Campbell supervisors approve rezoning at Seneca Commerce Park after heated public hearing over countywide park

Campbell County supervisors voted to rezone 36.186 acres of county-owned land at the end of Ewing Drive from agricultural to heavy industrial, approving a request that county staff said is intended to make Seneca Commerce Park eligible for state and federal site-development grants.

The item prompted a lengthy public hearing in which dozens of residents, youth coaches and community groups urged the board not to convert the larger, 136-acre stretch into industrial zoning and to preserve it as a countywide park instead. "I would like to speak against the proposed zoning request and in favor of a county wide park located in the current Seneca Industrial Complex," said Kristen Clay of Altavista during the public comment period.

The county's director of economic development, Nina Rezai, said the rezoning request is intended to unlock specific grant opportunities aimed at making sites "market ready" for employers. "The purpose of our rezoning request has just been in keeping with our history of grant funding, development taking place in the park. We're in need of more acreage in order to be eligible," Rezai told the board. She and staff said some programs — notably the Virginia Business Ready Sites program — require a contiguous block of roughly 50 acres to qualify and…