Advance Knox is almost to the finish line, but will Farragut halt its momentum?

Advance Knox, an ambitious plan that would guide the county's growth over the next 20 years, has passed several tests, but could Farragut play the spoiler?

Organizers are confident the Farragut Board of Mayor and Aldermen will approve the plan later this month and fall in line with the Knox County Commission and Knoxville City Council.

But voters in Farragut signaled recently that confidence is an assumption, not a guarantee. In the March 5 primary election, they chose Angela Russell as the Republican nominee for Knox County Commission District 5. Russell ran her campaign on an anti-development platform and is unhappy with Advance Knox.

Generally, the Farragut Board of Mayor and Aldermen supports residential and business development.

The board will vote March 28 on the Growth Policy Plan, the portion of Advance Knox that gives a broad sense of which parts of the county are primed for development and which should be left rural. It also includes rules for how much can be built, including reducing the number of homes allowed per acre from three to two in rural zones.

Knox County is operating under a two-decades-old plan and its growth trajectory is untenable. Projections are for more far-west sprawl and congested roads that could cost the county an extra $2 million a year to maintain, according to Knox County Mayor Glenn Jacobs and other county officials.

The new plan is intended to make development in the county less lopsided by condensing growth in different areas that can accommodate development. It's estimated the new plan would bring the county a nearly $5 million annual surplus from efficiencies.

That $5 million surplus could go to pay for road maintenance and schools and help keep property taxes low.

The Advance Knox initiative was started in November 2021.

What would happen if Farragut denied the plan?

Jacobs told Knox News in a statement he's confident Farragut leaders will approve the plan.

“We have a great working relationship with Farragut leaders, and they played a crucial role assisting us and providing us input to help craft the plan," he wrote. "They are obviously major stakeholders, and provided some great suggestions that we were able to work into the proposal."

If Farragut shoots down the plan, Jacobs could reconvene the Growth Policy Coordinating Committee to rework it, but he has previously said he wouldn't do that.

Jacobs said it would be premature to speculate what would happen if the plan is voted down, and wrote, "With all due respect, right now that would be a question for another day.”

Knox News asked Jacobs twice why he would not reconvene the committee and once if that stance was intended to put pressure on the bodies to approve the plan. Knox News was given the same response each time:

"I am confident that Farragut is going to pass the plan. They have been at the table throughout the entire process," Jacobs said. "That is the most important thing at this point. Everything else is speculation."

If Advance Knox fails, any reworked plan would need approval by the Knox County Commission, Knoxville City Council and Farragut Board of Mayor and Aldermen.

The Knox County Commission will vote on another part of the plan, the Future Land Use Map, at its April meeting. The map specifies which development types - including town centers, commercial space, residential subdivisions - can be built on which tracts of land.

The commission already has approved the growth policy plan on the condition it also approves the Future Land Use Map, which has already been approved by the Knoxville-Knox County Planning Commission.

Essentially. if the county votes down the Future Land Use Map, it could spoil Advance Knox.

Could Farragut's vote be overturned?

Yes.

No matter which way the Farragut Board of Mayor and Aldermen votes, the decision could be appealed in chancery court, according to Tennessee state code.

An appeal would be heard without a jury and the petitioner would have the burden of proving the decision was incorrect. A petitioner has 60 days to appeal after the decision of Farragut or the other bodies that voted on the plan.

Could Farragut kill Advance Knox?

Farragut leaders don't seem inclined to kill the plan. Knox News asked Farragut Board of Mayor and Aldermen members about their outlook ahead of the vote later this month.

Knox News posed questions to Vice Mayor Louise Povlin and Aldermen Scott Meyer, Drew Burnette and David White about their position on Advance Knox, but all declined to comment on the upcoming vote.

Mayor Ron Williams said that while Advance Knox is a priority for Jacobs and his staff, it's not front and center for him.

"There's more things going on in our town than (Advance Knox) ... I'm worried about what's going on in my town," he said.

Specifically, he's more concerned about incoming traffic from neighboring Loudon County. It's grown 1.61% annually since 2019, according to data from the University of Tennessee at Knoxville Boyd Center for Business and Economic Research. Loudon County is expected to have a population of nearly 69,500 people by 2045, according to the Boyd Center. That’s 14,500 more people than in 2020.

Williams told Knox News that Farragut isn't an "anti-development" town. He said his constituents are excited about new projects coming into the area, such as the Farragut Town Center, which includes a Chase Bank and Tupelo Honey restaurant. Farragut leaders are seeking input on a vision plan for the town center.

"I listened to all the farmers that felt threatened by the mapping," Williams said. "There's a tremendous amount of people in the Choto area, including one particular candidate for commission, and that's their business. Not mine."

Do 5th District Knox County Commission primary results spell trouble for future development?

Residents of the commission's 5th District - the far-west portion that covers the far-west communities of Farragut and Concord - have shown how they feel about development, and it doesn't look positive. Russell won the Republican Party's nomination in the March 5 five-way primary with nearly 48% of the vote.

If Russell wins the general election in August, her hostility to development could threaten future projects throughout the whole county.

Russell, who lives outside the town of Farragut, ran her campaign on the idea that development in the county needs to be stopped, or at least slowed. She gained recognition for her work opposing Choto Landing, a development that would have brought 56 leased townhomes to 12320 Northshore Drive for households earning less than $70,000 a year.

She told Knox News the reason she wants to serve on the commission is because of uncontrolled, irresponsible development.

"Instead of accelerating development, we need to pull back on it for a period of time to allow for the infrastructure to be done first," Russell told Knox News in a candidate interview before the primary.

Even though Russell doesn't live in Farragut and her anti-development activism is rooted outside the town, three-fourths of Farragut's precincts voted for her over four primary opponents.

She told Knox News she hasn't had much time to look over the plan due to traveling and running a campaign, and she isn't sure exactly how it would impact Farragut. She's planning on sitting down with Povlin before the Farragut vote to talk more. She said she went to public input meetings and watched a few of the Growth Policy Committee meetings.

She said overall, voters she talked to didn't feel like they knew what was going on with the plan.

"It seemed like it was just such a huge overview plan rather than knowing specifics ... people want to know what they're buying into, either approving or not approving," Russell said. "There was just too much that was still left to be defined."

No public input meetings were held in District 5 or Farragut, according to the Advance Knox website. Four virtual input meetings were held between March 29, 2022, and April 6, 2023. Public Input sessions were held from Feb. 24, 2022, to Jan. 10, 2024, when Jacobs recommended the plan.

You can find where your property lies on the Future Land Use Plan with Advance Knox's interactive map at advanceknox.org. Click on the "interactive map" button.

"I definitely would not have approved it," Russell said. "If I were doing as a straight up or down vote, I would not."

Russell's Democratic opponent in the Aug. 1 general election, S. Arthur Moore, holds a more favorable view.

"The hope for (Advance Knox) is that implementation of Advance Knox will lead to less pressure on Farragut," he told Knox News in an email. "This would stabilize our housing prices so that our teachers, nurses and police officers can afford to live in the communities they serve."

But Moore has concerns.

"What most concerns me is our approach to the county’s infrastructure. Knox County is already struggling with traffic congestion and decaying roads," We must balance our future development with our county’s current needs."

According to the proposed Future Land Use Map, the land northwest of Farragut is farmland, while much of the other surrounding land in Knox County is suburban. That map doesn't impact land within Farragut limits.

"The people of Farragut and Concord want to ensure we preserve the character of our unique corner of Knox County, and that we’re always Farragut and not simply a suburb of Knoxville," Moore said.

"We don’t want to be caught up in urban sprawl or in the worsening traffic that plagues our county. People in Farragut aren’t anti-development. They believe Knox County should not be one-size-fits-all when it comes to type, size and composition of those developments."

At a Knox County Commission meeting March 18, 9th District Commissioner Carson Dailey touted improvements in the Northshore and Choto area.

"(Choto residents) are not on an island out there. Sometimes they think they're on an island and they want things their way," Dailey said. "To get things their way, you've got to have growth."

He took the opportunity to urge Farragut leaders to pass Advance Knox.

5th District Commissioner John Schoonmaker voted in favor of Advance Knox

Knox County Commissioners already approved part of Advance Knox. District 5 Commissioner John Schoonmaker, who voted in favor, told Knox News he hadn't heard that Farragut aldermen would oppose the plan but acknowledged he hadn't outright asked them all. He touted provisions he was able to add to Advance Knox that make it more attractive to his district.

"I was able to work with Mayor Jacobs and we've allocated $2 million to improve Northshore between the two roundabouts (near Choto) and that's going to help with traffic flow," he said.

"Because Farragut has their own rules and their own comprehensive land use plan, (Advance Knox is) not going to affect them. What's going to affect them is how the Choto area is developed out as far as if traffic will come (into the town of Farragut)."

Silas Sloan is the growth and development reporter. Email silas.sloan@knoxnews.com. Twitter @silasloan. Instagram @knox.growth.

Allie Feinberg reports on politics for Knox News. Email her: allie.feinberg@knoxnews.com and follow her on X, formerly known as Twitter, @alliefeinberg.

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This article originally appeared on Knoxville News Sentinel: 'A question for another day'; Could Farragut spoil Advance Knox?