Pender County planning board reviews draft 'Pender 2050' future land use map; residents raise concerns about Penderlea, flooding and zoning

The Pender County Planning Board met in a work session in June to review a draft future land use map for the county’s comprehensive-plan update, presented as the “Pender 2050” draft, and to take public comment on the map’s categories, implementation and likely effects.

Planning staff told the board the draft is in community engagement window No. 2 (running April 28–June 6) and described new future-land-use categories meant to concentrate growth in places such as Hampstead and Rocky Point while discouraging development in flood-prone and environmentally sensitive areas. Planning staff said the next steps are to collect public feedback, prepare a final draft for a planning-board recommendation in August, and then seek approval from the Coastal Resources Commission and the Pender County Board of Commissioners before the map is implemented.

Why it matters: the map is intended to guide where Pender County prefers different kinds of development over the coming decades — for example, where higher-density centers, neighborhood-scale services and industrial or heavy-commercial areas should be encouraged — and staff and board members said the map will inform future zoning and infrastructure decisions.

The presentation and board discussion Planning staff summarized the draft’s main components: revised future-land-use categories, an expanded industrial/economic-development area along U.S. Highway 421, focused growth areas around Hampstead and south of Highway 210, a new “rural crossroads” category to distinguish small highway intersections from higher-intensity neighborhood mixed-use centers, and a conservation toolkit that suggests…