Forest Pond HOA

We also attended the NCDOT meeting at Vance High School. We spoke with Jason Talley and numerous others as they were trying to pitch this to us as residents of Forest Pond as a positive improvement to our neighborhood. We don't think that a 130 ft. wide 4-lane divided highway that is classified by the NCDOT as a arterial thoroughfare will be a positive addition to our small quiet community. This road is going to be as large and wide as WT Harris Blvd. with a posted speed limit of 45 Mph; in reality cars will be traveling 55-65 Mph. We would like to know who to contact to find out info about Forest Pond as we just moved here in September. We would like to get a petition circulating within the community to oppose the entire project. This is the only subdivision affected by this projected road.  If you drive down the Forest Pond subdivision and go past Forest Pond Dr. and see a patch of trees/dirt/shrubs on both sides of the road with no houses in this spot....this is where the road will intersect Nevin road with a red light there. This space will be wider than it looks with a possibility of two houses taken out completely to fit the road and right of way width.  Who is the president of our HOA? What numbers do we call to find out how many houses are here, etc..??? In order to stop a DOT project of this size it will take every member of the community to participate in voicing their opposition to this needless mess that will create dust, traffic for years, decrease in propertyvalues and take the POND out of FOREST POND and turn it into a mosquito infested stinky swampland.   Now is the time to start this. The opposition to this project needs to be started now as they plan to have the right of way acquisition completed by 2009 which means they need to buy portions of residents properties for the road. Residents will have no choice on whether or not to sell their property to the DOT. If the resident does not wish to accept the DOT's offer for their property then their property will be condemened. The DOT will take the property and YOU WILL TAKE WHAT THEY ARE OFFERING YOU. Iminent domain will apply in this case. Typicall the "fair market value" offered by the DOT is 80% of the actual property value so you may be losing money on selling them half of your property/lot. They will only buy what they need. They do not buy all the house and yard and make you rich, they only buy what they need and you lose money. We were told they already have the funding for this project which means the money is already there, Their proposal is 14.5 million dollars for the project. With NC's budget problems we think that this 14.5 million dollars would be better spent on improving exsisting roads, education, etc., etc... Local media outlets would love to know about this project and ask why we had to take money out of our schools when we are building a waste of a road. We digress. Anyone with info would be greatly appreciated.