause property value to drop.

“We already have enough to deal with in this parish with chemical plants and the rest they inherently give all of our neighborhoods. To add one and sandwich us between two huge chemical plants, it’s ridiculous,” concerned resident Patrick Cronin said.

With a fear of chemicals being stored at this light manufacturing zone in the future, residents say a “buffer zone” may not be enough to prevent health concerns as well.

“That’s 500 feet. That’s 150 yards. That’s literally throw a rock and hit it,” said concerned resident Steve Huffman.

However, when it comes to dangerous materials, LMTT insists that none will be stored in the light manufacturing zone.

“M1 doesn’t allow any hazardous products. Really, it would be infrastructure or adjacencies to support whatever the m-2 industrial development would be,” Rosenboom said.

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