By LYNETTE SOWELL
Cove Leader-Press
Church Mountain, a master-planned community with more than 1,000 homes, has been more than five years in the works.
On Tuesday evening, the Copperas Cove city council had a lengthy workshop during which the council, city administration, as well as the developers discussed the annexation plan for Church Mountain and addressed several areas that remained for discussion.
The property is 310.14 acres located west of Summers Road and along Lutheran Church Road.
This is presently just outside the Copperas Cove city limits, and the developers want to voluntarily annex that property to Copperas Cove. The subdivision would be built out in phases over 10-12 years.
WBW Single Development Group LLC and WBW Investment Solutions, LLC, the developers, have had more than 31 meetings with the city since March 31, 2020, as the developers and the City of Copperas Cove worked on an annexation and development agreement.
The developers most recently submitted three conceptual plan revisions, called Conceptual Phasing Plan 2, Conceptual Streetscape Plan 2, and Conceptual Master Plan No. 6.
On Tuesday, the council gave input on a number of remaining discussion points such as acquiring the certificates of convenience and necessity (CCN) for water to that subdivision – and who will pay for it, as well as minimum pavement widths, and that the developers pay for the construction of water and sewer systems, and also the completion of a traffic impact analysis during Phase 1.
Presently, the water rights in that area are with Kempner Water Supply (KWS). The WBW developers would like the water supply to be with Copperas Cove for the future homeowners. To do so, the CCN must be purchased from Kempner. The cost for CCN from Kempner has risen over the years and will continue to rise.
As it stood, the City of Copperas Cove did not want to reimburse the developer for the entire costs of the CCN, but would reimburse $173 per acre, or up to $53,654. The developer accepted but wanted to terminate if costs for the CCN exceeded $279 per acre, or up to $272,126 plus CCN acquisition costs.
Presently, KWS is charging more than that for CCN, with a price that could reach $900 per acre. However, the Public Utility Commission is also reviewing the CCN transfers and could lower that cost.
Ronan O’Connor, Vice President of WBW Development, spoke on their behalf.
“What we’re asking is for the City to pay for all the CCN transfer, and the reason behind that is we’re putting up front millions of dollars in infrastructure, that is ultimately going to be handed over to the city,” O’Connor said.
Additionally, the City will see revenue from that water and sewer infrastructure, as much as $56 million in utility fees for water, sewer, drainage, and solid waste over 20 years, an estimate which was provided as an example.
As far as the traffic impact analysis, or TIA, the city wanted the developer to have that study done as part of Phase 1 of the development and that it be done to TxDOT standards.
Over the growth of the development, the road will be studied to determine the impact of the increased traffic on Lutheran Church Road. Also, the Ashley Drive extension will increase traffic flow to F.M. 116 and lighten some of the traffic on Lutheran Church, it was pointed out.
The TIA is one of the unknowns that neither the City nor the developers know at this point.
“We’ve done traffic counts on Lutheran Church. They’re up about 1,200 trips a day,” said Public Works Director Scott Osburn. “Based on the existing pavement out there, it’s already at capacity. That stretch of Lutheran Church is at capacity at this point. So, as we’re talking about 12,000 additional trips, we need to make those connections, or the city needs to be prepared to give me approval to make some more improvements.”
Phase 1 will be approximately 200 homes, which adds up to an estimated 2,000 additional trips per day.
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